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the True Dharma Eye Treasury Shobogenzo

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The True Dharma-eye Treasury (Taisho No. 2582) is the masterwork of the thirteenth-century Zen master Eihei Dogen, founder of the Soto sect of Japanese Zen Buddhism. This reprint edition presents Volume 1 of the exemplary translation by Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross of the complete ninety-five-chapter edition of the Shobogenzo, compiled by the Zen master Hangyo Kozen in the late seventeenth century.
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THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY SHOBOGENZO VOLUME

dBET PDF Version All Rights Reserved© 2017

 

BDK English Tripiṭaka Series

THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY SHOBOGENZO Volume I

(Taishō Volume 82, Number 2582)

Translated from the Japanese by

Gudo Wafu NishijimaChodo Crossand

BDK America, Inc.2007

Copyright of the Original Edition © 1994–1999 Gudo Nishijima and Chodo Cross

Gudo Nishijima was born in Yokohama, Japan, in 1919, and graduated from Tokyoreceived until the master’s death in 1965. During this time he combined the dailyUniversity in 1946. In 1940 he first met Master Kōdō Sawaki, whose teaching heShōbōgenzō with a career at the Japanese Ministry practice of zazen and study of the of Finance and at a securities financing company. In 1973 he became a priest underNishijima became a consultant to the Ida Ryogokudo company, and in 1987 estab-the late Master Renpo Niwa, and in 1977 he received transmission of the Dharmafrom Master Niwa (who subsequently became abbot of Eiheiji). Shortly thereafter give instruction in zazen and lectures, in Japanese and in English, on Master Dōgen’slished the Ida Ryogokudo Zazen Dōjō in Ichikawa City near Tokyo. He continues toworks in Tokyo and Osaka and at the Tokei-in Temple in Shizuoka Prefecture.

train as a teacher of the FM Alexander Technique. He formally received the Dharma1982and received the Buddhist precepts in May 1983. In 1994 he returned to England toin 1998 and in the following year established the Middle Way Re-education Centre, after graduating from Sheffield University, met Nishijima Roshi in June 1982,Chodo Cross was born in Birmingham, England, in 1959. He went to Japan in(www.the-middle-way.org).

Copyright © 2007 by Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai andBDK America, Inc.

Reprinted by permission of Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—in a retrieval system, or transcribed in any form or by any meanswithout the prior written permission of the publisher.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2007938225ISBN: 978-1-886439-35-1Fifth Printing, 2016

Moraga, California 94556BDK America, Inc.1675Published by School Street

Printed in the United States of America

A Message on the Publication of theEnglish Tripiṭaka

The Buddhist canon is said to contain eighty-four thousand different teachings. I believe that this is because the Buddha’s basic approach was to prescribe a different treatment for every spiritual ailment, much as a doctor prescribes a different medicine for every medical ailment. Thus his teachings were always appropriate for the particular suffering individual and for the time at which the teaching was given, and over the ages not one of his prescriptions has failed to relieve the suffering to which it was addressed.

Ever since the Buddha’s Great Demise over twenty-five hundred years ago, his message of wisdom and compassion has spread throughout the world. Yet no one has ever attempted to translate the entire Buddhist canon into English throughout the history of Japan. It is my greatest wish to see this done and to make the translations available to the many English-speaking people who have never had the opportunity to learn about the Buddha’s teachings.

Of course, it would be impossible to translate all of the Buddha’s eightyfour thousand teachings in a few years. I have, therefore, had one hundred thirtynine of the scriptural texts in the prodigious Taishō edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon selected for inclusion in the First Series of this translation project.

It is in the nature of this undertaking that the results are bound to be criticized. Nonetheless, I am convinced that unless someone takes it upon himself or herself to initiate this project, it will never be done. At the same time, I hope that an improved, revised edition will appear in the future.

It is most gratifying that, thanks to the efforts of more than a hundred Buddhist scholars from the East and the West, this monumental project has finally gotten off the ground. May the rays of the Wisdom of the Compassionate One reach each and every person in the world.

                                                                     NUMATA Yehan

                                                                     Founder of the English

August 7, 1991                                                         Tripiṭaka Project

 

Editorial Foreword

(In January 1982, Dr. Society for the Promotion of Buddhism), decided to begin the monumental MATA Yehan, the founder of Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai task of translating the complete Taishō edition of the Chinese Tripiṭaka (Buddhist canon) into the English language. Under his leadership, a special preparatory committee was organized in April 1982. By July of the same year, the Translation Committee of the English Tripiṭaka was officially convened.

The initial Committee consisted of the following members: (late) HANAYAMA Shōyū (Chairperson), (late) BANDŌ Shōjun, ISHIGAMI Zennō, (late) KAMATA Shigeo, KANAOKA Shūyū, MAYEDA Sengaku, NARA Yasuaki, (late) SAYEKI Shinkō, (late) SHIOIRI Ryōtatsu, TAMARU Nuriyati, (late) TAMURA Kwansei, URYŪZU Ryūshin, and YUYAMA Akira. Assistant members of the Committee were as follows: KANAZAWA Atsushi, WATA NABE Shōgo, Rolf Giebel of New Zealand, and Rudy Smet of Belgium.

After holding planning meetings on a monthly basis, the Committee selected one hundred thirty-nine texts for the First Series of translations, an estimated one hundred printed volumes in all. The texts selected are not necessarily limited to those originally written in India but also include works written or composed in China and Japan. While the publication of the First Series proceeds, the texts for the Second Series will be selected from among the remaining works; this process will continue until all the texts, in Japanese as well as in Chinese, have been published.

Frankly speaking, it will take perhaps one hundred years or more to accomplish the English translation of the complete Chinese and Japanese texts, for they consist of thousands of works. Nevertheless, as Dr. NUMATA wished, it is the sincere hope of the Committee that this project will continue unto completion, even after all its present members have passed away.

ing his son, Mr. NDr. NUMATA passed away on May 5, 1994, at the age of ninety-seven, entrust-UMATA Toshihide, with the continuation and completion of the

Translation Project. The Committee also lost its able and devoted Chairperson,

Editorial Foreword

Professor HANAYAMA Shōyū, on June 16, 1995, at the age of sixty-three. After these severe blows, the Committee elected me, then Vice President of Musashino Women’s College, to be the Chair in October 1995. The Committee has renewed its determination to carry out the noble intention of Dr. NUMATA, under the leadership of Mr. NUMATA Toshihide.

ISHIGAMI The present members of the Committee are MZennō, ICHISHIMA Shōshin, KANAOKA Shūyū, NAYEDA Sengaku (Chairperson),ARA Yasuaki, TAMARU Noriyoshi, Kenneth K. Tanaka, URYŪZU Ryūshin, YUYAMA Akira, WATANABE Shōgo, and assistant member YONEZAWA Yoshiyasu.

The Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research was established in November 1984, in Berkeley, California, U.S.A., to assist in the publication of the BDK English Tripiṭaka First Series. The Publication Committee was organized at the Numata Center in December 1991. Since then the publication of all the volumes has been and will continue to be conducted under the supervision of this Committee in close cooperation with the Editorial Committee in Tokyo.

            M  ChairpersonAYEDA Sengaku

   Editorial Committee of   

                        the BDK English Tripiṭaka

viii

Publisher’s Foreword

On behalf of the Publication Committee, I am happy to present this contribution to the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series. The initial translation and editing of the Buddhist scripture found here were performed under the direction of the Editorial Committee in Tokyo, Japan, chaired by Professor Sengaku Mayeda, Professor Emeritus of Musashi no University. The Publication Committee members then put this volume through a rigorous succession of editorial and bookmaking efforts.

Both the Editorial Committee in Tokyo and the Publication Committee in Berkeley are dedicated to the production of clear, readable English texts of the Buddhist canon. The members of both committees and associated staff work to honor the deep faith, spirit, and concern of the late Reverend Dr. Yehan Numata, who founded the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series in order to disseminate Buddhist teachings throughout the world.

The long-term goal of our project is the translation and publication of the one hundred-volume Taishō edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon, plus a few influential extracanonical Japanese Buddhist texts. The list of texts selected for the First Series of this translation project is given at the end of each volume.

As Chair of the Publication Committee, I am deeply honored to serve in the post formerly held by the late Dr. Philip B. Yampolsky, who was so good to me during his lifetime; the esteemed Dr. Kenneth K. Inada, who has had such a great impact on Buddhist studies in the United States; and the beloved late Dr. Francis H. Cook, a dear friend and colleague.

In conclusion, let me thank the members of the Publication Committee for the efforts they have undertaken in preparing this volume for publication: Senior Editor Marianne Dresser, Dr. Hudaya Kandahjaya, Dr. Eisho Nasu, Reverend Kiyoshi Yamashita, and Reverend Brian Nagata, President of the Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research.

                  Publication Committee                John R. McRae                Chairperson

 

Note on the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series Reprint Edition

After due consideration, the Editorial Committee of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series chose to reprint the translation of Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō by Gudo Wafu Nishijima and  Chodo Cross (originally published under the title Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Books 1–4, Windbell Publications, 1994–1999) in order to make more widely available this exemplary translation of this important text. The remaining volumes II, III, and IV of this edition of Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury will appear in the forthcoming year.

Aside from the minor stylistic changes and the romanization of all Chinese and Japanese characters in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series, this edition reproduces as closely as possible the original translation.

 

Contents

A Message on the Publication of the English Tripiṭaka

                                                                        NUMATA Yehan                          v Editorial Foreword                                         MAYEDA Sengaku                    vii Publisher’s Foreword                                     John R. McRae                        ix Note on the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series Reprint Edition                            xi

Translators’ Introduction                                Gudo Wafu Nishijima

                                                                        and Chodo Cross                    xv

Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury, Volume I

Chapter One. Bendōwa: A Talk about Pursuing the Truth                               3 Chapter Two. Maka-hannya-haramitsu: Mahāprajñāpāramitā                     31 Chapter Three. Genjō-kōan: The Realized Universe                                     41 Chapter Four. Ikka-no-myōju: One Bright Pearl                                            49 Chapter Five. Jū-undō-shiki: Rules for the Hall of Accumulated Cloud       59 Chapter Six. Soku-shin-ze-butsu: Mind Here and Now Is Buddha                65

Chapter Seven. Senjō: Washing                                                                      75 Chapter Eight. Raihai-tokuzui: Prostrating to the Marrow of Attainment     89

Chapter Nine. Keisei-sanshiki: The Voices of the River Valley

    and the Form of the Mountains                                                                109 Chapter Ten. Shoaku-makusa: Not Doing Wrongs                                      127 Chapter Eleven. Uji: Existence-time                                                            143 Chapter Twelve. Kesa-kudoku: The Merit of the Kaṣāya                            157 Chapter Thirteen. Den-e: The Transmission of the Robe                             195 Chapter Fourteen. Sansuigyō: The Sutra of Mountains and Water              217 Chapter Fifteen. Busso: The Buddhist Patriarchs                                         235 Chapter Sixteen. Shisho: The Certificate of Succession                               245

Chapter Seventeen. Hokke-ten-hokke: The Flower of Dharma

    Turns the Flower of Dharma                                                                    263

Contents

Chapter Eighteen. Shin-fukatoku: Mind Cannot Be Grasped (The Former) 289 Chapter Nineteen. Shin-fukatoku: Mind Cannot Be Grasped (The Latter)  297

Chapter Twenty. Kokyō: The Eternal Mirror                                                313 Chapter Twenty-one. Kankin: Reading Sutras                                             341 Appendix I. Chinese Masters                                                                       359

Appendix II. Fukanzazengi: Universal Guide to the Standard Method

    of Zazen (Rufubon—The Popular Edition)                                              363 Appendix III. Busso: The Buddhist Patriarchs                                             371 Appendix IV. The Kaṣāya                                                                            373 Appendix V. Traditional Temple Layout                                                      375 Appendix VI. Lotus Sutra References                                                          381 Glossary of Sanskrit Terms                                                                           413 Bibliography                                                                                                 447 Index                                                                                                             455

A List of the Volumes of the BDK English Tripiṭaka (First Series)             487

Translators’ Introduction

Preface

by Gudo Wafu Nishijima

The Shōbōgenzō was written by Dōgen in the thirteenth century. I think that reading the Shōbōgenzō is the best way to come to an exact understanding of Buddhist theory, for Dōgen was outstanding in his ability to understand and explain Buddhism rationally.

Of course, Dōgen did not depart from traditional Buddhist thought. However at the same time, his thought as expressed in the Shōbōgenzō follows his own unique method of presentation. If we understand this method, the Shōbōgenzō would not be difficult to read. But unless we understand his method of thinking, it would be impossible for us to understand what Dōgen is trying to say in the Shōbōgenzō.

Buddhists revere the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Buddha means Gautama Buddha. Sangha means those people who pursue Gautama Buddha’s truth. Dharma means reality. Dōgen’s unique method of thought was his way of explaining the Dharma.

Basically, he looks at a problem from two sides, and then tries to synthesize the two viewpoints into a middle way. This method has similarities with the dialectic method in Western philosophy, particularly as used by Hegel and Marx. Hegel’s dialectic, however, is based on belief in spirit, and Marx’s dialectic is based on belief in matter. Dōgen, through the Buddhist dialectic, wants to lead us away from thoughts based on belief in spirit and matter.

Dōgen recognized the existence of something that is different from thought; that is, reality in action. Action is completely different from intellectual thought and completely different from the perceptions of our senses. So Dōgen’s method of thinking is based on action and, because of that, it has some unique characteristics.

First, Dōgen recognized that things we usually separate in our minds are, in action, one reality. To express this oneness of subject and object Dōgen says, for example:

If a human being, even for a single moment, manifests the Buddha’s posture in the three forms of conduct, while [that person] sits up straight in samādhi, the entire world of Dharma assumes the Buddha’s posture and the whole of space becomes the state of realization.

This sentence, taken from the Bendōwa chapter (Chapter One), is not illogical

but it reflects a new kind of logic.

Secondly, Dōgen recognized that in action, the only time that really exists is the moment of the present, and the only place that really exists is this place. So the present moment and this place—the here and now—are very important concepts in Dōgen’s philosophy of action.

The philosophy of action is not unique to Dōgen; this idea was also the center of Gautama Buddha’s thought. All the Buddhist patriarchs of ancient India and China relied upon this theory and realized Buddhism itself. They also recognized the oneness of reality, the importance of the present moment, and the importance of this place.

But explanations of reality are only explanations. In the Shōbōgenzō, after he had explained a problem on the basis of action, Dōgen wanted to point the reader into the realm of action itself. To do this, he sometimes used poems, he sometimes used old Buddhist stories that suggest reality, and he sometimes used symbolic expressions.

So the chapters of the Shōbōgenzō usually follow a four-phased pattern. First Dōgen picks up and outlines a Buddhist idea. In the second phase, he examines the idea very objectively or concretely, in order to defeat idealistic or intellectual interpretations of it. In the third phase, Dōgen’s expression becomes even more concrete, practical, and realistic, relying on the philosophy of action. And in the fourth phase, Dōgen tries to suggest reality with words. Ultimately, these trials are only trials. But we can feel something that can be called reality in his sincere trials when we reach the end of each chapter.

I think this four-phased pattern is related with the Four Noble Truths preached by Gautama Buddha in his first lecture. By realizing Dōgen’s method of thinking,

Translators’ Introduction

we can come to realize the true meaning of Gautama Buddha’s Four Noble Truths. This is why we persevere in studying the Shōbōgenzō.

Notes on the Translation by Chode Cross

Source Text

The source text for Chapters One to Twenty-one is contained in the first three volumes of Nishijima Roshi’s twelve-volume Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese). The Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō contains Dōgen’s original text, notes on the text, and the text rendered into modern Japanese. Reference numbers enclosed in brackets at the beginning of some paragraphs of this translation refer to corresponding page numbers in the Gendaigo-yakushōbōgenzō, and much of the material reproduced in the notes comes from the Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō.

The Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō is based upon the ninety-five–chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō, which was arranged in chronological order by Master Hangyō Kōzen sometime between 1688 and 1703. The ninety-five–chapter edition is the most comprehensive single edition, including important chapters such as Bendōwa (Chapter One) and Hokke-ten-hokke (Chapter Seventeen) that do not appear in other editions. Furthermore, it was the first edition to be printed with woodblocks, in the Bunka era (1804–1818), and so the content was fixed at that time. The original woodblocks are still preserved at Eiheiji, the temple in Fukui prefecture that Dōgen founded.

Sanskrit Terms

As a rule, Sanskrit words such as samādhi (the balanced state), prajñā (real wisdom), and bhikṣu (monk), which Dōgen reproduces phonetically with Chinese characters, read in Japanese as zanmai, hannya, and biku, have been retained in Sanskrit form.

In addition, some Chinese characters representing the meaning of Sanskrit terms that will already be familiar to readers (or which will become familiar in the course of reading the Shōbōgenzō) have been returned to Sanskrit. Examples are (“reality,” “law,” “method,” “things and phenomena”), usually translated as “Dharma” or “dharmas”; nyorai (“Thus-come”), always translated as “Tathāgata”; and shōmon (“voice-hearer”), always translated as “śrāvaka.”

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There are places in the Shōbōgenzō where Dōgen himself, relying on his wide familiarity with Chinese sutras, traces the origin of Chinese characters back to Sanskrit words. A prominent example is (“way,” “truth”), which, in the opening paragraph of Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), Hotsu-bodaishin, Dōgen explicitly identifies with the Sanskrit term bodhi.

Even in translating Chinese terms whose Sanskrit derivation Dōgen does not explicitly recognize, knowledge of the Sanskrit can still be very helpful. An early example is the adjective mui used in the opening sentence of Chapter One, Bendōwa, to describe zazen. Japanese dictionaries define mui as “idle” or “inactive,” but Nishijima Roshi originally translated it as “natural.” In Buddhist sutras, mui represents the Sanskrit asaṃskṛta, which is defined in the Monier-Williams Sanskrit-English Dictionary as “not prepared, not consecrated; unadorned; unpolished, rude (as speech).” The Sanskrit dictionary definition, while by no means an absolute criterion, supports Nishijima Roshi’s interpretation that mui describes zazen as natural, or without intention; something as it is.

Another example: The character ro, “leakage,” appears in the opening sentences of the Lotus Sutra, where it represents the Sanskrit āsrava. The SanskritEnglish Dictionary defines āsrava as “the foam on boiling rice; a door opening into water and allowing the stream to descend through it; (with Jainas) the action of the senses which impels the soul towards external objects; distress, affliction, pain.” Thus, in the second paragraph of Chapter Ten, Shoaku-makusa, the noun muro, “no leakage,” appears to describe the state without emotional distress, that is, the balanced and satisfied state of body-and-mind. This does not mean that muro should be translated as “the state without emotional distress” or as “the balanced and satisfied state of body-and-mind,” but such meaning will hopefully be conveyed by a literal translation such as “[the state] without excess” or “[the state] without the superfluous,” supported by a note and a cross-reference to the Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

Chinese Proper Nouns

In general Chinese proper nouns have been Romanized according to their Japanese pronunciation—as Dōgen would have pronounced them for a Japanese audience. Thus, we have let the romanization of all names of Chinese masters follow the Japanese pronunciation, while also adding an appendix showing the Chinese romanization of Chinese masters’ names. For other Chinese proper

Translators’ Introduction

names, we have used Chinese romanization only for terms such as the Shaolin Temple (in Japanese romanization Shōrinji), whose Chinese romanization may already be familiar to most readers.

Chinese Text

Dōgen wrote the Shōbōgenzō in Japanese, that is to say, using a combination of Chinese characters (squared ideograms usually consisting of many strokes) and the Japanese phonetic alphabet which is more abbreviated. Chinese of course is written in Chinese characters only. Therefore when Dōgen quotes a passage, or borrows a phrase, from a Chinese text—as he very often does—it is readily apparent to the eye as a string of Chinese ideograms uninterrupted by Japanese squiggles. We attempted to mirror this effect, to some degree, by using italics for such passages and phrases. (Editorial Note: In this BDK English Tripiṭaka Series edition, all such passages appear in quote marks.)

A pattern that occurs frequently in the Shōbōgenzō is a quotation of Chinese characters from a conversation between Zen masters, or from a sutra, followed by Dōgen’s commentary, in which each Chinese character takes on new meaning. An early example is in the second paragraph of Chapter Two, Maka-hannyaharamitsu, where Dōgen quotes the Great Wisdom Sutra (Mahāprajñāpāramitāsūtra). The sutra says setsu sa ze nen, literally, “[the monk] secretly makes this thought.” As a conventional phrase, this just means “[the monk] secretly thinks.” However, individually, the character setsu (secret) suggests something beyond thinking and sense perception, that is, something real; the character sa (make or work) suggests action; the character ze (this) suggests concrete reality; and the character nen (thought, idea, mindfulness) suggests not only thought but the monk’s real state of mind. So Dōgen’s commentary says that the monk’s setsu sa ze nen (“secretly working concrete mind”) is real wisdom itself.

In this way, Dōgen emphasizes that the words of the sutras and masters whom he reveres are not meant to convey only conceptual meaning. Those words are trying to bring us back to the reality that is prior to words. This is particularly true with respect to the Lotus Sutra. The Lotus Sutra contains the characters zekyō, “this sutra.” In several chapters of the Shōbōgenzō (specifically Chapter Fifty-two [Vol. III], Bukkyō, but see also Chapter Seventeen, Hokke-ten-hokke) the fact emerges that, in Dōgen’s mind, this sutra and the real universe in which we live are identified. That being so, Dōgen, in his commentaries, seems to treat

xix

the characters of the Lotus Sutra not as a stream of concepts but rather as a series of momentary mirrors, or independent blocks, of real form—to be brought in and rearranged as Dōgen sees fit.

In such instances, readers will want to refer to the Chinese characters in question. Fortunately, due to the generosity of Mr. Tadashi Nakamae (who provided the computer) and the industriousness of Michael and Yoko Latchford (who installed the software and created and input unavailable characters), we were able to reproduce the Chinese characters in the notes and in an appendix of Lotus Sutra references. (Editorial Note: In adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series, all Chinese characters have been omitted in this reprint edition. Interested readers may consult the original Wind-bell Publications edition, Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Books 1–4.)

The Meaning of Shōbogenzō, “True Dharma-eye Treasury”

Shō means “right” or “true.” Hō, “law,” represents the Sanskrit “Dharma.” All of us belong to something that, prior to our naming it or thinking about it, is already there. And it already belongs to us. “Dharma” is one name for what is already there.

Hōgen, “Dharma-eye,” represents the direct experience of what is already there. Because the Dharma is prior to thinking, it must be directly experienced by a faculty that is other than thinking. Gen, “eye,” represents this direct experience that is other than thinking.

Shōbōgen, “true Dharma-eye,” therefore describes the right experience of

what is already there.

Zō, “storehouse” or “treasury,” suggests something that contains and preserves the right experience of what is already there. Thus, Nishijima Roshi has interpreted Shōbōgenzō, “true Dharma-eye treasury,” as an expression of zazen itself.

All who benefit from this translation, myself included, should be profoundly grateful to Nishijima Roshi for his unceasing effort to clarify the real meaning of Shōbōgenzō.

SHŌBŌGENZŌ

THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY VOLUME I by

Dōgen

 

[Chapter One]

Bendōwa

A Talk about Pursuing the Truth

Translator’s Note: Ben means “to make an effort” or “to pursue,” means “the truth,” and wa means “a talk” or “story.” Master Dōgen usually used the word bendō to indicate the practice of zazen, so Bendōwa means a talk about pursuing the truth, or a talk about the practice of zazen. This volume was not included in the first edition of the Shōbōgenzō. It was found in Kyoto in the Kanbun era (1661–1673), and added to the Shōbōgenzō when the ninety-five–chapter edition was edited by Master Hangyō Kōzen in the Genroku era (1688–1704).

[11] When the buddha-tathāgatas,1 each having received the one-to-one transmission of the splendid Dharma, experience the supreme state of bodhi,2 they possess a subtle method that is supreme and without intention. The reason this [method] is transmitted only from buddha to buddha, without deviation, is that the samādhi of receiving and using the self3 is its standard. For enjoyment of this samādhi, the practice of [za]zen, in the erect sitting posture, has been established as the authentic gate. This Dharma4 is abundantly present in each human being, but if we do not practice it, it does not manifest itself, and if we do not experience it, it cannot be realized. When we let go, it has already filled the hands; how could it be defined as one or many? When we speak, it fills the mouth; it has no restriction in any direction. When buddhas are constantly dwelling in and maintaining this state, they do not leave recognitions and perceptions in separate aspects [of reality]; and when living beings are eternally functioning in this state, aspects [of reality] do not appear to them in separate recognitions and perceptions.5 The effort in pursuing the truth6 that I am now teaching makes the myriad dharmas7 real in experience; it enacts the oneness of reality on the path of liberation.8 At that moment of clearing barriers and getting free, how could this paragraph be relevant?

[14] After I established the will to pursue the Dharma, I visited [good] counselors9 in every quarter of our land. I met Myōzen10 of Kennin [Temple]. Nine seasons of frosts and of flowers11 swiftly passed while I followed him, learning a little of the customs of the Rinzai lineage. Only Myōzen had received the authentic transmission of the supreme Buddha-Dharma, as the most excellent disciple of the founding master, Master Eisai12—the other students could never compare with him. I then went to the great kingdom of Song, visiting [good] counselors in the east and west of Chekiang13 and hearing of the tradition through the gates of the five lineages.14 At last I visited Zen Master Nyojō15 of Daibyakuhō Mountain,16 and there I was able to complete the great task of a lifetime of practice. After that, at the beginning of the great Song era of Shōjō,17 I came home determined to spread the Dharma and to save living beings—it was as if a heavy burden had been placed on my shoulders. Nevertheless, in order to wait for an upsurge during which I might discharge my sense of mission, I thought I would spend some time wandering like a cloud, calling here and there like a water weed, in the style of the ancient sages. Yet if there were any true practitioners who put the will to the truth first, being naturally unconcerned with fame and profit, they might be fruitlessly misled by false teachers and might needlessly throw a veil over right understanding. They might idly become drunk with self-deception, and sink forever into the state of delusion. How would they be able to promote the right seeds of prajñā,18 or have the opportunity to attain the truth? If I were now absorbed in drifting like a cloud or a water weed, which mountains and rivers ought they to visit?19 Feeling that this would be a pitiful situation, I decided to compile a record of the customs and standards that I experienced firsthand in the Zen monasteries of the great kingdom of Song, together with a record of profound instruction from a [good] counselor which I have received and maintained. I will leave this record to people who learn in practice and are easy in the truth, so that they can know the right Dharma of the Buddha’s lineage. This may be a true mission.

    [17] [The sutras] say: Great Master Śākyamuni at the order on Vulture Peak20 transmitted the Dharma to Mahā kāśya pa.21 [The Dharma] was authentically transmitted from patriarch to patriarch and it reached Venerable Bodhi dharma.22 The Venerable One himself went to China and transmitted the Dharma to Great Master Eka.23 This was the first transmission of the Buddha Dharma in the Eastern Lands.24 Transmitted one-to-one in this manner, [the Dharma] arrived naturally at Zen Master Daikan,25 the Sixth Patriarch. At that time, as the real Buddha-Dharma spread through the Eastern [Land of] China, it became clear that [the Dharma] is beyond literary expression. The Sixth Patriarch had two excellent disciples, Ejō of Nangaku26 and Gyōshi of Seigen.27 Both of them, having received and maintained the posture of Buddha,28 were guiding teachers of human beings and gods alike. [The Dharma] flowed and spread in these two streams, and five lineages were established. These are the so-called Hōgen sect, Igyō sect, Sōtō sect, Unmon sect, and Rinzai sect. In great Song [China] today the Rinzai sect alone holds sway throughout the country. Although there are differences between the five traditions, the posture with the stamp of the Buddha’s mind29 is only one. Even in the great kingdom of Song, although from the Later Han dynasty30 onward philosophical texts had been disseminated through the country, and had left some impression, no one could decide which were inferior and which were superior. After the ancestral master came from the west, he directly cut to the source of the confusion,31 and spread the unadulterated Buddha-Dharma. We should hope that the same thing will happen in our country. [The sutras] say that the many patriarchs and the many buddhas, who dwelled in and maintained the Buddha Dharma, all relied on the practice of sitting erect in the samādhi of receiving and using the self,32 and esteemed [this practice] as the right way to disclose the state of realization. Human beings who attained the truth in the Western Heavens and Eastern Lands followed this style of practice. This [practice] relies on the mystical and authentic transmission of the subtle method from master to disciple, and the [disciple’s] reception and maintenance of the true essence of the teachings.

[20] In the authentic transmission of [our] religion, it is said that this Buddha-Dharma,33 which has been authentically and directly transmitted one-to-one, is supreme among the supreme. After the initial meeting with a [good] counselor we never again need to burn incense, to do prostrations, to recite Buddha’s name, to practice confession, or to read sutras. Just sit and 16a get the state that is free of body and mind. If a human being, even for a single moment, manifests the Buddha’s posture in the three forms of conduct,34 while [that person] sits up straight in samādhi, the entire world of Dharma assumes the Buddha’s posture and the whole of space becomes the state of realization. [The practice] thus increases the Dharma joy that is the original state of the buddha-tathāgatas, and renews the splendor of their realization of the truth. Furthermore, throughout the Dharma worlds in ten directions, ordinary beings of the three states and the six states35 all become clear and pure in body and mind at once; they experience the state of great liberation,36 and their original features appear. Then all dharmas experience and understand right realization and myriad things each put their Buddhist body into practice; in an instant, they totally transcend the limits of experience and understanding; they sit erect as kings of the bodhi tree;37 in one moment, they turn the great Dharma wheel38 which is in the unequaled state of equilibrium;39 and they expound the ultimate, unadorned, and profound state of prajñā. These balanced and right states of realization also work the other way,40 following paths of intimate and mystical cooperation, so that this person who sits in zazen steadfastly gets free of body and mind, cuts away miscellaneous impure views and thoughts [accumulated] from the past, and thus experiences and understands the natural and pure Buddha-Dharma. Throughout each of the infinitesimal, innumerable seats of truth of the buddha-tathāgatas, [the practitioner] promotes the Buddha’s work and spreads its influence far and wide over those who have the ascendant makings of a buddha, thus vividly uplifting the ascendant real state of a buddha. At this time, everything in the universe in ten directions—soil, earth, grass, and trees; fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles—performs the Buddha’s work. The people that receive the benefit thus produced by wind and water are all mystically helped by the fine and unthinkable influence of the Buddha, and they exhibit the immediate state of realization. All beings who receive and utilize this water and fire spread the influence of the Buddha in the original state of experience, so that those who live and talk with them, also, are all reciprocally endowed with the limitless buddha-virtue. Expanding and promoting their activity far and wide, they permeate the inside and the outside of the entire universe with the limitless,

unceasing, unthinkable, and incalculable Buddha-Dharma. [The state] is not dimmed by the views of these individuals themselves, however, because the state in the quietness, without intentional activity, is direct experience. If we divide practice-and-experience into two stages, as in the thoughts of common folk, each part can be perceived and understood separately. [But] if perception and understanding are mixed in, that is not the standard state of experience, because the standard state of experience is beyond deluded emotion. Although, in the quietness, mind and external world enter together into the state of experience and pass together out of the state of realization, [those movements] are the state of receiving and using the self.41 Therefore, [movements of mind and the external world] neither stir a single molecule nor disturb a single form, but they accomplish the vast and great work of Buddha and the profound and fine influence of Buddha. The grass, trees, soil, and earth reached by this guiding influence all radiate great brightness, and their preaching of the deep and fine Dharma is without end. Grass, trees, fences, and walls become able to preach for all souls, [both] common people and saints; and conversely, all souls, [both] common people and saints, preach for grass, trees, fences, and walls. The world of self-consciousness, and [the world] of consciousness of external objects, lack nothing—they are already furnished with the concrete form of real experience. The standard state of real experience, when activated, allows no idle moment. Zazen, even if it is only one human being sitting for one moment, thus enters into mystical cooperation with all dharmas, and completely penetrates all times; and it therefore performs, within the limitless universe, the eternal work of the Buddha’s guiding influence in the past, future, and present. For everyone it is completely the same practice and the same experience. The practice is not confined to the sitting itself; it strikes space and resonates, [like] ringing that continues before and after a bell. How could [the practice] be limited to this place? All concrete things42 possess original practice as their original features; it is beyond comprehension. Remember, even if the countless buddhas in ten directions, as numerous as 16c the sands of the Ganges, tried with all their power and all their buddha wisdom to calculate or comprehend the merit of one person’s zazen, they could not even get close.

[26] Now we have heard how high and great is the merit of this zazen. [But] some stupid person might doubtingly ask, “There are many gates to the Buddha-Dharma. Why do you solely recommend sitting in zazen?”43 I say: Because it is the authentic gate to the Buddha-Dharma.

[26] [Someone] asks, “Why do you see it as the only authentic gate?”

I say: Great Master Śākyamuni exactly transmitted, as the authentic tradition, this subtle method of grasping the state of truth, and the tathāgatas of the three times44 all attained the truth through zazen. Thus the fact that [zazen] is the authentic gate has been transmitted and received. Furthermore, the patriarchs of the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands all attained the truth through zazen. Therefore I am now preaching [zazen] to human beings and gods as the authentic gate.

[27]  [Someone] asks, “That which relies upon receiving the authentic transmission of the subtle method of the Tathāgata, or upon following the traces of the ancestral masters, is surely beyond the intellect of the common person. Reading sutras and reciting the names of buddhas, however, may naturally become the causes and conditions of enlightenment. But as for just idly sitting without doing anything, how can that be the means of getting enlightenment?”

I say: If you now think that the samādhi of the buddhas, the supreme and great Dharma, is idle sitting without doing anything, you are a person who insults the Great Vehicle.45 [Such] delusion is so deep that it is like being in the ocean and saying there is no water. [In zazen] we are already seated,

stably and thankfully, in the buddhas’ samādhi of receiving and using the self. Is this not the accomplishment of vast and great virtue? It is pitiful that your eyes are not yet open and your mind remains in a drunken stupor. In general, the state of the buddhas is unthinkable: intelligence cannot reach it. How much less could disbelief or inferior wisdom know the state? Only people of great makings and right belief can enter into it. For people of disbelief, even if taught, it is difficult to receive the teaching—even on Vulture Peak there were people [about whom the Buddha said,] “That they withdraw also is fine.”46 As a general rule, when right belief emerges in our mind, we should do training and learn in practice. Otherwise, we should rest for a while. Regret the fact if you will, but from ancient times the Dharma has been dry. Further, do you know for yourself any virtue that is gained from practices such as reading sutras and reciting names of buddhas? It is very unreliable to think that only to wag the tongue and to raise the voice has the virtue of the Buddha’s work. When we compare [such practices] with the Buddha-Dharma, they fade further and further into the distance. Moreover, we open sutras to clarify the criteria that the Buddha taught of instantaneous and gradual practice,47 and those who practice according to the teaching are invariably caused to attain the state of real experience. This is completely different from aspiring to the virtue of attainment of bodhi by vainly exhausting the intellect. Trying

to arrive at the Buddha’s state of truth [only] through action of the mouth, stupidly chanting thousands or tens of thousands of times, is like hoping to reach [the south country of] Etsu by pointing a carriage toward the north. Or it is like trying to put a square peg into a round hole. Reading sentences while remaining ignorant of how to practice [is like] a student of medicine forgetting how to compound medications. What use is that? Those who chant endlessly 17b are like frogs in a spring paddy field, croaking day and night. In the end it is all useless. It is still more difficult for people who are deeply disturbed by fame and gain to abandon these things. The mind that craves gain is very deep, and so it must have been present in the ancient past. How could it not be present in the world today? It is most pitiful. Just remember, when a practitioner directly follows a master who has attained the truth and clarified the mind, and when the practitioner matches that mind and experiences and understands it, and thus receives the authentic transmission of the subtle Dharma of the Seven Buddhas,48 then the exact teaching appears clearly and is received and maintained. This is beyond the comprehension of Dharma teachers who study words.49 So stop this doubting and delusion and, following the teaching of a true master, attain in experience the buddhas’ samādhi of receiving and using the self, by sitting in zazen and pursuing the truth.

[32] [Someone] asks, “The Flower of Dharma50 and the teaching of the Garland [Sutra],51 which have now been transmitted into this country, are both ultimate expressions of the Great Vehicle. Moreover, in the case of the Shingon sect,52 [the transmission] passed directly from Tathāgata Vairocana to Vajrasattva, and so [the transmission from] master to disciple is not at random. Quoting the principles which it discusses, that “Mind here and now is buddha” and “This mind becomes buddha,”53 [the Shingon sect] proclaims that we realize the right realization of the five buddhas54 in one sitting, without undergoing many kalpas55 of training. We can say that this is the ultimate refinement of the Buddha’s Dharma. What is so excellent then about the practice which you now solely recommend, to the exclusion of these other [practices]?”

I say: Remember, among Buddhists we do not argue about superiority and inferiority of philosophies, or choose between shallowness and profundity in the Dharma; we need only know whether the practice is genuine or artificial. Some have entered into the stream of the Buddha’s truth at the invitation of grass, flowers, mountains, and rivers. Some have received and maintained

17c the stamp of Buddha by grasping soil, stones, sand, and pebbles. Furthermore, the vast and great word56 is even more abundant than the myriad phenomena. And the turning of the great Dharma wheel is contained in every molecule. This being so, the words “Mind here and now is buddha” are only the moon in water,57 and the idea “Just to sit is to become buddha” is also a reflection in a mirror. We should not be caught by the skillfulness of the words. Now, in recommending the practice in which bodhi is directly experienced, I hope to demonstrate the subtle truth that the Buddhist patriarchs have transmitted one-to-one, and thus to make you into people of the real state of truth. Moreover, for transmission of the Buddha-Dharma, we must always take as a teacher a person who has experienced the [Buddha’s] state. It is never enough to take as our guiding teacher a scholar who counts words; that would be like the blind leading the blind. In this, the lineage of the authentic transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs, we all revere wise masters who have attained the truth and experienced the state, and we cause them to dwell in and to maintain the Buddha-Dharma. This is why, when Shintōists of [the lineages of] yin and yang58 come to devote themselves, and when arhats who have experienced the fruit59 come to ask for Dharma, we give each of them, without fail, the means of clarifying the mental state. This is something that has never been heard in other lineages. Disciples of the Buddha should just learn the Buddha Dharma. Furthermore, we should remember that from the beginning we have never lacked the supreme state of bodhi, and we will receive it and use it forever. At the same time, because we cannot perceive it directly,60 we are prone to beget random intellectual ideas, and because we chase after these as if they were real things, we vainly pass by the great state of truth. From these intellectual ideas emerge all sorts of flowers in space:61 we think about the twelvefold cycle62 and the twenty-five spheres of existence; and ideas of the three vehicles and the five vehicles63 or of having buddha[-nature] and not having buddha[-nature] are endless. We should not think that the learning of these

    intellectual ideas is the right path of Buddhist practice. When we solely sit in zazen, on the other hand, relying now on exactly the same posture as the Buddha, and letting go of the myriad things, then we go beyond the areas of delusion, realization, emotion, and consideration, and we are not concerned with the ways of the common and the sacred. At once we are roaming outside

the [intellectual] frame, receiving and using the great state of bodhi. How could those caught in the trap of words compare [with this]?

[37] [Someone] asks, “Among the three kinds of training64 there is training in the balanced state, and among the six pāramitās65 there is the dhyāna pāramitā, both of which all bodhisattvas learn from the outset and all bodhisattvas practice, regardless of whether they are clever or stupid. The zazen [that you are discussing] now is surely [only] one of these. Why do you say that the Tathāgata’s right Dharma is concentrated in this [practice of zazen]?”

I say: The question arises because this right Dharma-eye treasury, the supreme and great method, which is the one great matter66 of the Tathāgata, has been called the “Zen sect.” Remember that this title “Zen sect” was established in China and the east; it is not heard in India. When Great Master Bodhi dharma first stayed at Shaolin Temple in the Songshan Mountains,67 and faced the wall for nine years, monks and laymen were still ignorant of the Buddha’s right Dharma, so they called [Master Bodhidharma] a brahman who made a religion of zazen. Thereafter, the patriarchs of successive generations all constantly devoted themselves to zazen. Stupid secular people who saw this, not knowing the reality, talked at random of a zazen sect. Nowadays, dropping the word “za,” they talk of just the Zen sect.68 This interpretation is clear from records of the patriarchs.69 [Zazen] should not be discussed as the balanced state of dhyāna in the six pāramitās and the three kinds of training. That this Buddha-Dharma is the legitimate intention of the one-to-one transmission has never been concealed through the ages. In the order on Vulture Peak in ancient times, when the Tathāgata gave the Dharma to Venerable Mahākāśyapa, transmitting the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, the supreme and great method, only to him, the cer- 18b emony was witnessed directly by beings among the celestial throng which are present in the world above, so it must never be doubted. It is a universal rule that those celestial beings will guard and maintain the Buddha-Dharma eternally; their efforts have never faded. Just remember that this [transmission of zazen] is the whole truth of the Buddha’s Dharma; nothing can be compared with it.

[40]        [Someone] asks, “Why, in discussing entry into the state of experience, do Buddhists recommend us to practice the balanced state of dhyāna solely by sitting, which is [only] one of the four forms of conduct?”70 I say: It is difficult to calculate all the ways that buddhas have successively practiced since ancient times to enter the state of real experience. If we want to find a reason, we should remember that what Buddhists practice is reason in itself. We should not look for [a reason] besides this. But an ancestral master has praised [sitting] by saying, “Sitting in zazen is the peaceful and joyful gate of Dharma.”71 So in conclusion the reason may be that, of the four forms of conduct, [sitting is the most] peaceful and joyful. Furthermore, [sitting] is not the way practiced by one or two buddhas; all the buddhas and all the patriarchs possess this way.

[41]        [Someone] asks, “In regard to this practice of zazen, a person who has not yet experienced and understood the Buddha-Dharma may be able to acquire that experience by pursuing the truth in zazen. [But] what can a person who has already clarified the Buddha’s right Dharma expect to gain from zazen?”

I say: We do not tell our dreams before a fool, and it is difficult to put oars into the hands of a mountaineer; nevertheless I must bestow the teaching. The thought that practice and experience are not one thing is just the idea of non-Buddhists. In the Buddha-Dharma practice and experience are completely the same. [Practice] now is also practice in the state of experience; therefore,a beginner’s pursuit of the truth is just the whole body of the original state of experience. This is why [the Buddhist patriarchs] teach, in the practical cautions they have handed down to us, not to expect any experience outside of practice. And the reason may be that [practice itself] is the directly accessible original state of experience. Because practice is just experience, the experience is endless; and because experience is practice, the practice has no beginning. This is how both Tathāgata Śākyamuni and Venerable Patriarch Mahākāśyapa were received and used by the practice that exists in the state of experience. Great Master Bodhid harma and the Founding Patriarch Daikan72 were similarly pulled and driven by the practice that exists in the state of experience. The examples of all those who dwelled in and maintained the Buddha-Dharma are like this. The practice that is never separate from experience exists already: having fortunately received the one-to-one transmission of a share of the subtle practice, we who are beginners in pursuing the truth directly possess, in the state without intention, a share of original experience. Remember, in order to prevent us from tainting the experience that is never separate from practice, the Buddhist patriarchs have repeatedly taught us not to be lax in practice. When we forget the subtle practice, original experience has filled our hands; when the body leaves original experience behind, the subtle practice is operating throughout the body. Moreover, as I saw with my own eyes in great Song China, the Zen monasteries of many districts had all built zazen halls accommodating five or six hundred, or even one or two thousand monks, who were encouraged to sit in zazen day and night. The leader of one such order73 was a true master who had received the Buddha’s mind-seal. When I asked him the great intent of the Buddha-Dharma, I was able to hear the principle that practice and experience are never two stages. Therefore, in accordance with the teaching of the Buddhist patriarchs, and following the way of a true master, he encouraged [everyone] to pursue the truth in zazen; [he encouraged] not only the practitioners in his order but [all] noble friends who sought the Dharma, [all] people who hoped to find true reality in the Buddha-Dharma, without choosing between beginners and late learners, without distinction between common people and sacred people. Have you not heard the words of the ancestral master74 who said, “It is not that there is no practice-and-experience, but it cannot be tainted.” Another [master] said, “Someone who sees the way practices the way.”75 Remember 19a that even in the state of attainment of the truth, we should practice.

[45]     [Someone] asks, “The masters who spread the teachings through our country in previous ages had all entered Tang China and received the transmission of Dharma. Why, at that time, did they neglect this principle, and transmit only philosophical teaching?”

I say: The reason that past teachers of human beings did not transmit

this method was that the time had not come.

[46]     [Someone] asks, “Did those masters of former ages understand this

method?”

I say: If they had understood it, they would have made it known to all.

[45] [Someone] asks, “It has been said that we should not regret our life and death,76 for there is a very quick way to get free of life and death. That is, to know the truth that the mental essence is eternal. In other words, this physical body, having been born, necessarily moves toward death; but this mental essence never dies at all. Once we have been able to recognize that the mental essence which is unmoved by birth and decay77 exists in our own body, we see this as the original essence. Therefore the body is just a temporary form; it dies here and is born there, never remaining constant. [But] the mind is eternal; it is unchangeable in the past, future, or present. To know this is called ‘to have become free of life and death.’ Those who know this principle stop the past [cycle of] life and death forever and, when this body passes, they enter the spirit world. When they present themselves in the spirit world,78 they gain wondrous virtues like those of the buddha-tathāgatas. Even if we know

[this principle] now, [our body] is still the body that has been shaped by

     deluded behavior in past ages, and so we are not the same as the saints. Those who do not know this principle will forever turn in the cycle of life and death. Therefore we should just hasten to understand the principle that the mental essence is eternal. Even if we passed our whole life in idle sitting, what could we expect to gain? The doctrine I have expressed like this is truly in accord with the truth of the buddhas and the patriarchs, is it not?”

I say: The view expressed now is absolutely not the Buddha’s Dharma; it is the view of the non-Buddhist Senika.79 According to that non-Buddhist view, there is one spiritual intelligence existing within our body. When this intelligence meets conditions, it can discriminate between pleasant and unpleasant and discriminate between right and wrong, and it can know pain and irritation and know suffering and pleasure—all [these] are abilities of the spiritual intelligence. When this body dies, however, the spirit casts off the skin and is reborn on the other side; so even though it seems to die here it lives on there. Therefore we call it immortal and eternal. The view of that non-Buddhist is like this. But if we learn this view as the Buddha’s Dharma, we are even more foolish than the person who grasps a tile or a pebble thinking it to be a golden treasure; the delusion would be too shameful for comparison. National Master Echū80 of great Tang China strongly cautioned against [such thinking]. If we equate the present wrong view that “mind is eternal but forms perish” with the splendid Dharma of the buddhas, thinking that we have escaped life and death when we are promoting the original cause of life and death, are we not being stupid? That would be most pitiful. Knowing that this [wrong view] is just the wrong view of non-Buddhists, we should not touch it with our ears. Nevertheless, I cannot help wanting to save you from

this wrong view and it is only compassionate [for me] now [to try]. So remember, in the Buddha-Dharma, because the body and mind are originally one reality, the saying that essence and form are not two has been understood equally in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, and we should never dare to go against it. Further, in the lineages that discuss eternal existence, the myriad dharmas are all eternal existence: body and mind are not divided.81 And in the lineages that discuss extinction, all dharmas are extinction: essence and form are not divided.82 How could we say, on the contrary, that the body is mortal but the mind is eternal? Does that not violate right reason? Furthermore, we should realize that living-and-dying is just nirvana;83 [Buddhists] have never discussed nirvana outside of living-and-dying. Moreover, even if we wrongly imagine the understanding that “mind becomes eternal by getting free of the body” to be the same as the buddha-wisdom that is free of life and death, the mind that is conscious of this understanding still appears and disappears momentarily, and so it is not eternal at all. Then isn’t [this understanding] unreliable? We should taste and reflect. The principle that body and mind are one reality is being constantly spoken by the Buddha Dharma. So how could it be, on the contrary, that while this body appears and disappears, the mind independently leaves the body and does not appear or disappear? If there is a time when [body and mind] are one reality, and another time when they are not one reality, then it might naturally follow that the Buddha’s preaching has been false. Further, if we think that life and death are something to get rid of, we will commit the sin of hating the Buddha Dharma. How could we not guard against this? Remember, the lineage of the Dharma which [asserts that] “in the Buddha-Dharma the essential state of mind universally includes all forms,” describes the whole great world of Dharma inclusively, without dividing essence and form, and without discussing appearance and disappearance. There is no [state]—not even bodhi or nirvana—that is different from the essential state of mind. All dharmas, myriad phenomena and accumulated things, are totally just the one mind, without exclusion or disunion. All these various lineages of the Dharma assert that 20a [myriad things and phenomena] are the even and balanced undivided mind, other than which there is nothing; and this is just how Buddhists have understood the essence of mind. That being so, how could we divide this one reality into body and mind, or into life-and-death and nirvana? We are already the Buddha’s disciples. Let us not touch with our ears those noises from the tongues of madmen who speak non-Buddhist views.

[51] [Someone] asks, “Must a person who is devoted to this zazen always

adhere spotlessly to the precepts?”

I say: Keeping the precepts, and pure conduct,84 are the standard of the Zen lineages and the usual habit of Buddhist patriarchs. [But] those who have not yet received the precepts, or who have broken the precepts, are not without their share [of the benefit of zazen].

[51] [Someone] asks, “Is there nothing to prevent a person who practices this zazen from also performing mantra and quiet-reflection practices?”85

I say: When I was in China, I heard the true essence of the teachings from a true master; he said that he had never heard that any of the patriarchs who received the authentic transmission of the Buddha-seal ever performed such practices additionally, in the Western Heavens or in the Eastern Lands, in the past or in the present. Certainly, unless we devote ourselves to one thing, we will not attain complete wisdom.

[52] [Someone] asks, “Should this practice also be undertaken by laymen

and laywomen, or is it performed only by people who have left home?”

I say: An ancestral master has been heard to say that, with respect to understanding of the Buddha-Dharma, we must not choose between men and women, high or low.

[52] [Someone] asks, “People who leave home get free of all involvements at once, so they have no hindrances in practicing zazen and pursuing the truth. How can a busy layperson devotedly do training and be at one with the unintentional state of Buddhist truth?”

I say: In general, the Buddhist Patriarch,86 overfilled with pity, left open a wide and great gate of compassion so that all living beings could experience and enter [the state of truth]; what human being or god could not want to enter? Thus, when we study the past and the present, there are many confirmations of such [experience and entry]. For instance, Taisō87 and Junsō88 were, as emperors, very busy with affairs of state [but] they pursued the truth by sitting in zazen and realized the Buddhist Patriarch’s great truth. Both Minister Ri (Ch. Li) and Minister Bō (Ch. Fang), serving as [the emperor’s] lieutenants, were the arms and legs of the whole nation [but] they pursued the truth by sitting in zazen and experienced and entered the Buddhist Patriarch’s truth. This [practice-and-experience] rests only upon whether or not the will is present; it does not relate to whether the body stays at home or leaves home.

Moreover, any person who profoundly discerns the superiority or inferiority of things will naturally have belief. Still more, those who think that worldly affairs hinder the Buddha-Dharma only know that there is no Buddha-Dharma in the world; they do not know that there are no worldly dharmas in the state of Buddha. Recently in great Song [China] there was [a man] called Minister Hyō (Ch. Feng), a high-ranking official who was accomplished in the Patriarch’s truth. In his later years he made a poem in which he expressed himself as follows:

When official business allows, I like to sit in zazen.

I have seldom slept with my side touching a bed.

Though I have now become prime minister,

My fame as a veteran practitioner has spread across the four seas.

This was somebody with no time free from official duties but, because his will to the Buddha’s truth was deep, he was able to attain the truth. We should reflect on ourselves [in comparison] with him, and we should reflect on the present [in comparison] with those days. In the great kingdom of Song, the present generation of kings and ministers, officials and commoners, men and women, all apply their mind to the Patriarch’s truth, without exception. Both the military and literary classes are resolved to practice [za]zen and to learn the truth. Those who resolve it will, in many cases, undoubtedly clarify the mental state. Thus, it can naturally be inferred that worldly affairs do not 20c hinder the Buddha-Dharma. When the real Buddha-Dharma spreads throughout a nation the buddhas and the gods guard [that nation] ceaselessly, so the reign is peaceful. When the imperial reign is peaceful, the Buddha-Dharma comes into its own. Furthermore, when Śākyamuni was in the world, [even] people of heavy sins and wrong views were able to get the truth, and in the orders of the ancestral masters, [even] hunters and old woodcutters entered the state of realization, to say nothing of other people. We need only study the teaching and the state of truth of a true teacher.

[56] [Someone] asks, “Even in the present corrupt world in this latter age,89 is it still possible to realize the state of real experience when we perform this practice?”

I say: Philosophers have occupied themselves with such concepts and forms, but in the real teaching of the Great Vehicle, without discriminating between “right,” “imitative,” and “latter” Dharma, we say that all those who practice attain the state of truth. Furthermore, in this directly  transmitted right Dharma, both in entering the Dharma and getting the body out, we receive and use the treasure of ourselves. Those who are practicing can naturally know whether they have got the state of real experience or not, just as people who are using water can tell by themselves whether it is cold or warm.

[57] [Someone] asks, “It is said that in the Buddha-Dharma once we have clearly understood the principle that mind here and now is buddha, even if our mouth does not recite the sutras and our body does not practice the Buddha Way, we are not lacking in the Buddha-Dharma at all. Just to know that the Buddha-Dharma originally resides in each of us is the whole of the attainment of the truth. There is no need to seek anything else from other people. How much less need we bother about pursuing the truth in zazen?”

I say: These words are extremely unreliable. If it is as you say, how could any intelligent person fail to understand this principle once it had been

21a explained to them? Remember, we learn the Buddha-Dharma just when we give up views of subject and object. If knowing that “we ourselves are just buddha” could be called the attainment of the truth, Śākyamuni would not have bothered to teach the moral way in the past. I would like now to prove this through the subtle criteria of the ancient patriarchs:

Long ago, there was a monk called Prior Sokkō90 in the order of Zen Mas ter Hōgen.91 Zen Master Hōgen asks him, “Prior Sokkō, how long have you been in my order?”

Sokkō says, “I have served in the master’s order for three years already.”

The Zen master says, “You are a recent member of the order. Why do

you never ask me about the Buddha-Dharma?”

Sokkō says, “I must not deceive you, master. Before, when I was in the order of Zen Master Seihō, I realized the state of peace and joy in the Buddha Dharma.”

The Zen master says, “Relying upon what words were you able to enter?”

Sokkō says, “I once asked Seihō: Just what is the student that is I?92 Seihō said: The children of fire93 come looking for fire.”

Hōgen says, “Nice words. But I am afraid that you may not have under-

stood.”

Sokkō says, “The children of fire belong to fire. [So] I understood that their being fire yet looking for fire represented my being myself yet looking for myself.”

The Zen master says, “I have become sure that you did not understand. If the Buddha-Dharma were like that, it could never have been transmitted until today.”

At this Sokkō became embarrassed and distressed, and he stood up [to leave]. [But] on the road he thought, “The Zen master is [respected] throughout the country [as] a good counselor, and he is a great guiding master to five 21b hundred people. There must surely have been some merit in his criticism of my wrongness.”

[Sokkō] goes back to the Zen master to confess and to prostrate himself

in apology. Then he asks, “Just what is the student that is I?”

The Zen master says, “The children of fire come looking for fire.”

Under the influence of these words, Sokkō grandly realized the Buddha Dharma.

Clearly, the Buddha-Dharma is never known with the intellectual understanding that “we ourselves are just buddha.” If the intellectual understanding that “we ourselves are just buddha” were the Buddha-Dharma, the Zen master could not have guided [Sokkō] by using the former words, and he would not have admonished [Sokkō] as he did. Solely and directly, from our first meeting with a good counselor, we should ask the standards of practice, and we should singlemindedly pursue the truth by sitting in zazen, without allowing a single recognition or half an understanding to remain in our minds. Then the subtle method of the Buddha-Dharma will not be [practiced] in vain.

[61]     [Someone] asks, “When we hear of India and China in the past and present, there are those who realized the state of truth on hearing the voice of a bamboo, or who clarified the mind on seeing the colors of the flowers.94 Furthermore, the Great Teacher Śākyamuni experienced the truth when he saw the bright star, Venerable Ānanda95 realized the Dharma when a temple flagpole fell, and not only that: among the five lineages following from the Sixth Patriarch96 many people have clarified the mental state under the influence of a single word or half a line of verse. Had they all, without exception, pursued the truth by sitting in zazen?”

I        say: We should know that these people of the past and present who clarified the mind on seeing forms and who realized the truth on hearing sounds, were all without intellectual doubt in pursuing the truth, and just in the moment of the present there was no second person.

[62]     [Someone] asks, “In India and China, the people are originally unaffected and straight. Being at the center of the civilized world makes them so. As a result, when they are taught the Buddha-Dharma they understand and enter very quickly. In our country, from ancient times the people have had little benevolence and wisdom, and it is difficult for us to accumulate the seeds of rightness. Being the savages and barbarians97 [of the southeast] makes us so. How could we not regret it? Furthermore, people who have left home in this country are inferior even to the laypeople of the great nations; our whole society is stupid, and our minds are narrow and small. We are deeply attached to the results of intentional effort, and we like superficial quality. Can people like this expect to experience the Buddha-Dharma straight away, even if they sit in zazen?”

I        say: As you say, the people of our country are not yet universally benevolent and wise, and some people are indeed crooked. Even if we preach right and straight Dharma to them, they will turn nectar into poison. They easily tend toward fame and gain, and it is hard for them to dissolve their delusions and attachments. On the other hand, to experience and enter the Buddha Dharma, one need not always use the worldly wisdom of human beings and gods as a vessel for transcendence of the world.98 When the Buddha was in [the] world, [an old monk] experienced the fourth effect [when hit] by a ball,99 and [a prostitute] clarified the great state of truth after putting on a kaṣāya;100 both were dull people, stupid and silly creatures. But aided by right belief, they had the means to escape their delusion. Another case was the devout woman preparing a midday meal who disclosed the state of realization when she saw a stupid old bhikṣu101 sitting in quietness. This did not derive from her wisdom, did not derive from writings, did not depend on words, and did not depend on talk; she was aided only by her right belief. Furthermore, Śākyamuni’s teachings have been spreading through the three thousand-world only for around two thousand or so years. Countries are of many kinds; not all are nations of benevolence and wisdom. How could all people, moreover, possess only intelligence and wisdom, keenness [of ear] and clarity [of eye]? But the right Dharma of the Tathāgata is originally furnished with unthinkably great virtue and power, and so when the time comes it will spread through those countries. When people just practice with right belief, the clever and the stupid alike will attain the truth. Just because our country is not a nation of benevolence or wisdom and the people are dull-witted, do not think that it is impossible for us to grasp the Buddha-Dharma. Still more, all human beings have the right seeds of prajñā in abundance. It may simply be that few of us have experienced the state directly, and so we are immature in receiving and using it.

[65]          The above questions and answers have come and gone, and the alternation between audience and speaker has been untidy. How many times have I caused flowers to exist in flowerless space?102 On the other hand, the fundamental principle of pursuing the truth by sitting in zazen has never been transmitted to this country; anyone who hoped to know it would have been disappointed. This is why I intend to gather together the few experiences I had abroad, and to record the secrets of an enlightened teacher,103 so that they may be heard by any practitioner who desires to hear them. In addition, there are standards and conventions for monasteries and temples but there is not enough time to teach them now, and they must not be [taught] in haste.

[66]          In general, it was very fortunate for the people of our country that, even though we are situated east of the Dragon Sea and are far separated by clouds and mist, from around the reigns of Kinmei104 and Yōmei,105 the Buddha Dharma of the west spread to us in the east. However, confusion has multiplied over concepts and forms, and facts and circumstances, disturbing the situation of practice. Now, because we make do with tattered robes and mended bowls, tying thatch so that we can sit and train by the blue cliffs and white rocks, the matter of the ascendant state of buddha becomes apparent at once, and we swiftly master the great matter of a lifetime of practice. This is just the decree of Ryūge [Mountain],106 and the legacy of Kukkuṭapāda [Mountain].107 The forms and standards for sitting in zazen may be practiced following the Fukanzazengi which I compiled in the Karoku era.108

[68] Now, in spreading the Buddha’s teaching throughout a nation, on the one hand, we should wait for the king’s decree, but on the other hand, when we recall the bequest of Vulture Peak, the kings, nobles, ministers, and generals now manifested in hundred myriad koṭis of realms all have gratefully accepted the Buddha’s decree and, not forgetting the original aim of earlier lives to guard and maintain the Buddha’s teaching, they have been born. [Within] the frontiers of the spread of that teaching, what place could not be a buddha land? Therefore, when we want to disseminate the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, it is not always necessary to select a [particular] place or to wait for [favorable] circumstances. Shall we just consider today to be the starting point? So I have put this together and I will leave it for wise masters who aspire to the Buddha-Dharma and for the true stream of practitioners who wish, like wandering clouds or transient water weeds, to explore the state of truth.

                                    Mid-autumn day, [in the third year of] Kanki.109

                                    Written by the śramaṇa110 Dōgen, who entered                                     Song [China] and received the transmission of                                     the Dharma.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Bendōwa

Notes

1 represents the Sanskrit word Shobutsu nyorai. The expression derives from the tathāgata, which means “one who has arrived in theLotus Sutra (see LS 1.88). Nyorai state of reality.” It is the highest epithet of a buddha. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 2 the Sanskrit phrase Anoku-bodai, short for anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. Bodhianokutara-sanmyaku-sanbodai,means “perfect wisdom,” “thewhich is a transliteration of truth,” or “the state of truth.” See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

3     in-zanmai, samādhi explained from many viewpoints in the Jijuyō-zanmai. Ji means “self,” samādhiju means “to receive,” and (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). Shōbōgenzō, for example as as Dharma-nature; as means “to use.” jishō-zanmai,the SamādhisamādhiZanmaikai-is represents the Sanskrit word

experience when making effort without an intentional aim.that is king of samādhias the state like the sea; and as s. Jijuyō-zanmaihosshō-zanmai, samādhi suggests the state of natural balance that wezanmai-ō-zanmai, samādhi as self-experience; as

4     law, things and phenomena, method, reality, etc. “This Dharma” suggests the methodof zazen and at the same time the reality of zazen.has a wide range of meanings: Dharma, dharmas (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms),

5     In the state of zazen, our consciousness is whole.

6     Dōgen used the words “Effort” is kufu; “pursuing the truth” is kufu-bendō to express zazen itself.bendō, as in the chapter title Bendōwa. Master

7     Banpō,note 4. lit., ten thousand dharmas; in other words, all things and phenomena. See

8     contains the phrase Shutsuro. Shutsuworries and sensory attachments. that is, the state of vigorous action in which our body gets free from intellectualmeans “to get out” and shusshin no katsuro,ro“the vigorous road of the body getting out,”means “path” or “road.” The Fukanzazengi

9     Sanskrit Terms).Chishiki, short for zenchishiki, from the Sanskrit kalyāṇamitra (see Glossary of

10 set off together in 1223 to investigate Buddhism in China. Master Myōzen died onZenkō. Zen stands for Myōzen; kō is an honorific. Master Myōzen and Master Dōgen

May 5, 1225, at the age of forty-one, in the Ryōnenryō Dormitory at Tendōzan.

the Tendai sect on Mount Hiei.becoming the disciple of Master Eisai, Master Myōzen had learned the teachings of

11    The seasons of autumn and spring, respectively.

12    Master Eisai (1141–1215), who went to China and introduced the transmission of theRinzai sect into Japan. 13 A province in eastern China, bordering the East China Sea.

14    (The so-called Sōtō, Rinzai, Hōgen, Igyō, and Unmon sects. See Chapter Forty-nineVol. III), Butsudō.

15    Jō Zenji, Master Tendō Nyojō (1163–1228), successor of Master Setchō Chikan.Usually referred to in the Shōbōgenzō as Senshi, “my late master.” 16 Daibyakuhō, lit., “Great White Peak,” is another name for Tendōzan, where Master Tendō Nyojō led the order from 1224 until his death.

17    The Shōjō era was from 1228 to 1233.

18    Real wisdom. See Chapter Two, Maka-hannya-haramitsu. 19 In order to find a true teacher.

20    Vulture Peak (Skt. Gṛdhrakūṭa) is so called because the silhouette of the mountain resembles a vulture. The Buddha often preached there.

21    Master Mahākāśyapa, the first patriarch in India.

22    Master Bodhidharma (sixth century), the twenty-eighth patriarch in India and theFirst Patriarch in China. 23 Master Taiso Eka, the Second Patriarch in China.

24    as Tōchisaiten-tōchi,(Eastern Lands): China. Master Dōgen commonly referred to India and China“the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands.”

25    Master Daikan Enō (638–713), the Sixth Patriarch in China.

26    Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744).

27    eage.Master Seigen Gyōshi (d. 740), the Seventh Chinese Patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lin-

28    Or it can be interpreted as concrete form, or posture. Butsu-in,lit., “Buddha-seal.” Incan be interpreted as a seal of approval, that is, certification.

29    ō-zanmai,Butsu-shin-in,Master Dōgen says that the Buddha-mind–seal is the full lotus posturelit., “Buddha-mind–seal.” In Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), Zanmaiitself.

30    The Later Han dynasty was from 25 to 221 C.E.

31    Literally, “cut the roots of the arrowroot and wisteria.” These two vines symbolizesomething confused or complicated. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Kattō.

32    Jijuyō-zanmai; the state of natural balance, see note 3.

33    Buppō, “Buddha-Dharma,” or “Buddhist method,” in this case means zazen itself. 34 mind.Sangō, the three kinds of conduct or behavior; that is, behavior of body, speech, and

35    six human states, are the three miserable worlds plus the worlds of demons (Sanzu,of hungry ghosts (human beings, and gods (lit., “three courses,” or the three miserable states or worlds, are hell, the worldpretas), and the world of animals. devas). See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.Rokudō, lit., “six ways” or theasuras),

36    Dai-gedatsu-chi. Daimeans to get free of all hindrances. means great. GedatsuChi means state.represents the Sanskrit vimukti, which

37    The Sanskrit bodhiFicus religiosameans the state of truth. The Buddha attained the truth sitting). In Buddhist countries this tree is called the bodhi under a pipal tree (tree.

38    Seventy-four (Vol. IV), Tenbōrin, turning of the Dharma wheel, symbolizes Buddhist preaching. See ChapterTenbōrin.

39    Mutōdō, lit., “equality without equal,” from the Sanskrit Heart Sutra3.270). (see Chapter Two, Maka-hannya-haramitsuasamasama. The expression), and in the Lotus Sutraappears in the (LS

40    Toward the practitioner—the practice influences both object and subject.

41    Jijuyō no kyōgai,balance. See note 3.lit., “the area of receiving and using self,” that is, the state of natural

42    Hyakutō, lit., “hundreds of heads,” suggesting miscellaneous concrete things.

43    Questions and answers are not separated in the source text. They have been separatedhere for ease of reading.

44    Sanze, the past, present, and future; eternity.

45    Daijō, Mahayana Buddhism. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms, Mahayana.

46    Taiyakukei. See LS 1.86–88.

47    Tonzen-shugyō. Tonzen stands for tongo, “instantaneous realization,” and zengo, based on the two views of time.“gradual realization.” These represent two views of realization—as occurring just inthe moment of practice, and as a process continuing over a long line of moments— 48 muni, Kāśyapa, and Śākyamuni (see Chapter Fifteen, The seven ancient buddhas were Vipaśyin, Śikhin, Viśvabhū, Kraku cchanda, Kanaka-Busso). Belief in the Seven Śākyamuni.Buddhas reflects the belief that the Dharma is eternal, predating the historical Buddha, 49 Hōsshi. In Master Dōgen’s time some priests in the Tendai sect had this title.

50    Hokkeshū. Hokkemeans religion or sect. stands for Hokkekyō,HokkeshūSutra of the Flower of Dharmawas the name formerly used for the,” the Lotus Sutra. ShūTendai sect, which was established in China by Master Tendai Chigi based on theLotus Sutra. It was introduced into Japan by Master Saichō (767–822).

51    also established in China, based on the SutraKegonkyō,), see note 79. It was introduced into Japan in lit., “Kegon teaching,” means the teaching of the Kegon sect, which wasAvataṃsaka-sūtra 736. (Jp. Kegonkyō; Garland 52 Shingonshū. The Shingon sect is derived from Vajrayana Buddhism. Master Kūkai

Vajrayana Buddhism reveres Vajra sattva, the Diamond Buddha, who is said to havewent to China and brought the teachings of the Shingon sect back to Japan in 806. received the transmission from Vairocana, the Sun Buddha.

53 “Mind here and now is buddha” is mind becomes buddha” is ze-shin-sa-butsu.soku-shin-ze-butsu—the title of Chapter Six. “This 54 That is, the five buddhas in the mandala used in the esoteric Buddhism of the Shingon sect. A mandala is a pictorial representation with Vairocana Buddha in the middlesurrounded by buddhas to his north, south, east, and west.

55    Go, time. A or kō,kalparepresents the sound of the Sanskrit was explained, for example, as the time it would take to wear away akalpa, which means an infinitely long large boulder if a heavenly being brushed it once every three years with its sleeve.

56    the accumulation of material phenomena but also something that has meaning. Kōdai no monji, lit., “the wide and great characters,” suggests Dharma as not only

57    An image of the moon, not the moon itself.

58    yang, Meiyō no shintō. Meiyō means “yin and yang.” Shintō, lit., “Way of the Gods,” is theyin and the ings with indigenous Japanese beliefs.ethnic spiritual religion of Japan. The idea of two lineages of Shintō, the seems to have originated with attempts of the Shingon sect to reconcile its teach-

59    An arhat is a person who has attained the ultimate state (the fourth effect) of a (learning. The arhat is the subject of Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms), that is, the ultimate level of abstract BuddhistArakan.  śrāvaka

60    “Perceive it directly” is and mind, we directly experience the state of buddha. This is to receive a hit.”means to be struck by reality directly in momentary experience. In the last sectionjōtō,Gakudō yōjin shūshort for jōtō, or “receiving a hit,” as follows: “Using this bodyjōju-gattō,(Collection of Concerns in Learning thelit., “receiving a hit.” Generally,

jōtōof his independent work Truth), Master Dōgen explains

61    Kūge, “flowers in space,” symbolizes images. See Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III), Kūge.

62    pratītyasamutpādaJūni-rinden, the twelvefold cycle of cause and effect, from the Sanskrit (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). See, for example, LS dvādaśānga2.56.

63    philosophies; the Twenty-four (Vol. II),Sanjō, “three vehicles,” or the three kinds of Buddhists, are explained in Chapter pratyekabuddha,Bukkyō. They are the who relies on the theory of dependent origination sravaka, who relies on the theory of four beings and gods.(the twelvefold cycle of cause and effect); and the bodhisattva, who relies on the sixs (the six accomplishments). The five vehicles are these three, plus human

64    Sangaku,(dhyāna, usually translated as “meditation”), and wisdom (from the Sanskrit tisraḥ śikṣāḥ, are the precepts (prajñāśīla), the balanced state). See Glossary of

Sanskrit Terms.

65    accomplishment. (as real wisdom (The Sanskrit word śīlachan), patience or zenprajñā. (kṣāntiRokudō,pāramitā), diligence the six means that which has arrived at the opposite shore, anpāramitā(vīryadhyāna), the practice of meditation s, are giving (was rendered into Chinese and Japanesedāna), keeping the precepts(dhyāna), and). The Sanskrit

66    Ichidaijiten-hokke.appears in the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.88–90 and Chapter Seventeen, Hokke-

67    on Shōshitsu Peak.The Songshan Mountains consist of two main peaks, Taishitsu to the east, and Shōshitsuto the west. These mountains contained many Buddhist temples; Shaolin Temple was

68    lit., “The zazen sect is dhyāna sect,” or Zen sect.zazenshū, lit., “sitting dhyāna sect.” Dropping the za gives zenshū, 69 Kōroku, “broad records,” and goroku, “record of the words.” See Bibliography. 70 Shigi, walking, standing, sitting, and lying down.

71    Joyful Practice”).Zazen wa sunawachi anraku no homon nari.Chōro Sōsaku, who was the editor of the ). Master Dōgen quotes the same words in the anraku, “peaceful and joyful” or “stable and comfortable,” is contained inZenenshingi Lotus Sutra, “Anrakugyō”These words may originate with MasterFukanzazengi(Pure Criteria for Zen Monas-(see Appendix II(“Peaceful and). series The word

the title of the fourteenth chapter of the

72    Master Daikan Enō. See note 25. 73 Master Tendō Nyojō.

74    Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Master Nangaku Ejō. The conversation between Master Daikan Enō and Master Nan-Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Inmo; and Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), pt. 2, no. 1. See also Chapter Seven, Hensan.Senjō; gaku Ejō is recorded in

75    Keitokudentōroku, chapter 5, in the section on Master Honjō.

76    (Shōji,Vol. IVlit., “life and death” or “living-and-dying,” is the title of Chapter Ninety-two).

77    graph Shōmetsu. Shōshōmetsumeans not only “life” but also “birth” and “appearance.” In this para-has also been translated as “appearance and disappearance.”

78    Shōkai, lit., “essence-ocean.”

79    to the Buddha by a brahman called Senika. See Chapter Six, The Avataṃsaka-sūtra (Jp. Kegonkyō; Garland Sutra) records many questions putSoku-shin-ze-butsu.

80    Master Nan’yō Echū (675?–775), successor of Master Daikan Enō. “National Master” teen, and Forty-four (Vol. III).was his title as teacher of the emperor. See for example Chapters Six, Eighteen, Nine-

81    preaches the existence of all things,” held that For example, the Sarvāstivāda school, rendered as dharmasetsu-issai-u-bu,s have a real existence in the or “the school that widely studied in China and Japan. Past, present, and future. This school flourished in India for many centuries and was

82    discuss extinction” roughly correspond to the Śūnyatā school, or existence. School that stressed the teachings of nirvana, but which here is opposed to “Extinction” is jakumetsu, which was sometimes used as a translation of the Sanskritśūnyatā,jōjū, “eternal existence.” Thus, “lineages that which deny that there can be any statickūmon, i.e., the

83    Sanskrit Terms, nirvana. The Sanskrit word nirvāṇa literally means the extinction of a flame. See Glossary of 84 Jikai-bongyō. BongyōTerms). Gyōji, lit., “conduct and keeping” or “practice and continuance,” is the title represents the Sanskrit brahmacarya (see Glossary of Sanskrit of Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II).

85    (is characteristic of the esoteric Buddhism of the Shingon sect. Shingon-shikan no gyo. Shingon, lit., “truth-word,” means mantra. The use of maraschino, lit., the same as the practice of zazen explained by Master Dōgen, but in the Tendai sectand reflecting,” representing the Sanskrit words insight, reflection), is a practice of the Tendai sect: the method of practice is almost śamatha (quietness) and the practice is not regarded as sufficient in itself.

86    the Buddhist patriarchs in general; when capitalized, as “the Buddhist Patriarch,” it Busso is the title of Chapter Fifteen. Translated as “Buddhist patriarchs,” it refers to usually refers to the Buddha or to Master Bodhi dharma.

87    Taisō, a Tang emperor who reigned from 763 to 779, and a student of Master Nan’yōEchū.

88    Junsō, another Tang emperor, who reigned from 805 to 806.

89    thousand years during which the Dharma begins to pale; and the next ten thousand years during which the Dharma degenerates. See Glossary of during which the Dharma would flourish; were divided into three periods: Matsudai. Ma stands for saddharma.mappō, “latter Dharma.” The years after the Buddha’s deathshōbō, “right Dharma,” the first five hundred yearszōbō, “imitative Dharma,” the next onemappō, “latter Dharma,”

Sanskrit Terms, under

90    Sokkō-kan-in. Sokkō is the monk’s name; san in modern Japanese. is an honorific used for both priests andKanin or kansu is one laymen, approximately equivalent to of the six main officers of a large temple.

91    of the Hōgen sect.Master Hōgen Bun’eki (885–958), successor of Master Rakan Keichin and founder

92    means “self.” So Sokkō’s question was “What am I?”Gakunin no jiko. Gakunin, student, was used by a student to refer to himself. Jiko

93    real effort of a practitioner to pursue what is already there.Dōjifire.” Byōjō-dōji. Byōmeans child. The words “The children of fire come looking for fire” suggest theor tei is the fourth calendar sign, read as or hei is the third calendar sign, read as hinoto, or “younger brother of fire.”hinoe, or “older brother of

94    These examples of Buddhist masters realizing the truth are recorded in detail in Chapter Nine, Keisei-sanshiki. 95 Master Ānanda was the second patriarch in India, the successor of Master Mahā- kāśyapa.

96    Master Daikan Enō.

97    Ban-I. Of barbarians surrounding them. These included the and the people living to the south and east of China, including the Japanese. AS the center of civilization, the Chinese supposed the existence of four groupstō-i, the barbarians of the east. So the words “savages and barbarians” suggestnan-ban, the savages of the south

98    oneself in the world.” In the latter usage, the words usually mean to become the master Shusse can be interpreted either as “to transcend the secular world” or as “to manifest of a large temple.

99    order. So he led the old monk into a dark room and hit him with a ball, saying, “YouA young monk wanted to play a joke on a stupid old monk who lived in the Buddha’s him one last time and said, “You have got the fourth effect.” Strangely, when the old the fourth effect, refers to the state of an arhat, that is, the ultimate state of Hinayana monk came out of the dark room he had actually experienced the fourth effect. Then he hit him a third time and said, “You have got the third effect.” Finally he hit have got the first effect.” He hit him again and said, “You have got the second effect. “Shika,

Buddhism.

100  in Chapter Twelve, The story of the prostitute who put on a Kesa-kudoku.       kaṣāya (Buddhist robe) as a joke is recorded 101 A Buddhist monk (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms).

102  Chapter Forty-two [Vol. III], Here kūge, “flowers in space,” represents abstract images as opposed to reality. (InKūge, flowers in space and real flowers are identified.)

103  Master Tendō Nyojō.

104  539–571.

105  585–587.

106  Master Ryūge Kodon (835–923), successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai, lived on RyūgeMountain and made many poems praising the beautiful scenery of nature. 107 Master Mahākāśyapa, successor of the Buddha, is said to have died on Kukkuṭapāda Mountain in Magadha.

108  pitsubon,at the the Standard Method of Zazensummer of 1227 and wrote his first draft of the The Karoku era was from 1225 to 1227. Master Dōgen returned to Japan in the lateRufubon,“ Original Edition.” After revising this edition, Master Dōgen finally arrived“Popular Edition.” See Appendix II.) shortly thereafter. The initial version is called Fukanzazengi (Universal Guide toShin-

109  The fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month, 1231.

110  Monk (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms).

[Chapter Two]

Maka-hannya-haramitsu Mahāprajñāpāramitā

Translator’s Note: Maka is a phonetic rendering of the Sanskrit word mahā, which means “great.” Hannya is a phonetic rendering of the Sanskrit word prajñā, which can be translated as “real wisdom” or “intuitive reflection.” Haramitsu is a phonetic rendering of the Sanskrit word pāramitā, which literally means “to have arrived at the opposite shore,” that is, to have accomplished the truth. So maka-hannya-haramitsu means the accomplishment that is great real wisdom. In this chapter, Master Dōgen wrote his interpretation of the Mahāprajñāpāramitāhṛdaya-sūtra. Hṛdaya means heart. This short sutra, usually called the Heart Sutra, represents the heart of the six hundred volumes of the Mahā prajñā pāramitā-sūtra. Even though it is very short, the Heart Sutra contains the most fundamental principle of Buddhism. What is the most fundamental principle? Prajñā. What is prajñā? Prajñā, or real wisdom, is a kind of intuitive ability that occurs in our body and mind, when our body and mind are in the state of balance and harmony. We normally think that wisdom is something based on the intellect, but Buddhists believe that wisdom, on which our decisions are based, is not intellectual but intuitive. The right decision comes from the right state of body and mind, and the right state of body and mind comes when our body and mind are balanced and harmonized. So mahāprajñāpāramitā is wisdom that we have when our body and mind are balanced and harmonized. And zazen is the practice by which our body and mind enter the state of balance and harmony. Mahā prajñā pāramitā, then, is the essence of zazen.

[71] “When Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara1 practices the profound prajñā pāramitā, the whole body2 reflects that the five aggregates3 are totally empty.”4 The five aggregates are form, feeling, perception, volition, and consciousness. They are five instances of prajñā. Reflection is prajñā itself. When this principle is preached and realized, it is said that “matter is just the immaterial”5 and the immaterial is just matter. Matter is matter, the immaterial is the immaterial.6 22c

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They are hundreds of things,7 and myriad phenomena. Twelve instances of prajñā pāramitā are the twelve entrances [of sense perception].8 There are also eighteen instances of prajñā.9 They are eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind;10 sights, sounds, smells, tastes, sensations, and properties;11 plus the consciousnesses of eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind. There are a further four instances of prajñā. They are suffering, accumulation, cessation, and the Way.12 There are a further six instances of prajñā. They are giving, pure [observance of] precepts, patience, diligence, meditation, and prajñā [itself].13 One further instance of prajñāpāramitā is realized as the present moment. It is the state of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.14 There are three further instances of prajñāpāramitā. They are past, present, and future.15 There are six further instances of prajñā. They are earth, water, fire, wind, space, and consciousness.16 And there are a further four instances of prajñā that are constantly practiced in everyday life: they are walking, standing, sitting, and lying down.17

[74] In the order of Śākyamuni Tathāgata there is a bhikṣu18 who secretly thinks, “I shall bow in veneration of the profound prajñāpāramitā.Although in this state there is no appearance and disappearance of real dharmas,19 there are still understandable explanations of all precepts, all balanced states, all kinds of wisdom, all kinds of liberation, and all views. There are also understandable explanations of the fruit of one who has entered the stream, the fruit of [being subject to] one return, the fruit of [not being subject to] returning, and the fruit of the arhat.20 There are also understandable explanations of [people of] independent awakening,21 and [people of] bodhi.22 There are also understandable explanations of the supreme right and balanced state of bodhi. There are also understandable explanations of the treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. There are also understandable explanations of turning the wonderful Dharma wheel23 to save sentient beings.” The Buddha, knowing the bhikṣu’s mind, tells him, “This is how it is. This is how it is. The profound prajñāpāra mitā is too subtle and fine to fathom.”24

The bhikṣu’s “secretly working concrete mind”25 at this moment is, in the state of bowing in veneration of real dharmas, prajñā itself—whether or not [real dharmas] are without appearance and disappearance—and this is a “venerative bow” itself. Just at this moment of bowing in veneration, prajñā is realized as explanations that can be understood: [explanations] from “precepts,

Chapter Two

balance, and wisdom,”26 to “saving sentient beings,” and so on. This state is described as being without.27 Explanations of the state of “being without” can thus be understood. Such is the profound, subtle, unfathomable prajñā pāramitā. [76] The god Indra28 asks the venerable monk Subhūti,29 “Virtuous One! When bodhisattva mahāsattvas30 want to study31 the profound prajñā pāramitā, how should they study it?”

             Subhūti replies, “Kauśika!32 When bodhisattva mahāsattvas want to           

study the profound prajñāpāramitā, they should study it as space.”33 So studying prajñā is space itself. Space is the study of prajñā.

[77] The god Indra subsequently addresses the Buddha, “World-honored One! When good sons and daughters receive and retain, read and recite, think reasonably about, and expound to others this profound prajñāpāramitā that you have preached, how should I guard it? My only desire, World-honored

One, is that you will show me compassion and teach me.”

Then the venerable monk Subhūti says to the god Indra, “Kauśika! Do

you see something that you must guard, or not?”

The god Indra says, “No, Virtuous One, I do not see anything here that I must guard.”

Subhūti says, “Kauśika! When good sons and daughters abide in the profound prajñāpāramitā as thus preached, they are just guarding it. When good sons and daughters abide in the profound prajñāpāramitā as thus preached, they never stray. Remember, even if all human and nonhuman beings were looking for an opportunity to harm them, in the end it would be impossible. Kauśika! If you want to guard the bodhisattvas who abide in the profound prajñāpāramitā as thus preached, it is no different from wanting to guard space.”34

Remember, to receive and retain, to read and recite, and to think reasonably about [prajñā] are just to guard prajñā. And to want to guard it is to receive and retain it, to read and recite it, and so on. [78] My late master, the eternal buddha, says:

Whole body like a mouth, hanging in space; Not asking if the wind is east, west, south, or north, For all others equally, it speaks prajñā.

Chin ten ton ryan chin ten ton.35

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This is the speech of prajñā [transmitted] by Buddhist patriarchs from rightful successor to rightful successor. It is prajñā as the whole body, it is prajñā as the whole of others,36 it is prajñā as the whole self, and it is prajñā as the whole east, west, south, and north.

[79] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Śāriputra!37 These many sentient beings should abide in this prajñāpāramitā as buddhas. When they serve offerings

23b to, bow in veneration of, and consider the prajñāpāramitā, they should be as if serving offerings to and bowing in veneration of the buddha-bhagavats.38 Why? [Because] the prajñāpāramitā is no different from the buddha-bhagavats, and the buddha-bhagavats are no different from the prajñā pāramitā. The prajñāpāramitā is just the buddha-bhagavats themselves, and the buddhabhagavats are just the prajñāpāramitā itself. Wherefore? Because, Śāriputra, the apt, right, and balanced state of truth, which all the tathāgatas have, is always realized by virtue of the prajñāpāramitā. Because, Śāriputra, all bodhisattva mahāsattvas, the independently awakened, arhats, those beyond returning, those who will return once, those received into the stream, and so on, always attain realization by virtue of prajñāpāramitā. And because, Śāri putra, all of the ten virtuous paths of action39 in the world, the four states of meditation,40 the four immaterial balanced states,41 and the five mystical powers42 are always realized by virtue of the prajñāpāramitā.

[80] So buddha-bhagavats are the prajñāpāramitā, and the prajñā pāramitā is “these real dharmas.” These “real dharmas” are “bare manifestations”: they are “neither appearing nor disappearing, neither dirty nor pure, neither increasing nor decreasing.” The realization of this prajñāpāramitā is the realization of buddha-bhagavats. We should inquire into it, and we should experience it. To serve offerings to it and to bow in veneration is just to serve and to attend buddha-bhagavats, and it is buddha-bhagavats in service and attendance.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Maka-hannya-haramitsu                                     Preached to the assembly at Kannondōri-in                                     Temple on a day of the summer retreat in the                                     first year of Tenpuku.43

                                    Copied in the attendant monks’ quarters at                                      Kippō Temple in Etsu44 on the twenty-first day                                      of the third lunar month in spring of the second                                      year of Kangen.45

Chapter Two

The Heart Sutra of Mahāprajñāpāramitā

Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, when practicing the profound prajñāpāramitā, reflects that the five aggregates are totally empty, and overcomes all pain and wrongdoing. Śāriputra, matter is no different from the immaterial, and the immaterial is no different from matter. Matter is just the immaterial, and the immaterial is just matter. Feeling, perception, volition, and consciousness are also like this. Śāriputra, these real dharmas are bare manifestations. They are neither appearing nor disappearing, neither tainted nor pure, neither increasing nor decreasing. Therefore, in the state of emptiness, there is no form, no feeling, no perception, no volition, no consciousness. There are no eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, or mind; no sights, sounds, smells, tastes, sensations, properties. There is no realm of eyes, nor any other [elementary realm]: there is no realm of mind-consciousness. There is no ignorance, and no ending of ignorance, nor any other [causal process]: there is no old age and death, and no ending of old age and death. There is no suffering, accumulation, cessation, or path. There is no wisdom, and no attaining—because [the state] is nonattainment. Bodhisattvas rely upon prajñāpāramitā, and therefore their minds have no hindrance. They have no hindrance, and therefore they are without fear. They leave all confused dream-images far behind, and realize the ultimate state of nirvana. Buddhas of the three times rely upon prajñāpāramitā, and therefore they attain anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. So remember: prajñāpāramitā is a great and mystical mantra; it is a great and luminous mantra; it is the supreme mantra; it is a mantra in the unequaled state of equilibrium. It can clear away all suffering. It is real, not empty. Therefore we invoke the mantra of prajñāpāramitā. We invoke the mantra as follows:

Gate, gate, pāragate, pārasamgate. Bodhi, svāhā.

The Heart Sutra of Prajñā

 

Notes

1     Lotus Sutra,Kanjizai Bosatsu, lit., “Bodhisattva of Free Reflection,” is one of the Chinese renderingsof Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva (see Chapter Thirty-three [Vol. II], chapter 25, Heart Sutra.Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon). This paragraph begins with theKannon, and the same words as the

2     Master Dōgen added to the first line of the body,” as the subject of shoken, “to reflect.”Heart Sutra the word konshin, “whole 3 Go-un, from the Sanskrit pañca-skandha. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms, skandha.

4     “Empty,” As an adjective, kū, which represents the Sanskrit means bare, bald, naked, empty, as it is.śūnyatā (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms).

5     “The immaterial” is also kū, this time used as a noun. In this case, means the immamental face of reality as opposed to matter. In other cases, the noun empty state, that is, the state in which reality is as it is. See Chapter Twenty-two (Vol.II), terial, that which is empty, or devoid of physical substance; that is, the spiritual orBusshō. kū means the

6     and The sutra says shiki-soku-ze-kū, “matter is just the immaterial,” and shiki-ze-shiki,kū-soku-ze-shiki,matter is matter,

“the immaterial is just matter.” Master Dōgen added kū-ze-kū, the immaterial is the immaterial.

7     Hyakusō, lit., “hundreds of weeds.”

8     Jūni-ju, “twelve entrances,” from the Sanskrit dvādaśāyatanāni, are the six sense organs and their objects.

9     senses, their objects, and the six corresponding kinds of consciousness. See GlossaryJuhachi-kai,of Sanskrit Terms under lit., “eighteen realms,” from the Sanskrit dhātu-loka.    aśṭādaśa dhāta vaḥ, are the

10    which is placed on the same level as the senses, below touch. Shin, “body,” from the Sanskrit I, “mind,” from the Sanskrit kāya,manas,means the body, or the skin, as the organ ofmeans the mind as the center of thought,prajñā.

11    Shoku, hō,the objects of body and mind as sense organs.“sensations and properties” from the Sanskrit sparśa and dharma, represent

12    words derive from the Sanskrit Shitai, the four philosophies, or the Four [Noble] Truths, are duḥkha-satya (truth of suffering), ku, shu, metsu, dō.samudaya-satyaThese

37

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of the right way).(truth of accumulation), nirodha-satya (truth of dissolution), and mārga-satya (truth

13    in detail in Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III), Rokudō, the six pāramitās. In Sanskrit they are as follows: Giving is Bodaisatta-shishōbō.vīrya. Meditation is by the Chinese charactersPure [observance of]dhyāna.dāna, explained(Dhyāna pāramitā,zen-na,is sometimes represented phonetically in the but in this case real wisdom, is śīla. Patience is dhyānaprajñākṣānti.is expressed as .Diligence is Shōbōgenzōjō-ryo, lit., “quiet thought.”) The sixth precepts is

14    The Sanskrit “the supreme balanced and right state of truth.”Chinese in the second paragraph of this chapter as anuttara samyaksaṃbodhibodhi.” Alternative renderings into Chinese are (see Chapter One, note 2) is rendered intomujō-shōtō-bodai,mujō-tōshō-gaku,“the suprememujōright and balanced state of shōtō-gaku, “the supreme right and balanced state of truth,” and

15    Sanze, the three times.

16    Rokudai,dhātu.the six elements. In Sanskrit, saḍ dhātavaḥ. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms under

17    Shigi, the four forms of conduct.

18    The Sanskrit word bhikṣu (originally “mendicant”) means a Buddhist monk.

19    Mu-shohō-shōmetsu, kūsō . . . Fushō-fumetsu: or shohō no shōmetsu nashi. “These real dharmas are bare manifestations. They neitherThe Heart Sutra says ze-shohōappear nor disappear.”

20    The panna,śrāvakathe second is (“auditor”) passes through these four stages. In Sanskrit, the first is sakṛdāgāmin, the third is anāgāmin, and the fourth is arhat.srotā-

21    Twenty-four (Vol. II), buddhas, which the Buddha explains in the Buddhist. The distinction between Doku-kaku, lit., “independently awakened,” means Bukkyō.      śrāvakas, Lotus Sutra,pratyekabuddhapratyekabuddhais described in Chapters, bodhisattvas, and, a naturalistic

22    bodhisattva.Bodai, in this case, seems to suggest a person who has the state of bodhi, that is, a

23    Tenmyōhōrin, See Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), “turning the wonderful Dharma wheel,” means Buddhist preaching. Tenbōrin. 24 This passage is quoted from the tachment to Form.” Daihannyakyō, chapter 291, “Attachment and Nonat-

25       state of mind, which is “concrete”; and Setsu-sa-ze-nen.thought.” But sa,nen,“make,” also means “to act,” or “to function”; In the sutra, these characters literally mean “secretly made this “thought,” or “image in the mind,” also means “mindfulness,”nen not as a thought but as the monk ‘Sze, “this,” also means or “state of mind.” Master Dōgen interpreted prajñā itself, which is the state of action itself.

Chapter Two

26       of Sanskrit Terms under Precepts, balance, and wisdom are tisraḥ śikṣāḥ.sangaku, the three kinds of training. See Glossary

27       character Mu, nashi, is no appearance and disappearance” (see note 19), and “without appearance and dis-expresses absence. In this paragraph, mu means “the state of being without,” i.e., the state that ismu-shometsu is translated as “there Busshō. The free. This usage is explained in detail in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), appearance.” As a noun, mu appears over twenty times in the Heart Sutra.

28       Tentai-shaku. Tentai is literally “god-emperor” and shaku stands for Śakra-devānāmindra, which is the Sanskrit name of the god Indra. This figure was incorporated into Buddhism as a guardian of Buddhist teachings. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

29       Guju-zengen. Guju, term of reverence. Zengen, lit., “Good Manifestation,” is the Chinese rendering of “venerable monk,” is derived from the Sanskrit āyuṣmat, a

Subhūti, one of the Buddha’s disciples.

30       Mahāsattvaa Buddhist practitioner. Literally means “great being.” Both bodhisattva and mahā sattva describe 31 Gaku includes both the meaning of “learn” and of “practice.” Study of prajñā as space suggests the concrete practice of zazen.

32    Kauśika is another name of Indra. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

33    enty-seven (Vol. IV), Kokū, “empty space,” or “space,” from the Sanskrit Kokū.      ākāśa, is the title of Chapter Sev-

34    This story is also from the Daihannyakyō, chapter 291.

35    represents onomatopoeically the sound of the wind-bell. The original Chinese characters This poem about a wind-bell is from the Master [Tendō] Nyojō). The last line of the poem, Nyojōoshōgoroku“chin ten ton ryan chin ten ton,”teki chō tō ryō teki chō tō. (Record of the Words of The

original Chinese pronunciation is not known. Can be read in several ways in Japanese; for example,

36    “Others” is world.” In Master Dōgen’s commentary it suggests the latter meaning. A, which sometimes means “others” and sometimes means “the external 37 sūtraŚāriputra was one of the Buddha’s ten great disciples, and said to be foremost in wis-dom. He died while the Buddha was still alive. Much of the is addressed to Śāriputra.       Mahāprajñāpāramitā-

38    Bhagavat is a Sanskrit term of veneration. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

39    lies, two-faced speech, abusive slander, useless gossip, greed, anger, and devotion to Jū-zengōdō, the ten kinds of bad conduct, namely: killing, stealing, committing adultery, telling wrong views. or the ten paths of good action, are followed by refraining from doing

40    Shi-jōryo, or the “four dhyānas.” See Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV), Shizen-biku.

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41    as follows: 1) Shi-mushiki-jō,kū-muhen-sho-jō,or “the four balanced states that transcend the world of matter,” are “balance in infinite space”; 2) mu-shō-u-sho-jō, “balance in not having any-shiki-muhen-sho-jō, thinking.” Such enumeration of concepts is characteristic of Theravada Buddhism. Thing”; and 4) “balance in infinite consciousness”; 3) hisō-hihisō-sho-jō, “balance in transcendence of thinking and not42 Go-jinzū.Jinzū. The five mystical powers are discussed in Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), 43 1233.

44 Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture. 45 1244.

40

[Chapter Three] Genjō-kōan

The Realized Universe

Translator’s Note: Genjō means “realized,” and kōan is an abbreviation of kofu-no-antoku, which was a notice board on which a new law was announced to the public in ancient China. So kōan expresses a law, or a universal principle. In the Shōbōgenzō, genjō-kōan means the realized law of the universe, that is, Dharma or the real universe itself. The fundamental basis of Buddhism is belief in this real universe, and in Genjō-kōan Master Dōgen preaches to us the realized Dharma, or the real universe itself. When the seventy-five– chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō was compiled, this chapter was placed first, and from this fact we can recognize its importance.

[83]  When all dharmas are [seen as] the Buddha-Dharma, then there is delusion and realization, there is practice, there is life and there is death, there are buddhas and there are ordinary beings. When the myriad dharmas are 23c each not of the self, there is no delusion and no realization, no buddhas and no ordinary beings, no life and no death. The Buddha’s truth is originally transcendent over abundance and scarcity, and so there is life and death, there is delusion and realization, there are beings and buddhas. And though it is like this, it is only that flowers, while loved, fall; and weeds while hated, flourish.

[84]  Driving ourselves to practice and experience the myriad dharmas is delusion. When the myriad dharmas actively practice and experience ourselves, that is the state of realization. Those who greatly realize1 delusion are buddhas. Those who are greatly deluded about realization are ordinary beings. There are people who further attain realization on the basis of realization. There are people who increase their delusion in the midst of delusion. When buddhas are really buddhas, they do not need to recognize themselves as buddhas. Nevertheless, they are buddhas in the state of experience, and they go on experiencing the state of buddha.

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[85]  When we use the whole body and mind to look at forms, and when we use the whole body and mind to listen to sounds, even though we are sensing them directly, it is not like a mirror’s reflection2 of an image, and not like water and the moon. While we are experiencing one side, we are blind to the other side.

[86]  To learn the Buddha’s truth is to learn ourselves. To learn ourselves is to forget ourselves. To forget ourselves is to be experienced by the myriad dharmas. To be experienced by the myriad dharmas is to let our own body and mind, and the body and mind of the external world, fall away. There is a state in which the traces of realization are forgotten; and it manifests the traces of forgotten realization for a long, long time.

[87]  When people first seek the Dharma, we are far removed from the borders of Dharma. [But] as soon as the Dharma is authentically transmitted to us, we are a human being in [our] original element. When a man is sailing

along in a boat and he moves his eyes to the shore, he misapprehends that the shore is moving. If he keeps his eyes fixed on the boat, he knows that it is the boat that is moving forward. Similarly, when we try to understand the myriad dharmas on the basis of confused assumptions about body and mind, we misapprehend that our own mind or our own essence may be permanent. If we become familiar with action and come back to this concrete place, the truth is evident that the myriad dharmas are not self. Firewood becomes ash; it can never go back to being firewood. Nevertheless, we should not take the view that ash is its future and firewood is its past. Remember, firewood abides in the place of firewood in the Dharma. It has a past and it has a future. Although it has a past and a future, the past and the future are cut off. Ash exists in the place of ash in the Dharma. It has a past and it has a future. The firewood, after becoming ash, does not again become firewood. Similarly, human beings, after death, do not live again. At the same time, it is an established custom in the Buddha-Dharma not to say that life turns into death. This is why we speak of “no appearance.” And it is the Buddha’s preaching established in [the turning of] the Dharma wheel that death does not turn into life. This is why we speak of “no disappearance.”3 Life is an instantaneous situation, and death is also an instantaneous situation. It is the same, for example, with winter and spring. We do not think that winter becomes spring, and we do not say that spring becomes summer.

Chapter Three

[89]    A person getting realization is like the moon being reflected4 in water: the moon does not get wet, and the water is not broken. Though the light [of the moon] is wide and great, it is reflected in a foot or an inch of water. The whole moon and the whole sky are reflected in a dewdrop on a blade of grass and are reflected in a single drop of water. Realization does not break the individual, just as the moon does not pierce the water. The individual does not hinder the state of realization, just as a dewdrop does not 24b hinder the sky and moon. The depth [of realization] may be as the concrete height [of the moon]. The length of its moment should be investigated in large [bodies of] water and small [bodies of] water, and observed in the breadth of the sky and the moon.5

[90]    When the Dharma has not yet satisfied the body and mind we feel already replete with Dharma. When the Dharma fills the body and mind we feel one side to be lacking. For example, sailing out beyond the mountains and into the ocean, when we look around in the four directions, [the ocean] appears only to be round; it does not appear to have any other form at all. Nevertheless, this great ocean is not round, and it is not square. Other qualities of the ocean are inexhaustibly many: [to fishes] it is like a palace and [to gods] it is like a string of pearls.6 But as far as our eyes can see, it just seems to be round. As it is for [the ocean], so it is for the myriad dharmas. In dust and out of the frame,7 [the myriad dharmas] encompass numerous situations, but we see and understand only as far as our eyes of learning in practice are able to reach. If we wish to hear how the myriad dharmas naturally are,8 we should remember that besides their appearance of squareness or roundness, the qualities of the oceans and qualities of the mountains are numerous and endless; and that there are worlds in the four directions. Not only the periphery is like this: remember, the immediate present, and a single drop [of water] are also like this.

[91]    When fish move through water, however they move, there is no end to the water. When birds fly through the sky, however they fly, there is no end to the sky. At the same time, fish and birds have never, since antiquity, left the water or the sky. Simply, when activity is great, usage is great, and when necessity is small, usage is small. Acting in this state, none fails to 24c realize its limitations at every moment, and none fails to somersault freely at every place; but if a bird leaves the sky it will die at once, and if a fish

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leaves the water it will die at once. So we can understand that water is life and can understand that sky is life. Birds are life, and fish are life. It may be that life is birds and that life is fish. And beyond this, there may still be further progress. The existence of [their] practice-and-experience, and the existence of their lifetime and their life, are like this. This being so, a bird or fish that aimed to move through the water or the sky [only] after getting to the bottom of water or utterly penetrating the sky, could never find its way or find its place in the water or in the sky. When we find this place, this action is inevitably realized as the universe. When we find this way, this action is inevitably the realized universe [itself].9 This way and this place are neither great nor small; they are neither subjective nor objective; neither have they existed since the past nor do they appear in the present; and so they are present like this. When a human being is practicing and experiencing the Buddha’s truth in this state, to get one dharma is to penetrate one dharma, and to meet one act is to perform one act. In this state the place exists and the way is mastered, and therefore the area to be known is not conspicuous. The reason it is so is that this knowing and the perfect realization of the Buddha-Dharma appear together and are experienced together. Do not assume that what is attained will inevitably become self-conscious and be recognized by the intellect. The experience of the ultimate state is realized at once. At the same time, its mysterious existence is not necessarily a manifest realization.10 Realization is the state of ambiguity itself.11

 [94] Zen Master Hōtetsu12 of Mayokuzan is using a fan. A monk comes by and asks, “The nature of air is to be ever -present, and there is no place that [air] cannot reach. Why then does the master use a fan?”

The master says, “You have only understood that the nature of air is to be ever-present, but you do not yet know the truth13 that there is no place [air] cannot reach.”

The monk says, “What is the truth of there being no place [air] cannot

reach?”

At this, the master just [carries on] using the fan. The monk does prostrations.14 The real experience of the Buddha-Dharma, the vigorous road of the authentic transmission, is like this. Someone who says that because [the air] is ever-present we need not use a fan, or that even when we do not use [a fan] we can still feel the air, does not know ever-presence, and does not

Chapter Three

know the nature of air. Because the nature of air is to be ever-present, the behavior15 of Buddhists has made the earth manifest itself as gold and has ripened the Long River into curds and whey.16

                                    Shōbōgenzō Genjō-kōan

                                    This was written in mid-autumn17 in the first                                     year of Tenpuku,18 and was presented to the lay

                                    disciple Yō Kōshu of Chinzei.19                                     Edited in [the fourth] year of Kenchō.20

 

Notes

1     as a verb, Daigo, “great realization,” is the title of Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II). Here it is useddaigo suru, “greatly realize.”

2     Yadosu literally means “to accommodate.”

3     “No appearance” is which appear for example in the haramitsu—express the instantaneousness of the universe.fushō. “No disappearance” is Heart Sutra, quoted in Chapter Two, fumetsu. The words fushō-fumetsu—Maka-hannya4 Throughout this paragraph, “to be reflected in” is originally yadoru, lit., “to dwell in.” 5 We should investigate realization as concrete facts.

6     This sentence alludes to a traditional Buddhist teaching that different subjects see the same ocean in different ways: to fish it is a palace, to gods it is a string of pearls, to the Sanskrit humans it is water, and to demons it is blood or pus. nobility in ancient India. Mukta hāra, a name for a string of pearls or jewels worn by royalty and Yōraku, “string of pearls,” represents

7     Jinchū-kakuge, world experienced in the Buddhist state. “inside dust, outside the frame,” means the secular world and the

8     Banpo no kafu, lit., “the family customs of the myriad Fu means wind, air, style, behavior, custom.dharmas.” Ka means house, home, or family.

9     Genjō-kōan is used first as a verb, genjō-kōan su, and second as a noun, genjō-kōan.

10    “Manifest realization” and “realization” (in the next sentence) are originally the same characters: genjō. 11 “The state of ambiguity” is kahitsu. A Chinese sentence beginning with these characters would ask the question, “Why should it necessarily be that. . . ?” or “How can it con-clusively be decided that. . . ?”

12    A successor of Master Baso Dōitsu.

13    Dōribut the master recommended him to notice concrete facts. Means truth, principle, or fact. The monk was interested in philosophical theory,

14    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 23. According to the story in the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, a thousand students, what gain would there be? “after the monk’s prostration, the master says, “Useless master of monks! If you got

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15    Fū. The story. The second is “customs,” “manners,” or “behavior,” as in this usage. See Two meanings of are relevant in this section. The first is “wind” or “air,” as in also note 8.

16    Master Goso Hōen said in his formal preaching, “To change the Earth into gold, and Soraku, or “curds and whey,” was some

Chinese name for the galaxy we call the Milky Way. kind of edible dairy product, like yogurt or cheese. Chōga, lit., “Long River,” is the to churn the Long River into a milky whey.”

17    day of the eighth lunar month. autumn sky is usually very clear, this is a good time to view the moon. Several chapters In the lunar calendar, autumn is the seventh, eighth, and ninth lunar months. As the Shōbōgenzō were written around the time of the autumn equinox on the fifteenth of the

18    1233.

19    Corresponds to present-day Kyushu. 20 1252.

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[Chapter Four] One Bright Pearl

Ikka-no-myōju

Translator’s Note: Ikka means “one,” myō means “bright” or “clear,” and ju means “pearl.” So ikka-no-myōju means one bright pearl. This chapter is a commentary on Master Gensha Shibi’s words that the whole universe in all directions is as splendid as a bright pearl. Master Dōgen loved these words, so he wrote about them in this chapter.

[97] In [this] sahā world,1 in the great kingdom of Song, in Fuzhou province, at Genshazan, [there lived] Great Master Shūitsu, whose Dharma name [as a monk] was Shibi and whose secular surname was Sha.2 While still a layman he loved fishing, and he would float down the Nantai River on his boat, following the other fishermen. It may have been that he was not waiting even for the fish with golden scales that lands itself without being fished.3 At the beginning of the Kantsū4 era of the Tang dynasty, suddenly he desires to leave secular society; he leaves his boat and enters the mountains. He is 25b already thirty years old, [but] he has realized the precariousness of the floating world and has recognized the nobility of the Buddha’s Way. At last he climbs Seppōzan, enters the order of Great Master Shinkaku,5 and pursues the truth6 day and night. One day, in order to explore widely the surrounding districts, he leaves the mountain, carrying a [traveling] bag. But as he does so, he stubs his toe on a stone. Bleeding and in great pain, [Master Gensha] all at once seriously reflects as follows: “[They say] this body is not real existence. Where does the pain come from?” He thereupon returns to Seppō. Seppō asks him, “What is it, Bi of the dhūta?”7 Gensha says, “In the end I just cannot be deceived by others.”8 Seppō, loving these words very much, says, “Is there anyone who does not have these words [inside them]? [But] is there anyone who can speak these words?” Seppō asks further, “Bi of the dhūta, why do you not go exploring?”9 Master [Gensha] says, “Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands; the Second Patriarch did not go to the Western

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Heavens.”10 Seppō praised this very much. In his usual life as a fisherman [Master Gensha] had never seen sutras and texts even in a dream. Nevertheless, profundity of will being foremost, his outstanding resolve made itself apparent. Seppō himself considered [Gensha] to be outstanding among the sangha; he praised [Gensha] as the preeminent member of the order. [Gensha] used vegetable cloth for his one robe, which he never replaced, but patched hundreds of times. Next to his skin he wore clothes of paper, or wore moxa.11 Apart from serving in Seppō’s order, he never visited another [good] counselor. Nevertheless, he definitely realized the power to succeed to the master’s Dharma. After he had attained the truth at last, he taught people with the words that the whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. One day

a monk asks him, “I have heard the master’s words that the whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. How should the student understand [this]?” The master says, “The whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. What use is understanding?” On a later day the master asks the question back to the monk, “The whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. How do you understand [this]?” The monk says, “The whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. What use is understanding?” The master says, “I see that you are struggling to get inside a demon’s cave in a black mountain.”12

[101] The present expression “the whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl” originates with Gensha. The point is that the whole universe in ten directions is not vast and great, not meager and small, not square or round, not centered or straight, not in a state of vigorous activity, and not disclosed in perfect clarity. Because it is utterly beyond living-and-dying, going-and-coming,13 it is living-and-dying, going-and-coming. And because it is like this, the past has gone from this place, and the present comes from this place. When we are pursuing the ultimate, who can see it utterly as separate moments? And who can hold it up for examination as a state of total stillness? “The whole of the ten directions” describes the ceaseless [process] of pursuing things to make them into self, and of pursuing self to make it into something. The arising of emotion and the distinctions of the intellect, which we describe as separation, are themselves [as real as] turning the head and changing the face, or developing things and throwing [oneself] into the moment. Because we pursue self to make it into something, the whole of the

Chapter Four

ten directions is in the ceaseless state. And because [the whole of the ten directions] is a fact before the moment, it sometimes overflows beyond [our] regulating ability which is the pivot of the moment.14 “The one pearl” is not yet famous, but it is an expression of the truth. It will be famously recognized. “The one pearl” goes directly through ten thousand years: the eternal past has not ended, but the eternal present has arrived. The body exists now, and the mind exists now. Even so, [the whole universe] is a bright pearl. It is not grass and trees there and here, it is not mountains and rivers at all points of the compass; it is a bright pearl. “How should the student understand it?” Even though it seems that the monk is playing with his conditioned intellect15 in speaking these words, they are the clear manifestation of the great activity, which is 26a just the great standard itself. Progressing further, we should make it strikingly obvious that a foot of water is a one-foot wave: in other words, a yard of the pearl is a yard of brightness. To voice this expression of the truth, Gensha says, “The whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. What use is understanding?” This expression is the expression of truth to which buddha succeeds buddha, patriarch succeeds patriarch, and Gensha succeeds Gensha. If he wants to avoid this succession—while it is not true that no opportunity for avoidance exists—just when he is ardently trying to avoid it, [the moment] in which he speaks and lives is the total moment, conspicuously manifest before him. Gensha, on a subsequent day asks the monk, “The whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. How do you understand [this]?” This says that yesterday [Master Gensha] was preaching the established rule, but his exhalations today rely upon the second phase: today he is preaching an exception to the established rule. Having pushed yesterday aside, he is nodding and laughing. The monk says, “The whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. What use is understanding?” We might tell him: “You are riding your adversary’s horse to chase your adversary. When the eternal buddha preaches for you, he is going among different kinds of beings.”16 We should turn [back] light and reflect17 for a while: How many cases and examples of “What use is understanding?” are there? We can tentatively say that while teaching and practice are seven dairy cakes and five vegetable cakes, they are also “south of the Shō [River]” and “north of the Tan [River].”18

[105] Gensha says, “I see that you are struggling to get inside a demon’s cave in a black mountain.” Remember, the face of the sun and the face of

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the moon have never changed places since the eternal past. The sun’s face appears together with the sun’s face, and the moon’s face appears together with the moon’s face. For this reason, [Master Yakusan Ingen said,] “Even if I say that the sixth moon19 is a very nice time of year, I should not say that my surname is Hot.”20 Thus, this bright pearl’s possession of reality and lack of beginning are limitless, and the whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl. Without being discussed as two pearls or three pearls, the whole body21 is one right Dharma-eye, the whole body is real substance, the whole body is one phrase, the whole body is brightness, and the whole body is the whole body itself. When it is the whole body it is free of the hindrance of the whole body; it is perfect roundness,22 and roundly it rolls along.23 Because the virtue of the bright pearl exists in realization like this, there are Avalo- kiteśvaras24 and Maitreyas25 in the present, seeing sights and hearing sounds; and there are old buddhas and new buddhas manifesting their bodies and preaching the Dharma.26 Just at the moment of the present, whether suspended in space or hanging inside a garment,27 whether kept under a [dragon’s] chin28 or kept in a topknot,29 [the one bright pearl,] in all cases, is one bright pearl throughout the whole universe in ten directions. To hang inside a garment is its situation, so do not say that it will be dangling on the surface. To hang inside a topknot or under a chin is its situation, so do not expect to play with it on the surface of the topknot or on the surface of the chin. When we are intoxicated, there are close friends30 who give us a pearl; and we should always give a pearl to a close friend. When the pearl is hung upon us we are always intoxicated. That which “already is like this”31 is the one bright pearl which is the universe in ten directions. So even though it seems to be continually changing the outward appearance of its turning and not turning, it is just the bright pearl. The very recognition that the pearl has been existing like this is just the bright pearl itself. The bright pearl has sounds and forms that can be heard like this. Already “having got the state like this,”32 those who surmise that “I cannot be the bright pearl,” should not doubt that they are the pearl. Artificial and non artificial states of surmising and doubting, attaching and rejecting, are just the small view. They are nothing more than trying to make [the bright pearl] match the narrow intellect. How could we not love the bright pearl? Its colors and light, as they are, are endless. Each color and every ray of light at each moment and in every situation is the

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virtue of the whole universe in ten directions; who would want to plunder 26c it?33 No one would throw a tile into a street market. Do not worry about falling or not falling34 into the six states of cause and effect.35 They are the original state of being right from head to tail, which is never unclear, and the bright pearl is its features and the bright pearl is its eyes. Still, neither I nor you know what the bright pearl is or what the bright pearl is not. Hundreds of thoughts and hundreds of negations of thought have combined to form a very clear idea.36 At the same time, by virtue of Gensha’s words of Dharma, we have heard, recognized, and clarified the situation of a body and mind which has already become the bright pearl. Thereafter, the mind is not personal; why should we be worried by attachment to whether it is a bright pearl or is not a bright pearl, as if what arises and passes were some person?37 Even surmising and worry is not different from the bright pearl. No action nor any thought has ever been caused by anything other than the bright pearl. Therefore, forward steps and backward steps in a demon’s black-mountain cave are just the one bright pearl itself.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Ikka-no-myōju

                                   

 

Notes

1     of human beings. Shaba-sekai. Shaba represents the Sanskrit sahālokadhātu, which means the world

2     to be avoided.” See also Chapter Sixteen, Shūitsu” is Master Gensha’s posthumous title. Shibi is his Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison. When monks died they were not referred to by the name used in their lifetime. “Great MasterShisho, note 32.hōki, or “Dharma [name]

3     about the results of his efforts. Even as a layman Master Gensha led a relaxed and peaceful life, without worrying

4     860 to 873.

5     Master Seppō Gison (822–907), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan. Great MasterShinkaku is his posthumous title.

6     Bendō expresses the practice of zazen.

7     See also LS 2.310.means ascetic practice. Master Gensha was known for his hard practice, so he got Bizuda. the nickname of Bizuda. The twelve Bi is from the name Shibi. dhūtaZudaare listed in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), is from the Sanskrit word dhūta, which Gyōji.

8     on hand knowledge but only by experiencing things for himself. The expression is ironic. Master Gensha makes it sound as if he would like to be able to learn from others, but in the end it is impossible: he can be satisfied not with sec-

9     A hensan,it is used as a verb, or “thorough exploration,” is the title of Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III). Herea hensan suru.

10    Master Bodhidharma actually did come to the Eastern Lands (China), but “Master go to the Western Heavens,” suggests similarly that it was natural for him not to go. Eka, did not go to the Western Heavens (India), and “The Second Patriarch did not naturally, rather than out of personal intention. The Second Patriarch, Master Tais Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands” suggests that he came to China

11    Coarse vegetable fiber.

12    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 15.

13     Shōji-korai, or “living-and-dying, going-and-coming,” is an expression of everydayShōbōgenzō. life that appears 55

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14    Kiyō no kantoku. Kiyōsuggests the moment of the present. means the central part of a mechanism; at the same time, Kantoku means “being able to control.”   ki

15    (Gosshiki,Vol. II), Busshō. or “karmic consciousness.” The term is discussed in Chapter Twenty-two

16    refence between the real understanding of Master Gensha and the intellectual under-is a common expression in the Irui-chū-gyō, “going among different kinds of beings” (in the five or six destinies),Shōbōgenzō. In this case it suggests the absolute standing of the monk.

17    E-kō-hen-shō(Appendix II).describes the state in zazen. The expression appears in the Fukanzazengi

18    The Shō River flows north of the Tan River, and the Tan River flows south of the ShōIn Buddhist teaching and practice, recognition of concrete facts and theoretical under-River. In China the area between the two rivers was used as a symbol of one thing that can be expressed in two ways. In this sentence, cakes symbolize concrete things, standing are both important. and “south of the Shō River” and “north of the Tan River” represent subjective views.

19    Rokugatsu, or “the sixth lunar month,” was an uncomfortably hot time in the south of China.

20    “It is a nice time of year. “Buddhist monks would customarily avoid giving their family name, and reply instead, 21 Zenshin,See Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III), “whole body,” sometimes suggests the universe as the Buddha’s whole body. Nyorai-zenshin.

22       “Perfect roundness” is Da,en-da-da-chi,repeated for emphasis, means diagonal; at the same time, itlit., “circle diagonal-diagonal state.” Chi means “state.” En means suggests the absence of corners, i.e., roundness. circular or perfect.

23       Ten-roku-roku. Tenround object rolling. means “to turn” or “to roll.” Roku-roku is onomatopoeic for a

24       See also the Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara is the subject of Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Lotus Sutra, chapter 25, Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon.        Kannon.

25       million years in the future, to save all living beings who were left unsaved by the Bodhisattva Maitreya is expected to be born five thousand six hundred and seventy and Maitreya symbolize Buddhist practitioners today. Buddha. See, for example, LS 1.62. In this sentence the bodhisattvas Avalokiteśvara

26       Alludes to the description of Avalokiteśvara (“Hearer of the Sounds of the World”)Lotus Sutra. See LS 3.252. in the

27       See LS 2.114.

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28       of the truth. Black dragons keep a pearl under their chins. The black dragon’s pearl is a symbol

29       See LS 2.276. 30 See LS 2.114.

31 Dōyō discusses Kize-inmo. At the beginning of Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), kize-inmo-nin, or “a person in the state of already being like this.”Inmo, Master Ungo 32 Toku-inmo. These characters also appear in Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Inmo. 33 Master Gensha said, “It is forbidden for anyone to plunder a street market.” SeeShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 38.

34    cause and effect. See, for example, Chapter Seventy-six (Vol. IV), Furaku, “not falling,” and fumai, “not being unclear,” represent opposing views ofDai-shugyō.

35    cause and effect: the state of beings in hell, the state of hungry ghosts, the state ofRokudō no ingaanimals, the state of angry demons, the state of human beings, and the state of gods. Are the six states through which we pass according to the law of

36    of weeds” (see Chapter Twenty-two [Vol. II], Mei-mei no sōryō. Sōryōsō, “weeds” (symbolizing concrete things), for means “idea” or “thinking.” In this sentence, Master Dōgenmei-mei-taru hyaku-sō-tō,Busshō). “clear-clear are hundredssō, “idea,” in order to allude to the traditional saying substituted

37    The original word for “some person” is tare, which means “who?” 38 Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture.

39    1238.

40    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture. 41 1243.

 

[Chapter Five]

                                                Jū-undō-shiki                                      

Rules for the Hall of Accumulated Cloud

Translator’s Note: Jū-undō or “hall of accumulated cloud” was the name of the zazen hall of Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji. Shiki means rules. So Jū-undōshiki means “Rules for the Hall of Accumulated Cloud.” Kannon dōri kōshō- hōrinji was the first temple established by Master Dōgen. He built it in Kyoto prefecture in 1233, several years after coming back from China. Jū-undō was the first zazen hall to be built in Japan. Master Dōgen made these rules for the hall, and titled them. The chapter was not included in the Shōbōgenzō when the seventy-five–chapter edition was compiled, but was added when the ninety-five–chapter edition was compiled at the end of the seventeenth century. The inclusion of this chapter is very useful in understanding the Shōbōgenzō, because what is written here represents in a concrete way Master Dōgen’s sincere attitude in pursuing the truth.

[111]   People who have the will to the truth and who discard fame and gain may enter. We should not randomly admit those who might be insincere. If someone is admitted by mistake, we should, after consideration, make them leave. Remember, when the will to the truth has secretly arisen, fame and gain evaporate at once. Generally, in [all] the great-thousandfold world,1 there are very few examples of the right and traditional transmission. In our country, this will be seen as the original source. Feeling compassion for future ages, we should value the present.

[112]   The members of the hall should harmonize like milk and water, and should wholeheartedly promote each other’s practice of the truth. Now we are for the present [as] guests and hosts,2 but in future we will forever be Buddhist patriarchs. So now that each of us is meeting what is hard to meet, and is practicing what is hard to practice, we must not lose our sincerity. This [sincerity] is called “the body and mind of the Buddhist patriarchs”; it inevitably becomes buddha and becomes a patriarch. We have already left

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our families and left our hometowns; we rely on clouds and rely on waters.3 The benevolence of [the members of] this sangha, in promoting [each other’s] health and in promoting [each other’s] practice, surpasses even that of a father and mother. A father and mother are only parents for the short span between life and death, but [the members of] this sangha will be friends in the Buddha’s truth forever.

[113]   We should not be fond of going out. If absolutely necessary, once in one month is permissible. People of old lived in distant mountains or practiced in remote forests. They not only had few human dealings but also totally

discarded myriad involvements. We should learn their state of mind in shrouding their light and covering their tracks. Now is just the time to [practice as if to] put out a fire on our head. How could we not regret idly devoting this time to worldly involvements? How could we not regret this? It is hard to rely on what has no constancy, and we never know where, on the grass by the path, our dewdrop life will fall. [To waste this time] would be truly pitiful.

[114]   While we are in the hall we should not read the words of even Zentexts. In the hall we should realize the principles and pursue the state of truth. When we are before a bright window,4 we can enlighten the mind with the teachings of the ancients. Do not waste a moment of time. Single-mindedly make effort.5

[115]   We should make it a general rule to inform the leader of the hall6 where we are going, whether it is night or day. Do not ramble around at will. That might infringe the discipline of the sangha. We never know when this life will finish. If life were to end during an idle excursion, that would certainly be something to regret afterward.

[115]         We should not strike other people for their mistakes. We should not look on people’s mistakes with hatred. In the words of an ancient,7 “When we do not see others’ wrongness or our own rightness, we are naturally respected by seniors and admired by juniors.” At the same time, we should not imitate the wrongs of others. We should practice our own virtue. The Buddha prevented wrongdoing, but not out of hatred.

[116]         Any task, big or small, we should do only after informing the leader of the hall. People who do things without informing the leader of the hall should be expelled from the hall. When formalities between members and leaders are disrupted, it is hard to tell right from wrong.

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[116]   In and around the hall, we should not raise the voice or gather

heads to converse. The leader of the hall should stop this.

[117]   In the hall we should not practice ceremonial walking.8

[117]  In the hall we should not hold counting beads.9 And we should

not come and go with the hands hanging down.10

[118]  In the hall we should not chant, or read sutras. If a donor11 requests

the reading of sutras by the whole order, then it is permissible.

[118]  In the hall we should not loudly blow the nose, or loudly hack and spit. We should regret the fact that our moral behavior is still [so] imperfect. And we should begrudge the fact that time is stealing away, robbing us of life with which to practice the truth. It might be natural for us to have minds like fish in a dwindling stream.

[119]  Members of the hall should not wear brocade. We should wear[clothes of] paper, cotton, and so forth. Since ancient times, all the people who clarified the truth have been like this.

[119]  Do not come into the hall drunk. If someone forgetfully [enters] by mistake, they should do prostrations and confess. Also, alcohol should not be brought into [the hall]. Do not enter the hall flushed and inebriated.12

[120]  If two people quarrel, both should be sent back to their quarters,because they not only hinder their own practice of the truth but also hinder others. Those who see the quarrel coming but do not prevent it are equally at fault.

[120]        Anyone who is indifferent toward the instructions for [life] in thehall should be expelled by the common consent of all members. Anyone whose mind is in sympathy with the transgression is [also] at fault.

[121]        Do not disturb the other members by inviting guests, whether monks  28a

or laypeople, into the hall. When talking with guests in the vicinity [of the hall], do not raise the voice. Do not deliberately boast about your own training, greedily hoping for offerings. [A guest] who has long had the will to participate in practice, and who is determined to tour the hall and do prostrations,13 may enter. In this case also, the leader of the hall must be informed.

[121]  Zazen should be practiced as in the monks’ halls [of China].14 Never be even slightly lazy in attending and requesting [formal and informal teaching], morning and evening.

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[122]  During the midday meal and morning gruel, a person who dropsthe accessories for the pātra15 on the ground should be penalized16 according to the monastery rules.

[122]  In general, we should staunchly guard the prohibitions and preceptsof the Buddhist patriarchs. The pure criteria of monasteries should be engraved on our bones, and should be engraved on our minds.

[123]  We should pray that our whole life will be peaceful, and that our

pursuit of the truth will abide in the state without intent.

[123] These few rules [listed] above are the body and mind of eternal

buddhas. We should revere them and follow them.

                                    The twenty-fifth day of the fourth lunar month                                     in the second year of Rekinin.17 Set forth by the                                     founder of Kannondōri kōshō gokokuji, śramaṇa                                     Dōgen.

Notes

1     See for example, LS 2.218–220.world.” This expression, which derives from the ancient Indian belief that the world comprises many groups of thousands of worlds, occurs frequently in the Daisenkai is short for sanzen-daisen-sekai, or “the three-thousand-great-thousand fold Lotus Sutra.

2     Hinju, translated in paragraph 116 as “members and leaders.”

3     In China and Japan monks are commonly referred to as unsui, which means “clouds and water.”

4     Suggests a place, other than the zazen hall, suitable for reading.

5     Sen-itsu ni kufu su. These words also appear in the Fukanzazengi.

6     Dōshu, “leader of the hall,” would have been the head monk (not Master Dōgen himself).

7     Master Hakuyō Hōjun. See Zokudentōroku, chapter 29.

8     so that the buddha image remains to the practitioner’s right. Gyōdō, which the practitioner circles the buddha image three times, walking around clockwise ceremonial walking, is a way of serving offerings to the buddha image, in

9     sūtra. the recitations of Buddha’s name, and so on. The Sanskrit term for a rosary is Some people use a kind of rosary, usually with one hundred and eight beads, to count See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 

10    In other words, we should hold the hands in front of the chest in right hand covering the left fist. shashu, with the 11 “Donor” is originally dānapati, the Sanskrit word for a person who supports a Buddhist order. dāna (giving), the first of the six pāramitās. In this case dāna one, The reading of sutras at a donor’s request is explained in detail in Chapter Twenty-stands for Kankin.

12    means leeks, the Japanese phonetic alphabet, this allows alternative interpretations. The interpretation used here is that “Flushed and inebriated” is originally emboldened, or inebriated. The traditional interpretation in Japan has been that gi means onions, and niragu means to temper steel, or to redden; and no ka shi teniragi nokashi te.means smelling, so the sentence wouldBeing written in nokashi te hiragana,meansnira mean “Do not enter the hall smelling of leeks and onions.”

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13    Junrei method is explained in Chapter Twenty-one, stands for jundō-raihai, or “to go round the hall and do prostrations.” TheKankin. 14 the monks would live in the hall, not only sitting but also eating and sleeping there.In large temples in China the zazen hall was called the sōdō, or “monks’ hall,” because

15    Pātra(Vol. IV), is the Sanskrit word for the Buddhist food bowl. See Chapter Seventy-eightHatsu-u.

16    was scarce, so it is likely that monks were penalized by paying oil from their ration.“Penalized” is batsu-yu, lit., “penalty of oil.” In the temples of China oil for lamps

17    1239.

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[Chapter Six] Mind Here and Now Is Buddha

Soku-shin-ze-butsu

Translator’s Note: Soku means “here and now.” Shin means “mind.” Ze means “is.” Butsu means “buddha.” The principle of soku-shin-ze-butsu, or “mind here and now is buddha” is very famous in Buddhism, but many people have interpreted the principle to support the beliefs of naturalism. They say if our mind here and now is just buddha, our conduct must always be right, and, in that case, we need not make any effort to understand or to realize Buddhism. However, this interpretation is a serious mistake. The principle soku-shin-ze-butsu, “mind here and now is buddha,” must be understood not from the standpoint of the intellect but from the standpoint of practice. In other words, the principle does not mean belief in something spiritual called “mind” but it affirms the time “now” and the place “here” as reality itself. This time and place must always be absolute and right, and so we can call them the truth or “buddha.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen explained this meaning of soku-shin-ze-butsu, “mind here and now is buddha.”

[125] What every buddha and every patriarch has maintained and relied upon, without exception, is just “mind here and now is buddha.” Many students, however, misunderstand that “mind here and now is buddha” did not exist in India but was first heard in China. As a result, they do not recognize their mistake as a mistake. Because they do not recognize the mistake as a mistake, many fall down into non-Buddhism. When stupid people hear talk of “mind here and now is buddha,” they interpret that ordinary beings’ intellect and sense perception, which have never established the bodhi-mind, are just buddha. This derives from never having met a true teacher. The reason I say that they become non-Buddhists is that there was a non-Buddhist in India, called Senika, whose viewpoint is expressed as follows:

The great truth exists in our own body now, so we can easily recognize its situation. In other words, [a spiritual intelligence] distinguishes

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between pain and pleasure, naturally senses cold and warmth, and recognizes discomfort and irritation. [The spiritual intelligence] is neither restricted by myriad things nor connected with circumstances: things come and go and circumstances arise and pass, but the spiritual intelligence always remains, unchanging. This spiritual intelligence is all around, pervading all souls—common and sacred—without distinction. In its midst, illusory flowers in space exist for the time being, but when momentary insight has appeared, and things have vanished and circumstances have disappeared, then the spiritual intelligence, the original essence, alone is clearly recognizable, peaceful, and eternal. Though the physical form may be broken, the spiritual intelligence departs unbroken; just as, when a house burns down in a fire, the master of the house leaves. This perfectly clear and truly spiritual presence is called

28b         “the essence of perception and intelligence.” It is also described as “buddha,” and called “enlightenment.” It includes both the subject and the object, and it permeates both delusion and enlightenment. [So] let the myriad dharmas and all circumstances be as they are. The spiritual intelligence does not coexist with circumstances and it is not the same as things. It abides constantly through passing kalpas. We might also call the circumstances that exist in the present “real,” insofar as they derive from the existence of the spiritual intelligence: because they are conditions arising from the original essence, they are real things. Even so, they are not eternal as the spiritual intelligence is, for they exist and then vanish. [The spiritual intelligence] is unrelated to brightness and darkness, because it knows spiritually. We call this “the spiritual intelligence,” we also call it “the true self,” we call it “the basis of awakening,” we call it “original essence,” and we call it “original substance.” Someone who realizes this original essence is said to have returned to eternity and is called a great man who has come back to the truth. After this, he no longer wanders through the cycle of life and death; he experiences and enters the essential ocean1 where there is neither appearance nor disappearance. There is no reality other than this, but as long as this essence has not emerged, the three worlds2 and the six states3 are said to arise in competition.

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This then is the view of the non-Buddhist Senika.

[129] Master Echū, National Master Daishō,4 of the great kingdom of

Tang, asks a monk, “From which direction have you come?”

The monk says, “I have come from the south.”

The master says, “What [good] counselors are there in the south?”

The monk says, “[Good] counselors are very numerous.” The master says, “How do they teach people?”

The monk says, “The [good] counselors of that quarter teach students directly that mind here and now is buddha. Buddha means consciousness itself. You now are fully endowed with the essence of seeing, hearing, awareness, and recognition. This essence is able to raise the eyebrows and to wink, to come and go, and to move and act. It pervades the body, so that when [something] touches the head, the head knows it, and when something touches the foot, the foot knows it. Therefore it is called ‘the true all-pervading intelligence.’ Apart from this there is no buddha at all. This body must appear and disappear, but the mental essence has never appeared or disappeared since the limitless past. The appearance and disappearance of the body is like a dragon changing its bones, a snake shedding its skin, or a person moving out of an old house. This body is inconstant; the essence is constant. What 29a they teach in the south is, for the most part, like this.”

The master says, “If it is so, they are no different from the non-Buddhist Senika. He said, ‘In our body there is a single spiritual essence. This essence can recognize pain and irritation. When the body decays the spirit departs; just as when a house is burning the master of the house departs. The house is inconstant; the master of the house is constant.’ When I examine people like this, they do not know the false from the true. How can they decide what is right? When I was on my travels, I often saw this kind. Recently they are very popular. They gather assemblies of three or five hundred people and, eyes gazing toward the heavens, they say ‘This is the fundamental teaching of the south.’5 They take the Platform Sutra6 and change it, mixing in folk stories, and erasing its sacred meaning. They delude and disturb recent students. How could [theirs] be called the oral teaching?7 How painful it is, that our religion is being lost. If seeing, hearing, awareness, and recognition could be equated with the buddha-nature, Vimalakīrti8 would not have said, ‘The 67

Dharma is transcendent over seeing, hearing, awareness, and recognition. When we use seeing, hearing, awareness, and recognition, it is only seeing, hearing, awareness, and recognition; it is not pursuit of the Dharma.’”

[131] National Master Daishō is an excellent disciple of the eternal buddha of Sōkei.9 He is a great good counselor in heaven above and in the human world. We should clarify the fundamental teaching set forth by the National Master, and regard it as a criterion10 for learning in practice. Do not follow what you know to be the viewpoint of the non-Buddhist Senika. Among those of recent generations who subsist as masters of mountains in the great kingdom of Song, there may be no one like the National Master. From the ancient past, no counselors to equal the National Master have ever manifested themselves in the world. Nevertheless, people of the world mistakenly think that even Rinzai11 and Tokusan12 might equal the National Master. Only people [who think] like this are great in number. It is a pity that there are no teachers with clear eyes. This “mind here and now is buddha” that the Buddhist patriarchs maintain and rely upon is not seen by non-Buddhists and [people of] the two vehicles, even in their dreams. Buddhist patriarchs alone, together with Buddhist patriarchs,13 possess hearing, action, and experience that have enacted and that have perfectly realized “mind here and now is buddha.” Buddhas14 have continued to pick up and to throw away

hundreds of weeds, but they have never represented themselves as a sixteen foot golden body.15 “The immediate”16 universe17 exists; it is not awaiting realization,18 and it is not avoiding destruction. “This concrete”19 triple world20 exists; it is neither receding nor appearing, and it is not just mind.21 “Mind”22 exists as fences and walls; it never gets muddy or wet, and it is never artificially constructed. We realize in practice that “mind here and now is buddha,”23 we realize in practice that “the mind which is buddha is this,”24 we realize in practice that “buddha actually is just the mind,”25 we realize in practice that “mind-and-buddha here and now is right,”26 and we realize in practice that “this buddha-mind is here and now.”27

[134] Realization in practice like this is just “mind here and now is buddha” picking itself up and authentically transmitting itself to “mind here and now is buddha.” Authentically transmitted like this, it has arrived at the present day. “The mind that has been authentically transmitted” means one mind as all dharmas, and all dharmas as one mind. For this reason, a man

Chapter Six

of old28 said, “When a person becomes conscious of the mind, there is not an inch of soil on the earth.” Remember, when we become conscious of the mind, the whole of heaven falls down and the whole ground is torn apart. Or in other words, when we become conscious of the mind, the earth grows three inches thicker. An ancient patriarch said,29 “What is fine, pure, and bright mind? It is mountains, rivers, and the earth, the sun, the moon, and the stars.” Clearly, “mind” is mountains, rivers, and the earth, the sun, the moon, and the stars. But what these words say is, when we are moving forward, not enough, and when we are drawing back, too much. Mind as mountains, rivers, and the earth is nothing other than mountains, rivers, and the earth. There are no additional waves or surf, no wind or smoke. Mind as the sun, the moon, and the stars is nothing other than the sun, the moon, and the stars. There is no additional fog or mist. Mind as living-and-dying, coming and-going, is nothing other than living-and-dying, coming-and-going. There is no additional delusion or realization. Mind as fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles is nothing other than fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles. There is no additional mud or water. Mind as the four elements and five aggregates is nothing other than the four elements and five aggregates. There is no additional horse or monkey.30 Mind as a chair or a whisk31 is nothing other than a chair or a whisk. There is no additional bamboo or wood. Because the state is like 29c this, “mind here and now is buddha” is untainted “mind here and now is buddha.” All buddhas are untainted buddhas. This being so, “mind here and now is buddha” is the buddhas [themselves] who establish the will, undergo training, [realize] bodhi, and [experience] nirvana. If we have never established the will, undergone training, [realized] bodhi, and [experienced] nirvana, then [the state] is not “mind here and now is buddha.” If we establish the mind and do practice-and-experience even in a single kṣaṇa,32 this is “mind here and now is buddha.” If we establish the will and do practice-and-experience in a single molecule, this is “mind here and now is buddha.” If we establish the will and do practice-and-experience in countless kalpas, this is “mind here and now is buddha.” If we establish the will and do practice-and experience in one instant of consciousness, this is “mind here and now is buddha.” If we establish the will and do practice-and-experience inside half a fist, this is mind here and now is buddha. To say, on the contrary, that undergoing training to become buddha for long kalpas is not “mind here and now

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is buddha” is never to have seen, never to have known, and never to have learned “mind here and now is buddha.” It is never to have met a true teacher who proclaims “mind here and now is buddha.” The term “buddhas” means Śākyamuni Buddha. Śākyamuni Buddha is just “mind here and now is buddha.” When all the buddhas of the past, present, and future become buddha, they inevitably become Śākyamuni Buddha, that is, “mind here and now is buddha.”

                                    Shōbōgenzō Soku-shin-ze-butsu

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kannondōri kōshō-                                     hōrinji in the Uji district of Yōshū,33 on the                                     twenty-fifth day of the fifth lunar month in the                                     first year of Enō.34

Notes

1     Shōkai. See Chapter One, Bendōwa.

2     immaterial. See Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), Sangai, “three worlds” or “triple world,” are the worlds of volition, matter, and theSangai-yuishin.

3     ghosts, the state of animals, the state of angry demons, the state of human beings,and the state of gods. Rokudō, the six [miserable] states, are the state of beings in hell, the state of hungry

4     Master Nan’yō Echū (675?–775), successor of Master Daikan Enō. “National Master

Nan’yō Echū simply as the National Master.Daishō” was his title as a teacher of the emperor. Master Dōgen often refers to Master

5     strong in the north. However, the Buddhism of southern China was thought to be Master Nan’yō Echū lived in the north of China which was the center of Chinese civilization at the time of the Tang dynasty (619–858), so Buddhist philosophy was very practical. The government moved south in the Song dynasty (960–1279) inresponse to invasion from the north. 6ure The ) is a collection of the teachings of Master Daikan Enō, the Sixth Patriarch in Rokusodaishihōbōdangyō (Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch’s Dharma Treas-

China and the master of Master Nan’yō Echū.

7     not recorded in writing until the first century Gonkyō, on palm leaves in the monasteries of Sri Lanka. “oral teaching,” suggests the original teaching of the Buddha, which was B.C.E., when the Pāli canon was written

8     between Vimalakīrti and the Buddha are recorded in the Jōmyō, lit., “Pure Name,” is a Chinese rendering of Vimalakīrti, a layman of theBuddha’s time who was excellent in Buddhist philosophy. Many questions and answersVimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtra). Vimalakīrti Sutra (Skt.

9     Master Daikan Enō.

10    times heat a turtle shell and divine an appropriate course of action by looking at the“Criterion” is kikan, lit., “turtle mirror.” In ancient China, fortune-tellers would somecrack. Thus, a turtle shell was used like a mirror, as a criterion for making decisions.

11    Kiun. See Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III), Master Rinzai Gigen (d. 867), founder of the Rinzai sect, successor of Master ŌbakuButsudō.

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12    Master Tokusan Senkan (780–865), successor of Master Ryūtan Sōshin. See ChapterEighteen, Shin-fukatoku.

13    Yui-busso-yo-bussowith buddhas.” The perfectly realize that all is a variation of Lotus Sutradharmas are real form.” See LS 1.68.says, “Buddhas alone, together with buddhas, canyui-butsu-yo-butsu, “buddhas alone, together

14    Butsusoku, “here and now”; means “buddha.” The following four sentences begin with ze, “is”; and shin, “mind,” respectively. butsu, “buddha”;

15    The sixteen-foot golden body is the idealized image of the Buddha.

16 Soku function as a copula, i.e., a linking verb, to express the oneness of two factors (A can function as an adjective (“here and now,” “immediate,” “actual”); it can soku

B = “A, that is, B”); it can function as an adverb (“here and now,” “just,” “immediately,”“directly,” “actually”); and it can also function as a conjunction expressing temporalcontingency (A soku B = “A, immediately followed by B”).

17 used as an adjective.Soku-kōan, “the immediate universe” or “the here-and-now universe.” Here soku is 18 kōanGenjō. Genjō . and kōan are often associated, as in the title of Chapter Three, Genjō-

19 rect”); it can function as a copula in the same way as Ze can function as an adjective (“this,” “concrete,” “this concrete”; or “right,” “cor-soku (“is,” “are,” “is just the as a pronoun (“this”).same as”); it can function as an adverb (“here and now,” “actually”); and it can function 20 adjective. Zesangai, “this triple world” or “this concrete triple world.” Here ze is used as an 21 seven (Vol. III), Yuishin. Sangai yuishin,Sangai-yuishin.“the triple world is just mind,” is the title of Chapter Forty-

22    Shin means mind.

23    an adjective and notes.Soku-shin ze butsu,ze as in the title of this chapter. In this case, (is) is a copula. The four expressions following this expressionsoku-shin-ze-butsu.soku (here and now) isSee following represent further combinations of the four characters

24    Shin-soku-butsu ze. In this case, soku (which is) is a copula and ze (this) is a pronoun. 25 Butsu soku ze shin. In this case, soku (actually) is an adverb and ze (is just) is a copula.

26    Soku-shin-butsu ze. In this case, soku (here and now) and ze (right) are both adjectives.

27    tives.Ze-butsu-shin soku. In this case also, ze (this) and soku (here and now) are both adjec-

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28    in which an inch of soil cannot be separated from the whole earth. Master Chōrei Shutaku. His words mean that to know the mind is just to know reality,

29    shōbōgenzō,Master Isan Reiyū asked the question to his disciple Master Kyōzan Ejaku. See pt. 2, no. 68.  Shinji-

30    The horse represents the restless will and the monkey represents the mischievousintellect. Horse and monkey allude to the phrase i-ba shen-en, or “horse-will, monkey-mind.”

31    held by a master during a Buddhist lecture.Hossu is a ceremonial fly whisk—a wooden stick with a long plume of animal hair— 32 in the clicking of the fingers. Setsuna represents the Sanskrit kṣāṇa, “moment.” Sixty-five kṣāṇas are said to pass

33 Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture. 34

 

[Chapter Seven] Washing

                                                          Senjō                                            

Translator’s Note: Sen means “to wash,” and means “to purify.” So senjō means “washing.” Buddhism is neither idealism nor materialism but belief in reality, which has both a spiritual side and a material side. So Buddhism insists that to clean our physical body is to purify our mind. Therefore, in Buddhism, cutting our fingernails, shaving our head, and washing our body are all very important religious practices. In this chapter Master Dōgen expounds the religious meaning of such daily behavior, and preaches the importance in Buddhism of cleansing our physical body.

[139] There is practice-and-experience that Buddhist patriarchs have guided and maintained; it is called “not being tainted.”

[140] The Sixth Patriarch1 asks Zen Master Daie2 of Kannon-in Temple

on Nangakuzan, “Do you rely on practice and experience or not?”

Daie says, “It is not that there is no practice and experience, but the state

can never be tainted.”

The Sixth Patriarch says, “Just this untainted state is that which buddhas guard and desire. You are also like this. I am also like this. And the ancestral masters of India3 were also like this. . . .”4

[140]         The Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms for Or dained Monks5 says, “Purifying the body means washing the anus and the urethra,6 and cutting the nails of the ten fingers.” So even though the body and mind is not tainted, there are Dharma practices of purifying the body and there are Dharma practices of purifying the mind. Not only do we clean body and mind; we also clean the nation and clean beneath trees.7 To clean the nation, even though it has never become dirty, is “that which buddhas guard and desire”; and even when they have arrived at the Buddhist fruit, they still do not draw back or cease. It is hard to fathom this point. To enact the Dharma is the point. To attain the state of truth is to enact the Dharma.

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[141]         The “Pure Conduct” chapter of the Garland Sutra8 says, “When we relieve ourselves, we should pray that living beings will get rid of impurity and will be free of greed, anger, and delusion. Then, having arrived at the water, we should pray that living beings will progress toward the supreme state of truth and attain the Dharma that transcends the secular world. While we are washing away impurity with the water, we should pray that living beings will have pure endurance, and will ultimately be free of dirt.”

[142]         Water is not always originally pure or originally impure. The bodyis not always originally pure or originally impure. All dharmas are also like this. Water is never sentient or nonsentient, the body is never sentient or nonsentient, and all dharmas are also like this. The preaching of the Buddha,

30b the World-honored One, is like this. At the same time, [to wash] is not to use water to clean the body; [rather,] when we are maintaining and relying upon the Buddha-Dharma in accordance with the Buddha-Dharma, we have this form of behavior, and we call it “washing.” It is to receive the authentic transmission of a body and mind of the Buddhist Patriarch immediately; it is to see and to hear a phrase of the Buddhist Patriarch intimately; and it is to abide in and to retain a state of brightness of the Buddhist Patriarch clearly. In sum, it is to realize countless and limitless virtues. At just the moment when we dignify body and mind with training, eternal original practice is completely and roundly realized. Thus the body and mind of training manifests itself in the original state.

[144]     We should cut the nails of [all] ten fingers. Of [“all] ten fingers”means the fingernails of both left and right hands. We should also cut the toenails. A sutra says, “If the nails grow to the length of a grain of wheat, we acquire demerit.” So we should not let the nails grow long. Long nails are naturally a precursor of non-Buddhism. We should make a point of cutting the nails. Nevertheless, among the priests of the great kingdom of Song today, many who are not equipped with eyes of learning in practice grow their nails long. Some have [nails] one or two inches long, and even three or four inches long. This goes against the Dharma. It is not the body and mind of the Buddha Dharma. People are like this because they are without reverence for the old traditions9 of Buddhists; venerable patriarchs who possess the state of truth are never like this. There are others who grow their hair long. This also goes against the Dharma. Do not mistakenly suppose that because these are the habits of priests in a great nation, they might be right Dharma.

[145]     My late master, the eternal buddha, spoke stern words of warning to priests throughout the country who had long hair or long nails. He said, “Those who do not understand [the importance of] shaving the head10 are 30c not secular people and are not monks; they are just animals. Since ancient times, was there any Buddhist patriarch who did not shave the head? Those today who do not understand [the importance of] shaving the head are truly animals.” When he preached to the assembly like this, many people who had not shaved their heads for years shaved their heads. In formal preaching in the Dharma hall or in his informal preaching, [the master] would click his fingers loudly as he scolded them.11 “Not knowing what the truth is, they randomly grow long hair and long nails; it is pitiful that they devote a body and mind in the south [continent] of Jambudvīpa12 to wrong ways. For the last two or three hundred years, because the truth of the Founding Patriarch has died out, there have been many people like these. People like these become the leaders of temples and, signing their names with the title of ‘master,’ they create the appearance of acting for the sake of the many, [but] they are without benefit to human beings and gods. Nowadays, on all the mountains throughout the country, there is no one at all who has the will to the truth. The ones who attained the truth are long extinct. Only groups of the corrupt and the degenerate [remain].” When he spoke like this in his informal preaching, people from many districts who had arbitrarily assumed the title of “veteran master” bore no grudge against him and had nothing to say for themselves. Remember, growing the hair long is something that Buddhist patriarchs remonstrate against, and growing the nails long is something that non-Buddhists do. As the children and grandchildren of Buddhist patriarchs, we should not be fond of such violations of the Dharma. We should clean the body and mind, and we should cut the nails and shave the head.

[147] “Wash the anus and the urethra”: Do not neglect this. There was an episode in which, through this practice, Śāriputra13 caused a non-Buddhist to submit himself. This was neither the original expectation of the no Buddhist nor the premeditated hope of Śāriputra, but when the dignified behavior of the Buddhist patriarchs is realized, false teaching naturally succumbs. When [monks] practice beneath a tree or on open ground,14 they have no constructed toilets; they rely on conveniently located river valleys, streams, and so on, and they clean themselves with pieces of soil. This is

[when] there is no ash. They just use two lots of seven balls of soil. The

method of using the two lots of seven balls of soil is as follows: First they take off the Dharma robe and fold it, then they pick up some soil—not black but yellowish soil—and divide it into balls, each about the size of a large soy bean. They arrange these into rows of seven balls, on a stone or some other convenient place, making two rows of seven balls each. After that they prepare a stone to be used as a rub stone. And after that they defecate. After defecating they use a stick, or sometimes they use paper. Then they go to the waterside to clean themselves, first carrying three balls of soil to clean with. They take each individual ball of soil in the palm of the hand and add just a little water so that, when mixed with the water, [the soil] dissolves to a consistency thinner than mud—about the consistency of thin rice gruel. They wash the urethra first. Next, they use one ball of soil, in the same way as before, to wash the anus. And next, they use one ball of soil, in the same way as before, briefly to wash the impure hand.15

[149] Ever since [monks] started living in temples, they have built toilet buildings. These are called tōsu (east office), or sometimes sei (toilet), and sometimes shi (side building).16 They are buildings that should be present wherever monks are living. The rule in going to the toilet is always to take the long towel.17 The method is to fold the towel in two, and then place it over the left elbow so that it hangs down from above the sleeve of your jacket. Having arrived at the toilet, hang the towel over the clothes pole.18 The way to hang it is as it has been hanging from your arm. If you have come wearing a kaṣāya of nine stripes, seven stripes, and so on, hang [the kaṣāya] alongside the towel. Arrange [the kaṣāya] evenly so that it will not fall down. Do not throw it over [the pole] hastily. Be careful to remember the mark [on the pole]. “Remembering the mark” refers to the characters written along the clothes pole; these are written inside moon-shaped circles on sheets of white paper, which are then attached in a line along the pole. So remembering the mark means not forgetting by which character you have put your own gown,19 and not getting [the places] mixed up. When many monks are present do not confuse your own place on the pole with that of others. During this time, when [other] monks have arrived and are standing in lines, bow to them with the hands folded.20 In bowing, it is not necessary to face each other directly and bend the body; it is just a token bow of salutation with the folded hands placed in front of the chest. At the toilet, even if you are not wearing a gown, still bow to and salute [other] monks. If neither hand has become impure, and neither hand is holding anything, fold both hands and bow. If one hand is already soiled, or when one hand is holding something, make the bow with the other hand. To make the bow with one hand, turn the hand palm upward, curl the fingertips slightly as if preparing to scoop up water, and bow as if just lowering the head slightly. If someone else [bows] like this, you should do likewise. And if you [bow] like this, others should do likewise. When you take off the jacket21 and the gown, hang them next to the towel. The way to hang them is as follows: Remove the gown and bring the sleeves together at the back, then bring together the armpits and lift them up so that the sleeves are one over the other. Then, take the inside of the back of the collar of the gown with the left hand, pull up the shoulders with the right hand, and fold the sleeves and the left and right lapels over each other. Having folded the sleeves and lapels over each other, make another fold, down the middle from 31c top to bottom, and then throw the collar of the gown over the top of the pole. The hem of the gown and the ends of the sleeves will be hanging on the near side of the pole. For example, the gown will be hanging from the pole by the join at the waist. Next, cross over the ends of the towel which are hanging down on the near and far sides of the pole, and pull them across to the other side of the gown. [There,] on the side of the gown where the towel is not hanging, cross over [the ends] again and make a knot. Go round two or three times, crossing over [the ends] and making a knot, to ensure that the gown does not fall from the pole to the ground. Facing the gown, join the palms of your hands.22 Next, take the cord and use it to tuck in the sleeves.23 Next, go to the washstand and fill a bucket with water and then, holding [the bucket] in the right hand, walk up to the toilet. The way to put water into the bucket is not to fill it completely, but to make ninety percent the standard. In front of the toilet entrance, change slippers. Changing slippers means taking off your own slippers in front of the toilet entrance and putting on the straw [toilet] slippers.24

[153]          The Zenenshingi25 says, “When we want to go to the toilet, we should go there ahead of time. Do not get into a state of anxiety and haste by arriving just in time. At this time, fold the kaṣāya, and place it on the desk in your quarters, or over the clothes pole.”

[154]          Having entered the toilet, close the door with the left hand. Next, pour just a little water from the bucket into the bowl of the toilet. Then put the bucket in its place directly in front of the hole. Then, while standing facing the toilet bowl, click the fingers three times. When clicking the fingers, make a fist with the left hand and hold it against the left hip. Then put the hem of your skirt and the edges of your clothes in order, face the entrance, position the feet either side of the rim of the toilet bowl, squat down, and defecate. Do not get either side of the bowl dirty, and do not soil the front or back of the bowl. During this time, keep quiet. Do not chat or joke with the person on the other side of the wall, and do not sing songs or recite verses in a loud voice. Do not make a mess by weeping and dribbling, and do not be angry or hasty. Do not write characters on the walls, and do not draw lines in the earth with the shit-stick. The stick is to be used after you have relieved yourself. Another way is to use paper; old paper should not be used, and paper with characters written on it should not be used. Distinguish between clean sticks and dirty sticks. The sticks are eight sun26 long, of triangular section, and the thickness of a thumb. Some are lacquered and some are not lacquered. Dirty [sticks] are thrown into the stick box. Clean [sticks] originally belong in the stick rack. The stick rack is placed near the board [that screens] the front of the toilet bowl. After using the stick or using paper, the method of washing is as follows: Holding the bucket in the right hand, dip the left hand well [into the water] and then, making the left hand into a dipper, scoop up the water; first rinsing the urethra three times and then washing the anus. Make yourself pure and clean by washing according to the method. During this time, do not tip the bucket so suddenly that water spills out of the hand or splashes down, causing the water to be used up quickly. After you have finished washing put the bucket in its place, and then, taking [another] stick, wipe yourself dry. Or you can use paper. Both places, the urethra and the anus, should be thoroughly wiped dry. Next, with the right hand, rearrange the hem of your skirt and the corners of your clothes, and holding the bucket in the right hand, leave the toilet, taking off the straw [toilet] slippers and putting on your own slippers as you pass through the entrance. Next, returning 32b to the washstand, put the bucket back in its original place. Then wash the hands. Taking the spoon for ash in the right hand, first scoop [some ash] onto a tile or a stone, sprinkle a few drops of water onto it with the right hand, and cleanse the soiled hand. Scrub the [fingers] on the tile or the stone, as if sharpening a rusty sword on a whetstone. Wash like this, using ash, three times. Then wash another three times, putting soil [on the stone] and sprinkling it with water. Next, take a honey locust27 in the right hand, dip it in a small tub of water, and scrub it between the hands. Wash [the hands] thoroughly, going up to the forearms as well. Wash with care and effort, dwelling in the mind of sincerity. Three lots of ash, three lots of soil, and one honey locust, makes seven rounds altogether; that is the standard. Next, wash [the hands] in the large tub. This time skin cleansers,28 soil, ash, and so on, are not used. Just wash with water, either cold or hot. After washing once, pour the [used] water into a small bucket, then pour some fresh water [into the tub], and wash the hands again.

[157]  The Garland Sutra says, “When we wash the hands with water, we should pray that living beings will get excellent and fine hands, with which to receive and to retain the Buddha-Dharma.”29

[158]  To pick up the water ladle, always use your right hand. While doing this, do not noisily clatter the ladle and bucket. Do not splash water about, scatter honey locusts around, get the washstand area wet, or be generally hasty and messy. Next, wipe the hands on the common towel, or wipe them on your own towel. After wiping the hands, go under the clothes pole, in 32c front of your gown, and take off the cord and hang it on the pole. Next, after joining hands, untie the towel, take down the gown, and put it on. Then, with the towel hanging over the left arm, apply fragrance. In the common area there is a fragrance applicator. It is fragrant wood fashioned into the shape of a treasure pot,30 as thick as a thumb and as long as the width of four fingers. It is hung from the clothes pole with a piece of string a foot or more long, which is threaded through a hole bored in each end of the fragrant [wood]. When this is rubbed between the palms, it naturally spreads its scent to the hands. When you hang your cord on the pole, do not hang it on top of another so that cord and cord become confused and entangled. Actions like these all “purify the Buddha’s land, and adorn the Buddha’s kingdom,” so do them carefully, and do not be hasty. Do not be in a hurry to finish, thinking that you would like to get back. Privately, you might like to consider the principle that “we do not explain the Buddha-Dharma while in the toilet.”31 Do not keep looking into the faces of other monks who have come there. Cold water is considered better for washing when in the toilet itself; it is said that hot water gives rise to intestinal diseases. [But] there is no restriction against using warm water to wash the hands. The reason that a cauldron is provided is so that we can boil water for washing the hands. The Shingi says, “Late in the evening, boil water and supply oil.32 Always ensure [a] continuous [supply of] hot and cold water, so that the minds of the monks are not disturbed.” So we see that we [can] use both hot and cold water. If the inside of the toilet has become dirty, close the door, and hang up the “dirty” sign.

If a bucket has been dropped [into the toilet bowl] by mistake, close the door,

33a and hang up the “fallen bucket” sign. Do not enter33 a closet on which one of these signs is hung. If, when you are already in the toilet, [you hear] someone outside clicking the fingers, you should leave presently. The Shingi says, “Without washing, we must neither sit on the monks’ platform, nor bow to the Three Treasures. Neither must we receive people’s prostrations.” The Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms says, “If we fail to wash the anus and the urethra, we commit a duṣkṛta,34 and we must not sit on a monk’s pure sitting cloth35 or bow to the Three Treasures. Even if we do bow, there is no happiness or virtue.”

[162]     Thus, at a place of the truth where we strive in pursuit of the truth,36 we should consider this behavior to be foremost. How could we not bow to the Three Treasures? How could we not receive people’s prostrations? And how could we not bow to others? In the place of truth of a Buddhist patriarch, this dignified behavior is always done, and people in the place of truth of a Buddhist patriarch are always equipped with this dignified behavior. It is not our own intentional effort; it is the natural expression of dignified behavior itself. It is the usual behavior of the buddhas and the everyday life of the patriarchs. It is [buddha-behavior] not only of buddhas in this world: it is buddha-behavior throughout the ten directions; it is buddha-behavior in the Pure Land and in impure lands. People of scant knowledge do not think that buddhas have dignified behavior in the toilet, and they do not think that the dignified behavior of buddhas in the sahā world37 is like that of buddhas in the Pure Land. This is not learning of the Buddha’s truth. Remember, purity and impurity is [exemplified by] blood dripping from a human being. At one time it is warm, at another time it is disgusting. The buddhas have toilets, and this we should remember.

[163]     Fascicle Fourteen of the Precepts in Ten Parts38 says, “Śrāmaṇera Rāhula39 spent the night in the Buddha’s toilet. When the Buddha woke up, the Buddha patted Rāhula on the head with his right hand, and preached the following verse:

You were never stricken by poverty,

Nor have you lost wealth and nobility.40

Only in order to pursue the truth, you have left home.

You will be able to endure the hardship.”

[164]     Thus, there are toilet buildings in the Buddha’s places of practicing the truth. And the dignified behavior done in the Buddha’s toilet building is washing. That the Buddha’s behavior, having been transmitted from patriarch 33b to patriarch, still survives is a delight to those who venerate the ancients. We have been able to meet what is difficult to meet. Furthermore, the Tathāgata graciously preached the Dharma for Rāhula inside the toilet building. The toilet building was one [place of] assembly for the Buddha’s turning of the Dharma wheel. The advancing and stillness41 of that place of truth has been authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs.

[165]     Fascicle Thirty-four of the Mahāsaṃghika Precepts42 says, “The toilet building should not be located to the east or to the north. It should be located to the south or to the west. The same applies to the urinal.”

[166]     We should follow this [designation of] the favorable directions. This was the layout of all the monasteries43 in India in the Western Heavens, and the [method of] construction in the Tathāgata’s lifetime. Remember, this is not only the buddha-form followed by one buddha; it describes the places of truth, the monasteries, of the Seven Buddhas. It was never initiated; it is the dignified form of the buddhas. Before we have clarified these [dignified forms], if we hope to establish a temple and to practice the Buddha-Dharma, we will make many mistakes, we will not be equipped with the Buddha’s dignified forms, and the Buddha’s state of bodhi will not yet manifest itself before us. If we hope to build a place of practicing the truth, or to establish a temple, we should follow the Dharma-form that the Buddhist patriarchs have authentically transmitted. We should just follow the Dharma-form that has been authentically transmitted as the right tradition. Because it is the traditional authentic transmission, its virtue has accumulated again and again. Those who are not legitimate successors to the authentic transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs do not know the body and mind of the Buddha-Dharma. Without knowing the body and mind of the Buddha-Dharma, they never clarify the buddha-actions of the Buddha’s lineage. That the Buddha-Dharma of Great Master Śākyamuni Buddha has now spread widely through the ten directions is the realization of the Buddha’s body and mind. The realization of the Buddha’s body and mind, just in the moment, is like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Senjō

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kannondōrikōshō-                                     hōrinji in the Uji district of Yōshū,44 on the   twenty-third day of the tenth lunar month in the  winter of the first year of Enō.45

Notes

1     Master Daikan Enō (638–713), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin.

2     was his posthumous title. Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744), successor of Master Daikan Enō. Zen Master Daie

3     Saiten, “Western Heavens,” means India.

4     Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), pt. 2, no. 1. See also Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Hensan.   Inmo, and

5     The Daibikusanzenyuigikyō.

6     the urethra. Although it is not common practice nowadays to wash around the urethraDaishōben. the words suggest the parts of the body where feces and urine emerge: the anus and after urinating, it seems that Master Dōgen recommended us to do so. In modern Japanese daishōben means “feces and urine,” but in this chapter

7     truth while sitting under a It is a Buddhist tradition to sit under a tree. The Buddha is said to have realized the bodhi tree.

8     and the whole universe is myriad things and phenomena. The The sutra compares the whole universe to the realization of Vairocana Buddha. Its basic teaching is that myriad things and phenomena are the oneness of the universe, Garland Sutra is the Kegonkyō in Japanese, and the Avataṃsaka-sūtra in Sanskrit.

9     lation of the ancients.” In modern Japanese “Reverence for the old traditions” is keiko,keikolit., “consideration of the past,” or “emu-is the term generally used for training by sumo wrestlers, martial artists, etc.

10    the head,” and hair.” In Master Dōgen’s commentary, the expressions used areIn Master Tendō Nyojō’s quotation, “shaving the head” is jōhatsu, teitō,lit., “purifying thelit., “shaving teihatsu, lit., “shaving the hair.”

11    totally clear where Master Dōgen’s own words end and the second quotation begins. The first quotation in this paragraph is clearly defined in the original text. But it is not

12    Indian cosmology, human beings live. Jambudvīpa is the continent south of Mount Sumeru on which, according to ancient

13    to Buddhism on witnessing Śāri Putra’s method of defecating. Of the Śāriputra was one of the Buddha’s ten great disciples. There is a story in chapter 35Makasōgiritsu (Mahāsaṃghika Precepts) that a non-Buddhist was converted

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14    and the monks of his time. However, the tense of the Japanese is the present. Juge-roji, “beneath trees and on open ground,” suggests the practice of the Buddha

15    It is not clear what was done with the remaining eleven balls of soil.

16    In certain ages, however, the main toilet building was located to the west. See Appendix A standard temple in China and Japan faces south. As you approach the temple from Five, Temple Layout.(the south, the Buddha hall is directly in front of you, and the zazen hall is to the left west). A toilet building located to the east would be on the far right (furthest east).

17    meters) in length, which is used as a towel, and also as a sash to keep up the sleeves. It is one of the eighteen articles a monk is supposed to have. The method of using the Shukin.shukin The is explained in detail in Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III), shukin is a piece of cloth, measuring one jo plus two Senmen.shaku (total: 3.64

18    Jōkan,height.lit., “pure pole,” is a bamboo or wooden pole set up horizontally at about head

19    The standard form of the it was customary for the jacket and skirt to be sewn together, hence the name sanworn the following clothes: a white loincloth, white underclothes, a black jacket (or “directly sewn.” The worn by priests in Japan today. A monk of Master Dōgen’s time would usually haveblack cotton jacket, or Jikitotsu,) and black skirt lit., “directly sewn.” Traditionally a monk in China wore a kind of long(kunzuhensan,jiki totsukaṣāya,), and/or a black gown and a black skirt, or is the long black gown with wide sleeves commonlyor Buddhist robe, is universal (see Chapter Twelve, Den-e), but the other clothes worn by monks(jikitotsukunzu. By Master Dōgen’s time,), and finally the jikitotsu,kaṣāya.hen-

Kesa-kudoku; have changed according to the climates and customs of different countries and different ages.  and Chapter Thirteen,

20    Shashu.in front of the chest with the palm of the hand facing downward. The open right hand The left hand is curled into a fist, the fingers covering the thumb, and placed rests, palm down, on the top of the left hand.

21    Hensan. See note 19.

22    Gasshō. In gasshō the palms are brought together in front of the chest, with the tips of the fingers in line with the nostrils.

23    Literally, “take the banzu and wear it on both arms.” Banzu, lit., “binding thing,” is a can be tucked in, leaving the arms bare. Long cord tied round the shoulders and armpits (of the undergarment) so that the sleeves 24 Ho-ai, used for weaving. Lit., “cattail slippers.” Ho, “cattail,” is a marsh plant with long flat leaves, often

25       The by Master Chōro Sōsaku in 1103. It was based on Master Hyakujō’s Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries.).  The editing of the Zenenshingi was completedKoshingi (Old

Pure Criteria

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26       One sun is approximately equal to 1.2 inches.

27       Honey locusts are produced by a tall leguminous tree of the same name (japonica). They are long twisted pods containing a sweet edible pulp and seeds that Gleditsia resemble beans.

28       Menyaku, lit., “face medicines.”

29       bhadra in sixty fascicles between 418 and 420. A second translation was done by This quotation is from the old translation of the Garland Sutra done by Buddha from 759 to 762.Śikṣānanda in eighty fascicles between 695 and 699. This is known as the new trans-lation, but there was also a third partial translation done by Prajña in forty fascicles

30       piece of fragrant wood would have been oval with tapered ends.) In certain Buddhist This kind of pot has an oval body, a long neck, and a lid, often with jewels. (So the

ceremonies, such pots were used to hold water for sprinkling on practitioners’ heads. 31 has not been traced. The characters are in the style of a quotation from a Chinese text, though the source

32    Oil for lamps.

33    “Enter” is originally “ascend.” The toilets were raised a little above the ground.

34    include, for example, failure to observe the seven methods of stopping a quarrel. according to their relative importance, as Violations of some of the two hundred and fifty precepts for monks were classed, duṣkṛta. Wrongdoings in this category

35    tractions on, or to sit on. Zagu represents the Sanskrit niṣīdana. The zagu is a cloth or a mat used to do pros-

36    to express zazen itself. “A place of the truth” is Master Dōgen often used the expression “A place of the truth where we strive in pursuit of the truth” is bendō kufu,dōjō, lit., “truth-place,” which represents “effort in pursuit of the truth,”bendō kufu no dōjō. the Sanskrit bodhimaṇḍa, “seat of truth.” See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 37 The sahā world means the human world. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

38    It enumerates the two hundred and fifty precepts of a monk in Hinayana Buddhism, The Jūjuritsu, a sixty-one–fascicle translation of the Vinaya of the Sarvāstivāda school. and was translated into Chinese by Puṇyatara (Hannyatara) and Kumārajīva.

39    which means “monk.” Rāhula was the Buddha’s son from his marriage with Yaśo- The Sanskrit word śrāmaṇera, which means “novice,” is a variation of śramaṇa, of the precepts. he was foremost among the ten great disciples of the Buddha in meticulous observation dharā. It is said that he became a fully ordained monk when he was twenty, and that

40    Rāhula was born into the nobility. Before becoming a monk, the Buddha was the heir to his father’s throne, so his son

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41    real behavior in daily life. Shinshi, “progressing and stopping,” suggests active and passive behavior, that is, 42 of Hinayana Buddhism. It was translated into Chinese by Buddhabhadra during theThe Makasōgiritsu, a forty-fascicle version of the Vinaya of the Mahā saṃghika school

Eastern Jin dynasty (317–420).

43 Shōja is the translation into Chinese characters of the Sanskrit vihāra. 44 Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture. 45 1239.

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[Chapter Eight]

                                           Raihai-tokuzui                                     

Prostrating to the Marrow of Attainment

Translator’s Note: Raihai means “to prostrate oneself to,” toku means “to get,” or “to attain,” and zui means “marrow.” So raihai-tokuzui means prostrating oneself to attainment of the marrow, in other words, revering what has got the truth. In this chapter Master Dōgen preached to us that the value of a being must be decided according to whether or not it has got the truth. So, he said, even if it is a child, a woman, a devil, or an animal like a wild fox, if it has got the truth, we must revere it wholeheartedly. In this attitude, we can find Master Dōgen’s sincere reverence of the truth, and his view of men, women, and animals.

[169]           In practicing the state of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi the most difficult thing is to find a guiding teacher. Though beyond appearances such as those of a man or a woman, the guiding teacher should be a big stout fellow,1 and should be someone ineffable.2 He is not a person of the past and present, but may be a good counselor with the spirit of a wild fox.3 These are the features of [someone who] has got the marrow;4 he may be a guide and a benefactor; he is never unclear about cause and effect; he may be you, me, him, or her.5

[170]           Having met with a guiding teacher, we should throw away myriad involvements and, without wasting a moment of time,6 we should strive in pursuit of the truth. We should train with consciousness, we should train without consciousness, and we should train with semiconsciousness. Thus, we should learn walking on tiptoes7 to put out a fire on our head.8 When we behave like this, we are unharmed by abusive demons. The patriarch who cuts off an arm and gets the marrow9 is never another, and the master who gets free of body and mind10 is ourself already. Getting the marrow, and receiving the Dharma, invariably come from sincerity and from belief. There is no example of sincerity coming from outside, and there is no way for sincerity to emerge from within. [Sincerity] just means attaching weight to the

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Dharma and thinking light of [one’s own] body. It is to get free from the secular world and to make one’s home the state of truth. If we attach even slightly more weight to self-regard for the body than to the Dharma, the Dharma is not transmitted to us, and we do not attain the truth. Those resolute spirits who attach [greater] weight to the Dharma are not unique, and they do not depend upon the exhortation of others, but let us take up, for the present, one or two instances. It is said that those who attach weight to the Dharma will make the body into a seat on the floor,11 and will serve for countless kalpas [whatever] is maintaining and relying upon the great Dharma, [whatever] has “got my marrow,”12 whether it is an outdoor pillar, whether it is a stone

lantern, whether it is the buddhas, whether it is a wild dog, a demon or a god, a man or a woman. Bodies and minds are easily received: they are [as common] in the world as rice, flax, bamboo, and reeds. The Dharma is rarely met. Śākyamuni Buddha says, “When you meet teachers who expound the supreme state of bodhi, have no regard for their race or caste,13 do not notice their looks, do not dislike their faults, and do not examine their deeds. Only because you revere their prajñā, let them eat hundreds and thousands of pounds of gold every day, serve them by presenting heavenly food, serve them by scattering heavenly flowers, do prostrations and venerate them three times every day, and never let anxiety or annoyance arise in your mind. When we behave like this, there is always a way to the state of bodhi. Since I established the mind, I have been practicing like this, and so today I have been able to attain anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” This being so, we should hope that even trees and stones might preach to us,14 and we should request that even fields and villages might preach to us.15 We should question outdoor pillars, and we should investigate even fences and walls. There is the ancient [example of the] god Indra16 prostrating himself to a wild dog as his master, and asking it about the Dharma; his fame as a great bodhisattva has been transmitted. [Fitness to be asked] does not rest upon the relative nobility of one’s station. Nevertheless, stupid people who do not listen to the Buddha’s Dharma think, “I am a senior bhikṣu. I cannot prostrate myself to a junior who has got the Dharma.” “I have endured long training. I cannot prostrate myself to a recent student who has got the Dharma.” “I sign my name with the title of master. I cannot prostrate myself to someone who does not have the title of master.” “I am an Administrator of Dharma Affairs.17 I cannot prostrate myself to lesser monks who have got the Dharma.” “I am the Chief 34b Administrator of Monks.18 I cannot prostrate myself to laymen and laywomen who have got the Dharma.” “I am [a bodhisattva] of the three clever stages and ten sacred stages. I cannot prostrate myself to bhikṣuṇīs and other [women], even if they have got the Dharma.” “I am of royal pedigree. I cannot prostrate myself to the family of a retainer or to the lineage of a minister, even if they have got the Dharma.” Stupid people like these have heedlessly fled their father’s kingdom and are wandering on the roads of foreign lands;19 therefore, they neither see nor hear the Buddha’s truth.

[176] Long ago, in the Tang dynasty, Great Master Shinsai of Jōshū20 established the mind and set off as a wayfarer.21 In the story he says, “I shall question anyone who is superior to me, even a child of seven. And I shall teach anyone who is inferior to me, even a man of a hundred.” The old man22 is willing to prostrate himself on asking a seven-year-old about the Dharma— this is a rare example of a resolute spirit, and the working of the mind of an eternal buddha. When a bhikṣuṇī who has got the truth and got the Dharma manifests herself in the world,23 bhikṣus24 who seek the Dharma and learn in practice will devote themselves to her order, prostrating themselves and asking about the Dharma—this is an excellent example of learning in practice. For instance, it is like the thirsty finding drink.

[178] The Chinese Zen Master Shikan25 is a venerable patriarch in Rinzai’s lineage. Once upon a time, Rinzai sees the master coming [to visit] and holds onto him. The master says, “It is understood.”26 Rinzai lets go and says, “I will allow you to stop for a while.”27 From this point on, he has already become Rinzai’s disciple. He leaves Rinzai and goes to Massan,28 at which time Massan asks him, “Where have you come from?” The master says, “The entrance of the road.” Massan says, “Why have you come here without anything on?”29 The master has no words. He just prostrates himself, bowing as disciple to teacher. The master asks a question back to Massan: “Just what is Massan?” Massan says, “[Massan] never shows a peak.”30 The master says, “Just who is the person within the mountain?” Massan says, “It is beyond appearances 34c such as those of a man or a woman.” The master says, “Then why do you not change [your form]?” Massan says, “I am not the ghost of a wild fox. What might I change?” The master prostrates himself. Eventually he decides to work as the head of the vegetable garden and works there altogether for three years.

Later, when he has manifested himself in the world,31 he preaches to the assembly, “I got half a dipper at Old Papa Rinzai’s place, and I got half a dipper at Old Mama Massan’s place.32 Making a dipper with both [halves], I have finished drinking, and, having arrived directly at the present, I am completely satisfied.” Hearing these words now, I look back on the traces of those days with veneration for the past. Massan is an excellent disciple33 of Kōan Daigu. She has power in her lifeblood, and so she has become Shikan’s “Ma.” Rinzai is an authentic successor of Ōbaku [Ki]un.34 He has power in his efforts, and so he has become Shikan’s “Pa.” “Pa” means father, and “Ma” means mother.35 Zen Master Shikan’s prostration to and pursuit of the Dharma under the nun Massan Ryōnen are an excellent example of a resolute spirit, and integrity that students of later ages should emulate. We can say that he broke all barriers, large and small.

[180] Nun Myōshin is a disciple of Kyōzan.36 Kyōzan, on one occasion, is choosing the Chief of the Business Office.37 He asks around the retired officers and others on Kyōzan, “Who is the right person?” They discuss it back and forth, and eventually Kyōzan says, “Disciple [Myō]shin from the Wai River, though a woman, has the spirit of a big stout fellow.38 She is certainly qualified to be Chief of the Business Office.” All the monks agree. [So] at length Myōshin is assigned as Chief of the Business Office. The dragons and elephants in Kyōzan’s order do not resent this. Though the position is in fact not so grand, the one selected for it might need to love herself.

While she is posted at the business office, seventeen monks from the Shoku

district39 form a group to visit teachers and seek the truth, and, intending to climb Kyōzan, they lodge at dusk at the business office. In a nighttime talk, while resting, they discuss the story of the Founding Patriarch Sōkei,40 and the wind and the flag.41 The words of each of the seventeen men are totally inadequate. Meanwhile, listening from the other side of the wall, the Chief of the Business Office says, “Those seventeen blind donkeys! How many straw sandals have they worn out in vain? They have never seen the Buddha Dharma even in a dream.” A temple servant present at the time overhears the Chief of the Business Office criticizing the monks and informs the seventeen monks themselves, but none of the seventeen monks resents the criticism of the Chief of the Business Office. Ashamed of their own inability to express the truth, they at once prepare themselves in the dignified form,42

burn incense, do prostrations, and request [her teaching]. The Chief of the Business Office (Myōshin) says, “Come up here!” The seventeen monks approach her, and while they are still walking, the Chief of the Business Office says, “This is not wind moving, this is not a flag moving, and this is not mind moving.” When she teaches them like this, the seventeen monks all experience reflection. They bow to thank her and have the ceremony to become her disciples. Then they go straight back home to western Shoku. In the end, they do not climb Kyōzan. Truly the state [demonstrated] here is beyond [bodhisattvas at] the three clever and ten sacred stages;43 it is action in the truth as transmitted by Buddhist patriarchs from authentic successor to authentic successor. Therefore, even today, when a post as master or assistant master44 is vacated, a bhikṣuṇī who has got the Dharma may be requested [to fill it]. Even if a bhikṣu is senior in years and experience, if he has not got the Dharma, what importance does he have? A leader of monks must always rely upon clear eyes. Yet many [leaders] are drowning in the body and mind of a village bumpkin; they are so dense that they are prone to be derided even in the secular world. How much less do they deserve to be mentioned in the Buddha-Dharma? Moreover, there may be [men] who would refuse to prostrate themselves to women monks who are teachers that have received the Dharma, and who are [the men’s] elder sisters, aunts, and so on.45 Because they do not know and 35b will not learn, they are close to animals, and far from the Buddhist patriarchs. When the sole devotion of body and mind to the Buddha-Dharma is retained deep in [a person’s] consciousness, the Buddha-Dharma always has compassion for the person. Even human beings and gods, in their stupidity, have the sympathy to respond to sincerity, so how could the buddhas, in their rightness, lack the compassion to reciprocate sincerity? The sublime spirit that responds to sincerity exists even in soil, stones, sand, and pebbles. In the temples of the great kingdom of Song today, if a resident bhikṣuṇī is reputed to have got the Dharma, the government issues an imperial edict for her to be appointed master of a nuns’ temple, and she gives formal preaching in the Dharma hall of her present temple. All the monks, from the master down, attend [the formal preaching]. They listen to the Dharma, standing on the ground, and questions are also [put by] the bhikṣus, the male monks. This is a traditional standard. A person who has got the Dharma is one individual true eternal buddha here and now, and as such should not be met as someone

from the past. When that person looks at us, we meet each other in a new and singular state. When we look at that person, the mutual relation may be “today having to enter today.” For example, when arhats, pratyekabuddhas, and [bodhisattvas at]46 the three clever and ten sacred stages come to a bhikṣuṇī who is retaining the transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury, to prostrate themselves and to ask her about Dharma, she must receive these prostrations. Why should men be higher? Space is space, the four elements are the four elements,47 the five aggregates are the five aggregates,48 and women are also like this. As regards attainment of the truth, both [men and women] attain the truth, and we should just profoundly revere every single person who has attained the Dharma. Do not discuss man and woman. This is one of Buddhism’s finest Dharma standards.

[187]          In Song dynasty [China], the term “householder”49 refers to gentle men who have not left their families.50 Some of them live in houses with

35c their wives, while others are single and pure, but anyway we can say that they are immensely busy in a dense forest of dusty toil.51 Nevertheless, if one of them has clarified something, patch-robed monks52 gather to do prostrations and to ask for the benefit [of his teaching], as to a master who had left home. We also should be like that, even toward a woman, even toward an animal. When [a person] has never seen the truths of the Buddha-Dharma even in a dream, even if he is an old bhikṣu of a hundred years, he cannot arrive at the level of a man or woman who has got the Dharma, so we should not venerate [such a person] but need only bow to him as junior to senior. When [a person] practices the Buddha-Dharma and speaks the Buddha Dharma, even if a girl of seven, she is just the guiding teacher of the four groups53 and the benevolent father of all living beings. We should serve and venerate her as we do the buddha-tathāgatas, and as it was, for example, when the dragon’s daughter became a buddha.54 This is just the time-honored form in Buddhism. Those who do not know about it, and who have not received its one-to-one transmission, are pitiful.

[188]          Another case: Since the ancient past in Japan and China, there have been women emperors. The whole country is the possession of such an empress, and all the people become her subjects. This is not out of reverence for her person but out of reverence for her position. Likewise, a bhikṣuṇī has never been revered for her person but is revered solely for her attainment of the Dharma. Furthermore, the virtues that accompany the four effects all belong to a bhikṣuṇī who has become an arhat.55 Even [these] virtues accompany her; what human being or god could hope to surpass these virtues of the fourth effect? Gods of the triple world are all inferior to her. While being forsaken [by human beings] she is venerated by all the gods. How much less should anyone fail to venerate those who have received the transmission of the Tathāgata’s right Dharma, and who have established the great will of a bodhisattva?56 If we fail to venerate such a person it is our own wrongness. 36a And if we fail to revere our own supreme state of bodhi, we are stupid people who insult the Dharma. Again, there are in our country daughters of emperors, or ministers’ daughters who become queens’ consorts,57 or queens who are titled with the names of temples.58 Some of them have shaved their head, and some of them do not shave their head. In any case, priests who [only] look like bhikṣus, and who crave fame and love gain, never fail to run to the house of such [a woman] and strike their head at her clogs. They are far inferior to serfs following a lord. Moreover, many of them actually become her servants for a period of years. How pitiful they are. Having been born in a minor nation in a remote land, they do not even know a bad custom like this for what it is. There was never [such ignorance] in India and China but only in our country. It is lamentable. Forcedly to shave the head and then to violate the Tathāgata’s right Dharma must be called deep and heavy sin. Solely because they forget that worldly ways are dreams and illusions, flowers in space, they are bonded in slavery to women. It is lamentable. Even for the sake of a trifling secular livelihood, they act like this. Why, for the sake of the supreme bodhi, do they fail to venerate the venerable ones who have got the Dharma? It is because their awe for the Dharma is shallow and their will to pursue the Dharma is not pervasive. When [people] are already coveting a treasure they do not think about refusing it just because it is the treasure of a woman. When we want to get the Dharma, we must surpass such resolve. If it is so, even grass, trees, fences, and walls will bestow the right Dharma, and the heavens and the earth, myriad things and phenomena, will also impart the right Dharma. This is a truth that we must always remember. Before we 36b seek the Dharma with this determination, even if we meet true good counselors, we will not be soaked by the benevolent water of Dharma. We should pay careful attention [to this].

[192] Furthermore, nowadays extremely stupid people look at women without having corrected the prejudice that women are objects of sexual greed. Disciples of the Buddha must not be like this. If whatever may become the object of sexual greed is to be hated, do not all men deserve to be hated too? As regards the causes and conditions of becoming tainted, a man can be the object, a woman can be the object, what is neither man nor woman can be the object, and dreams and fantasies, flowers in space, can also be the object. There have been impure acts done with a reflection on water as an object, and there have been impure acts done with the sun in the sky as an object.59 A god can be the object, and a demon can be the object. It is impossible to count all the possible objects; they say that there are eighty-four thousand objects. Should we discard all of them? Should we not look at them? The precepts60 say, “[Abuse of] the two male organs,61 or the three female organs,62 are both pārājika, and [the offender] may not remain in the community.”63 This being so, if we hate whatever might become the object of sexual greed, all men and women will hate each other, and we will never have any chance to attain salvation. We should examine this truth in detail. There are non-Buddhists who have no wife: even though they have no wife, they have not entered the Buddha-Dharma, and so they are [only] non-Buddhists with wrong views. There are disciples of the Buddha who, as the two classes of laypeople,64 have a husband or a wife: even though they have a husband or a wife, they are disciples of the Buddha, and so there are no other beings equal to them in the human world or in heaven above.

[194] Even in China, there was a stupid monk who made the following

vow: “Through every life, in every age, I shall never look at a woman.” Upon what morality is this vow based? Is it based on secular morality? Is it based on the Buddha-Dharma? Is it based on the morality of non-Buddhists? Or is it based on the morality of heavenly demons?65 What wrong is there in a woman? What virtue is there in a man? Among bad people there are men who are bad people. Among good people there are women who are good people. Wanting to hear the Dharma, and wanting to get liberation, never depend upon whether we are a man or a woman. When they have yet to cut delusion, men and women alike have yet to cut delusion. When they cut delusion and experience the principle, there is nothing at all to choose between a man and a woman. Moreover, if [a man] has vowed never to look at a woman, must he discard women even when vowing to save limitlessly many living beings?66 If he discards them, he is not a bodhisattva. How much less [does he have] the Buddha’s compassion. This [vow] is just a drunken utterance caused by deep intoxication on the wine of the śrāvaka. Neither human beings nor gods should believe this [vow] to be true. Furthermore, if we hate [others] for the wrongs they have committed in the past, we must even hate all bodhisattvas. If we hate like this, we will discard everyone, so how will we be able to realize the Buddha-Dharma? Words like those [of the monk’s vow] are the deranged speech of a stupid man who does not know the Buddha Dharma. We should feel sorry for him. If that monk’s67 vow is true, did Śākyamuni and the bodhisattvas of his time all commit wrongs?68 And was their bodhi-mind less profound than the will of that monk? We should reflect [on this] quietly. We should learn in practice whether the ancestral masters who transmitted the treasury of Dharma, and the bodhisattvas of the Buddha’s lifetime, had things to learn in the Buddha-Dharma without this vow. If the 37a vow of that monk were true, not only would we fail to save women but also, when a woman who had got the Dharma manifested herself in the world and preached the Dharma for human beings and gods, we would be forbidden to come and listen to her, would we not? Anyone who did not come and listen would be not a bodhisattva, but just a non-Buddhist. When we look now at the great kingdom of Song, there are monks who seem to have been in training for a long time, [but] who have only been vainly counting the sands of the ocean69 and rolling like surf over the ocean of life and death.70 There are also those who, although women, have visited [good] counselors, made effort in pursuit of the truth, and thus become the guiding teachers of human beings and gods. There are [women] such as the old woman who wouldn’t sell her rice cakes [to Tokusan] and threw her rice cakes away.71 It was pitiful that although [Tokusan] was a male monk, a bhikṣu, he had been vainly counting the sands of the ocean of philosophy, and had never seen the Buddha-Dharma, even in a dream. In general, we should learn to understand clearly whatever circumstances we meet. If we learn only to fear and to flee [from circumstances], that is the theory and practice of a śrāvaka of the Small Vehicle. When we abandon the east and try to hide away in the west, the west is also not without its circumstances. Even if we think that we have escaped circumstances, unless we understand them clearly, though they may be distant they

are still circumstances, we are still not in the state of liberation, and the distant circumstances will [disturb us] more and more deeply.

[198] Again in Japan, there is one particularly laughable institution. This is either called a “sanctuary,”72 or called a “place for practicing the truth of the Great Vehicle,” where bhikṣuṇīs and other women are not allowed to enter. The wrong custom has long been handed down, and so people cannot recognize it for what it is. People who emulate the ancients do not rectify it, and men of wide knowledge give no thought to it. Calling it the enactment of people of authority, or terming it the legacy of men of tradition, they never

37b discuss it at all. If one laughed, a person’s guts might split. Just who are the so-called people of authority? Are they sages or are they saints? Are they gods or are they devils? Are they [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred stages or are they [bodhisattvas at] the three clever stages? Are they [bodhisattvas in] the balanced state of truth or are they [bodhisattvas in] the fine state of truth? Moreover, if old [ways] should never be reformed, should we refrain from abandoning incessant wandering through life and death? Still more, Great Master Śākyamuni is just the supreme right and balanced state of truth itself,73 and he clarified everything that needs to be clarified, he practiced everything that needs to be practiced, and he liberated74 all that needs to be liberated. Who today could even approach his level? Yet the Buddha’s order when he was in the world included all four groups: bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās, it included the eight kinds of beings,75 the thirty-seven kinds of beings, and the eighty-four thousand kinds of beings. The formation of the Buddhist order is clearly the Buddhist order itself. So what kind of order has no bhikṣuṇīs, has no women, and has no eight kinds of beings? We should never hope to have so-called sanctuaries which surpass in their purity the Buddhist order of the Tathāgata’s lifetime, because they are the sphere of heavenly demons.76 There are no differences in the Dharma-form of the Buddhist order, not in this world or in other directions, and not among a thousand buddhas of the three times.77 We should know that [an order] with a different code is not a Buddhist order. “The fourth effect”78 is the ultimate rank. Whether in the Mahayana or the Hinayana, the virtues of the ultimate rank are not differentiated. Yet many bhikṣuṇīs have experienced the fourth effect. [So] to what kind of place—whether it is within the triple world or in the buddha lands of the ten directions—can [a bhikṣuṇī] not go? Who could

stand in her path? At the same time, the fine state of truth79 is also the supreme rank. When a woman has [thus] already become buddha, is there anything in all directions that she cannot perfectly realize? Who could aim to bar her from passing? She already has virtue that “widely illuminates the ten directions”; what meaning can a boundary have? Moreover, would goddesses be 37c barred from passing? Would nymphs be barred from passing? Even goddesses and nymphs are beings that have not yet cut delusion; they are just aimlessly wandering ordinary beings. When they have wrong, they have; when they are without [wrong], they are without. Human women and bestial women, also, when they have wrong, they have; when they are without wrong, they are without. [But] who would stand in the way of gods or in the way of deities? [Bhikṣuṇīs] have attended the Buddha’s order of the three times; they have learned in practice at the place of the Buddha. If [places] differ from the Buddha’s place and from the Buddha’s order, who can believe in them as the Buddha’s Dharma? [Those who exclude women] are just very stupid fools who deceive and delude secular people. They are more stupid than a wild dog worrying that its burrow might be stolen by a human being. The Buddha’s disciples, whether bodhisattvas or śrāvakas, have the following ranks: first, bhikṣu; second, bhikṣuṇī; third, upāsaka; and fourth, upāsikā. These ranks are recognized both in the heavens above and in the human world, and they have long been heard. This being so, those who rank second among the Buddha’s disciples are superior to sacred wheel-turning kings,80 and superior to Śakra-devānām-indra.81 There should never be a place where they cannot go. Still less should [bhikṣuṇīs] be ranked alongside kings and ministers of a minor nation in a remote land. [But] when we look at present “places of the truth” that a bhikṣuṇī may not enter, any rustic, boor, farmer, or old lumberjack can enter at random. Still less would any king, lord, officer, or minister be refused entry. Comparing country bumpkins and bhikṣuṇīs, in terms of learning of the truth or in terms of attainment of rank, who is superior and who is inferior, in conclusion? Whether discussing this according to secular rules or according to the Buddha-Dharma, [one would think that] rustics and boors should not be allowed to go where a bhikṣuṇī might go. [The situation in Japan] is utterly deranged; [our] inferior nation is the first to leave this stain [on its history]. How pitiful it is. When the eldest daughters 38a of the compassionate father of the triple world came to a small country, they

found places where they were barred from going. On the other hand, fellows who live in those places called “sanctuaries” have no fear of [committing] the ten wrongs,82 and they violate the ten important precepts83 one after another. Is it simply that, in their world of wrongdoing, they hate people who do not do wrong? Still more, a deadly sin84 is a serious matter indeed; those who live in sanctuaries may have committed even the deadly sins. We should just do away with such worlds of demons. We should learn the Buddha’s moral teaching and should enter the Buddha’s world. This naturally may be [the way] to repay the Buddha’s benevolence. Have these traditionalists understood the meaning of a sanctuary, or have they85 not? From whom have they received their transmission? Who has covered them with the seal of approval? Whatever comes into “this great world sanctified by the buddhas”—whether it is the buddhas, living beings, the earth, or space—will get free of fetters and attachments, and will return to the original state which is the wonderful Dharma of the buddhas. This being so, when living beings step once [inside] this world, they are completely covered by the Buddha’s virtue. They have the virtue of refraining from immorality, and they have the virtue of becoming pure and clean. When one direction is sanctified, the whole world of Dharma is sanctified at once, and when one level is sanctified, the whole world of Dharma is sanctified. Sometimes places are sanctified using water, sometimes places are sanctified using mind, and sometimes places are sanctified using space. For every case there are traditions which have been transmitted and received, and which we should know.86 Furthermore, when we are sanctifying an area, after sprinkling nectar87 and finishing devotional prostrations88—in other words, after making the place pure— we recite the following verse:

This world and the whole world of Dharma, Naturally are sanctified, pure and clean.

Have the traditionalists and veterans who nowadays usually proclaim sanctuaries understood this meaning, or have they not? I guess they cannot know that the whole world of Dharma is sanctified within [the act of] sanctification itself. Clearly, drunk on the wine of the śrāvaka, they consider a small area to be a great world. Let us hope that they will snap out of their habitual drunken delusion, and that they will not violate the wholeness of

the great world of the buddhas. We should prostrate ourselves in veneration of the virtue by which [the buddhas], through acts of salvation and acceptance, cover all living beings with their influence. Who could deny that this [prostration] is the attainment of the marrow of the truth?

                                    Shōbōgenzō Raihai-tokuzui

                                    Written at Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji on the day                                     of purity and brightness89 in [the second year of]                                     Enō.90

 

Notes

1         as an adjective meaning “all right.”Daijōbu,a man of Confucian virtue. The word was used later in Chinese Buddhism, meaningor “great stout fellow,” was originally a concept in Confucianism, suggestingdaijōbu is commonly used someone who has trained perfectly. In modern Japanese,

2         Inmonin.“If you want to attain the matter of the ineffable, you must have become someoneMaster Ungo Dōyō, quoted in Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Inmo, says, ineffable.”

3         Yako-zei,mystical, not practical enough. But in this case, it suggests the presence of somethingnatural and mystical.or “ghost of a wild fox,” often suggests criticism that a person’s state is too

4         “Got the marrow” is tokuzui. Master Taiso Eka made three prostrations to Master Bodhidharma, and returned to his seat. Master Bodhidharma said, “You have got mymarrow.” The story is recorded in Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Kattō. 5 “Him or her” is kare, which usually means “he” or “him,” but which in this context is clearly neutral.

6     Sun-in, lit., “an inch of shadow.”

7     Gyōsoku, tiptoes. To learn walking on tiptoes means to learn how to behave like the Buddha.lit., “holding up the feet.” Legend says the Buddha naturally walked on

8     A symbol of sincere behavior.

9     affirmed Master Taiso Eka’s state with the words “You have got my marrow.” Master Taiso Eka cut off part of his arm to show his sincerity to Master Bodhidharma(see Chapter Thirty [Vol. II], Gyōji), and several years later Master Bodhidharma

10    used by Master Tendō Nyojō, Master Dōgen’s master. Shinjin-datsuraku, “getting free of body and mind,” was an expression commonly

11    A figurative expression suggesting a humble attitude.

12    Gozui o nyotoku seru araba,Master Bodhidharma’s marrow. lit., “If it has ‘you-got’ ‘my-marrow.’” Gozui means

13    In the Buddha’s time, Indian society had four castes: the ruling nobility), vaiśya (workers), and śūdra (servants). At the lowest end of the brahmana (priests), kṣatriya social scale were people without any caste.

103

14    a child bodhisattva the first two lines of a four-line poem: “All actions are in the state demon said it was too hungry to tell the child the last two lines, so the child offered without constancy/Concrete existence is the arising and passing of Nyaku-ju nyaku-seki alludes to a story in the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra.dharma A demon tolds.” The demon recited the last two lines: “After arising and passing have ceased,/The peace his own body as a meal for the demon if it would recite the last two lines. So the

on some nearby trees and rocks in his own blood, before being eaten by the demon. and quiet is pleasure itself.” The child preserved the verse for posterity by writing it

15    Nyaku-den nyaku-ri. These words originate in the Lotus Sutra. See LS 3.72–74. 16 Tentai-shaku. See Chapter Two, Maka-hannya-haramitsu, note 28.

17    Hōmushi.an official in the government.Shi means “government official.” A monk holding this position would also have beenThe title is no longer in use, and the exact nature of the position is unclear.

18    Sōjōshi. This title has also gone out of use.

19    Sutra.Alludes to a parable in the See LS 1.236.   Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”) chapter of the Lotus

20    Masters Ōbaku, Hōju, Enkan, and Kassan. Died in 897, at the age of one hundredMaster Jōshū Jūshin. A successor of Master Nansen Fugan. He also studied under and twenty. Great Master Shinsai is his posthumous title. See Chapter Thirty-five(Vol. II), Hakujushi. 21 Angya,masters, or on a pilgrimage to sacred places.lit., “to go on foot,” means to travel from place to place, visiting Buddhist

22 It is said that Master Jōshū Jūshin was already sixty before he became a Buddhist monk. 23 a big temple.Shusse, lit., “manifest oneself in the world,” usually means to become the master of

24    Dharma, and Sangha.the Sanskrit word “sangha,” as in the case of the Three Treasures, Biku-sō. Bikuusually translated as “monk,” is originally neutral in gender. It sometimes representsrepresents the Sanskrit word bhikṣu, which means a male monk. buppōsō: Buddha,Sō,

25    Master Kankei Shikan (d. 895), successor of Master Rinzai. Throughout this paragraphhe is referred to as “the master.” 26 Master Rinzai wanted Master Kankei to stay in his order. Master Kankei understood Master Rinzai’s intention, and agreed.

27    while.” When Master Kankei becomes the master of his own temple, he preaches toShinji-shōbōgenzō,Rinzai. When Master Rinzai sees him, he holds onto him. Master Kankei says,“Understood.” Master Rinzai lets go of him and says, “I will allow you to stop for apt. 3, no. 17: Master Kankei Shikan is coming to visit Master Chapter Eight

at the moment of the present, I am completely satisfied.”the assembly, “When I met Master Rinzai, there was no discussion. Arriving directly

28    Nun-Master Massan Ryōnen, successor of Master Kōan Daigu.

29    Literally, “Why haven’t you come here covering yourself?” This suggests that it issometimes better to be polite than to give a terse “Zen” answer.

30    The proper name Massan is literally “Last Mountain” or “End Mountain.” 31 Shusse, i.e., when he became the master of a big temple. See note 23. 32 “Papa” is ya-ya. “Mama” is jō-jō.

33    explains the term Jinsoku, lit., “mystical foot,” is a traditional term for an excellent member of an order.Daichidoron (based on the Mahāprajñā pāra mitopadeśa)

The Chinese commentary

we call them mystical; they support many living beings, so we call them feet.”jinsoku as follows: “Their fine abilities are difficult to fathom, so

34    Master Hyakujō Ekai.Master Ōbaku Kiun (exact dates unknown, d. between 855 and 859), successor of

35    Japanese phonetic alphabet.Master Dōgen explained the meaning of the Chinese characters ya and jo using the

36    Master Kyōzan Ejaku (807–883), successor of Master Isan Reiyū.

37    Kai-in.chants, and donors. The building was usually located lower down the mountain thanThis office was for dealing with laypeople such as government officials, merthe main temple buildings.

38    Daijōbu. See note 1. Suggests that she was healthy and vigorous, and had self-control.

39    In present-day Sichuan province.

40    Master Daikan Enō (638–713), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin.

41    Two monks are having a discussion. One monk says, “The flag is moving.” The otheralso Chapter Twenty-nine [Vol. II], and the flag is not moving. You are moving mind.” (monk says, “The wind is moving.” Master Daikan Enō says, “The wind is not movingInmo.)    Keitokudentōroku, chapter 5. See

42    Igi o gu su,the zagu (prostration clothlit., “to prepare the dignified form,” means to wear the ).    kaṣāya and to take

43    first group of ten stages is the ten stages of belief. The next three groups of ten stagesA bodhisattva is said to pass through fifty-two stages on the road to buddhahood. The fifty-first stage is “marvelous enlightenment.”are the three clever stages. The fifth group of ten stages is the ten sacred stages. Thetōkaku, “equal enlightenment,” and the fifty-second stage is myōkaku,

44    Master Mahākāśyapa.Hanza, lit., “half-seat”—a reference to the story that the Buddha shared his seat with

105

45    Elder sister means a senior female member of one’s master’s order. Aunt means asenior female member of one’s master’s order.

46    In the tor”), pratyekabuddhaLotus Sutra the Buddha explains four classes of Buddhists: (lit., “individually enlightened one”), bodhisattva (lit., “enlightśrāvaka (lit., “audi-four (Vol. II), the fourth and final state of a enment being”), and buddha. These classes were further subdivided. An arhat is atBukkyō. śrāvaka. For further explanation, see Chapter Twenty-

47    The four elements are earth, water, fire, and wind; representing the material world.

48    resenting the phenomenal world. The five aggregates are form, feeling, perception, volition, and consciousness; rep-

49    Koji,a man who did not work for the imperial government, but studied Confucianism asof a household.” At the same time, the concept of “householder,” represents the Sanskrit word koji. kojigṛhapati, also comes from Confucianism: which means “the master a civilian, was called

50    Shukke. Shutsu means “to get out of” or “to transcend.” Ke means a house, a home, inevitably connected with family life. As a verb, monk; as a noun, it means a monk. or a family; at the same time it suggests the web of social and economic relationships shukke means to become a Buddhist

51    Jinrō, “dusty toil,” in this context means secular work.

52    Un-nō-ka-bei, lit., “clouds-patches-mist-sleeves.” Clouds and mist suggest the free and the gowns with wide sleeves usually worn by monks in China and Japan.natural life of a Buddhist monk. Patches and sleeves suggest the Buddhist robe, and 53 Shishu, upāsakathe four groups of Buddhist followers: s (laymen), and upāsikās (laywomen). bhikṣus (monks), bhikṣuṇīs (nuns),

54    See LS 2.224.

55    identifies arhat and buddha needs to learn nothing more. In Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), is the fourth effect). An arhat is a gamin The four stages of a (once-returner), śrāvakaanāgāminare as follows: śrāvaka(non-returner), and arhat (the ultimate state, whichwho has overcome all hindrances and whosrotāpanna (stream-enterer), Arakan, Master Dōgensakṛ dā -

56    III), Ninety-three (Vol. IV), The will to save others before we ourselves are saved. See Chapter Sixty-nine (Vol.Hotsu-mujōshin; Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), Doshin. Hotsu-bodaishin; and Chapter 57 The emperor would have several wives, or queens consort. Ministers would be eager to have a daughter made a queen consort.

58    liked to have a titular position in a Buddhist temple. In those days Buddhism was revered highly in Japanese society. So aristocratic women Chapter Eight

59    References to old Chinese and Japanese stories. The a book of ancient Japanese legends, tells the story of a woman who was sexuallyKojiki (Record of Ancient Matters), stimulated by the rays of the sun.

60    Fascicle 1 of the Shibunritsu (Vinaya in Four Divisions).

61    The male organ and anus.

62    The urethra, female organ, and anus.

63    The Sanskrit word which may warrant expulsion from the monastic order. pārājika expresses one of the most serious violations of the precepts,

64    Upāsaka (layman) and upāsikā (laywoman).

65    Tenma are demons in heaven who govern the world of volition and hinder Buddhism.

Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), They symbolize idealistic people. The various classes of demons are discussed in Hotsu-bodaishin.

66    The original words are to save them.” This is the first of beings are countless; I vow to save them./Delusions are endless; I vow to end them./The teachings of Dharma are boundless; I vow to learn them./The Buddha’s truth is Supreme; I vow to realize it.”shujo-muhen-seigan-do,shi-gu-seigan ,or “living beings are limitless; I vow the Four Universal Vows: “Living

67    “That monk” is nanji, or “you.” Master Dōgen often uses nanji for the third person, when criticizing someone’s wrongness. 68 That is, by looking at women.

69    is the line “Entering the ocean and counting sands, they hinder themselves in vain.” In Master Yōka Gengaku’s poem Shōdōka (“Song of Experiencing the Truth”) there only by reading books. Counting the sands of the ocean symbolizes the difficulty of realizing the Dharma

70    Symbolizes the life of people who do not have any meaningful goal.

71    See Chapters Eighteen and Nineteen, Shin-fukatoku.

72    Kekkai, lit., “bounded area,” represents the Sanskrit sīmā-bandha, “a depository of rules of morality.”

73    or “awareness”; it suggests the state experienced throughout the body and mind in Mujō-shōtō-gaku.samyaksaṃbodhizazen. sometimes represented phonetically as Bodhi is usually represented by the character . The Sanskrit word These characters represent the meaning of the Sanskrit bodhibodai.is represented by dō, lit., “Way,” and it is also kaku, lit., “awakening,”anuttara

74    Gedatsu su. Ge means “to solve,” and datsu means “to get rid of.” Here gedatsu su

is used as a verb.

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75    (The eight kinds of beings: celestial musicians who feed on fragrances), kiṃnaradevas (half horses, half men), and s (gods), nāgas (dragons), asuras (angry titans), yakṣamahoragas (demons), s (serpents). Thesegaruḍagandharvas (birdss that hunt dragons),

sutras to suggest the diversity of the Buddha’s audiences. See Glossary of SanskritTerms and, for example, LS 2.140.fantastic beings existed in ancient Indian legends, so they were utilized in Buddhist

76    Tenma. See note 65.

77    Sanze, past, present, and future; eternity.

78    Shika, athwartship, the ultimate state in Hinayana Buddhism. See note 55.

79    The ultimate state of a bodhisattva in Mahayana Buddhism. See note 43.

80    four such kings who rule over the four continents surrounding Mount Sumeru. They Tenrinjō-ō,each have a precious wheel or from the Sanskrit cakravarti-rāja.cakra.  In ancient Indian mythology there are

81    The god Indra. See note 16 and Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

82    wrongs are as follows: killing, stealing, adultery, telling lies, duplicitous speech,There are several interpretations of the ten wrongs. One interpretation is that the ten abusive slander, idle chatter, greed, anger, and holding wrong views.

83    The ten important precepts, or prohibitions, are as follows: not to take life, not toother Buddhists, not to praise oneself, not to begrudge the Dharma or one’s possessions, steal, not to lust, not to lie, not to sell or consume liquor, not to discuss the faults of

IV), not to get angry, and not to insult the Three Treasures. See Chapter Ninety-four (Vol.Jukai.

84    The five deadly sins are to kill one’s father, to kill one’s mother, to kill an arhat, to spill the Buddha’s blood, and to disrupt the Buddhist order.

85    “They” is originally nanji (“you”); see note 67.

86    For example, it is traditional to sprinkle water over the area where a precepts ceremony is to be held.

87    In this case, “nectar” means water. Kanrō, lit., “sweet dew,” from the Sanskrit amṛta, which means nectar from heaven. 88 prostration, the practitioner drops five parts of the body to the ground: left knee, rightKimyō no rai, a prostration made as a symbol of devoting one’s life. In a devotional knee, left elbow, right elbow, and forehead.

89    Sei-mei no hi. This was the name given to the fifteenth day after the spring equinox.

90    1240.

[Chapter Nine]

Keisei-sanshiki

and the Form of the Mountains The Voices of the River Valley

Translator’s Note: Kei means “river valley,” sei means “sound” or “voice,” san means “mountain,” and shiki means “form” or “color.” So keisei-sanshiki means the voices of river valleys and the forms of mountains—that is, nature. In Buddhism, this world is the truth itself, so nature is a face of the truth. Nature is the material side of the real world, so it is always speaking the truth, and manifesting the law of the universe every day. This is why it has been said since ancient time that sounds of rivers are the preaching of Gautama Buddha and forms of mountains are the body of Gautama Buddha. In this chapter, Master Dōgen preached to us the meaning of nature in Buddhism.

[209] In the supreme state of bodhi, Buddhist patriarchs who transmitted the truth and received the behavior have been many, and examples of past ancestors who reduced their bones to powder1 cannot be denied. Learn from the ancestral patriarch who cut off his arm,2 and do not differ by a hair’s breadth [from the bodhisattva who] covered the mud.3 When we each get rid of our husk, we are not restricted by former views and understanding, and things which have for vast kalpas been unclear suddenly appear before us. In the here and now of such a moment, the self does not recognize it, no one else is conscious of it, you do not expect it, and even the eyes of Buddha do not glimpse it. How could the human intellect fathom it?

was Soshoku, and who was also called Shisen.[210] In the great kingdom of Song there lived Layman T4 He seems to have been a real ōba, whose name dragon in the literary world,5 and he studied the dragons and elephants of the Buddhist world.6 He swam happily into deep depths, and floated up and down through layers of cloud.7 Once he visited Lushan.8 In the story he hears the sounds of a mountain stream flowing through the night, and realizes the truth. 38c

He makes the following verse, and presents it to Zen Master Jōsō:9

109

The voices of the river valley are the [Buddha’s] wide and long     tongue,10

The form of the mountains is nothing other than his pure body.

Through the night, eighty-four thousand verses. On another day, how can I tell them to others?

When he presents this verse to Zen Master [Jō]sō, Zen Master [Jō]sō affirms it. [Jō]sō means Zen Master Shōkaku Jōsō, a Dharma successor of Zen Master Ōryū Enan.11 [E]nan is a Dharma successor of Zen Master Jimyō Soen.12 Once, when Layman [Tōba] met Zen Master Butsuin Ryōgen,13 Butsu- in gave him a Dharma robe, the Buddhist precepts, and so on, and the layman always wore the Dharma robe to practice the truth. The layman presented Butsuin with a priceless jeweled belt. People of the time said, “Their behavior is beyond common folk.” So the story of realizing the truth on hearing the river valley may also be of benefit to those who are later in the stream. It is a pity that, so many times, the concrete form of the teaching, preaching of Dharma by manifestation of the body,14 seems to have leaked away. What has made [Layman Tōba] see afresh the form of the mountains and hear the voices of the river valley? A single phrase? Half a phrase? Or eighty-four thousand verses? It is a shame that sounds and forms have been hiding in the mountains and waters. But we should be glad that there are moments in which, and causes and conditions whereby, [real sounds and forms] show up in the mountains and waters. The tongue’s manifestation never flags. How could the body’s form exist and vanish? At the same time, should we learn that they are close when they are apparent, or should we learn that they are close when they are hidden? Should we see them as a unity, or should we see them as a half?15 In previous springs and autumns, [Layman Tōba] has not seen or heard the mountains and waters but in moments “through the night,” he is able, barely, to see and to hear the mountains and waters. Bodhisattvas who are learning the truth now should also open the gate to learning

[by starting] from mountains flowing and water not flowing.16 On the day before the night during which this layman has realized the truth, he has visited Zen Master [Jō]sō and asked about stories of “the nonemotionally preaching Dharma.”17 Under the words of the Zen master, the form of his somersaulting is still immature,18 but when the voices of the river valley are heard, waves

break back upon themselves and surf crashes high into the sky. This being so, now that the voices of the river valley have surprised the layman, should we put it down to the voices of the river valley, or should we put it down to the influence of Shōkaku? I suspect that Shōkaku’s words on “the nonemotionally preaching Dharma” have not stopped echoing but are secretly mingling with the sounds of the mountain stream in the night. Who could empirically affirm this situation as a single gallon?19 And who could pay homage20 to it as the whole ocean? In conclusion, is the layman realizing the truth, or are the mountains and waters realizing the truth? How could anyone who has clear eyes not put on their eyes at once [and look] at the manifestation of the long tongue and the pure body?

[215] Another case: Zen Master Kyōgen Chikan21 was learning the truth in the order of Zen Master Daii Daien.22 On one occasion, Daii says, “You are sharp and bright, and you have wide understanding. Without quoting from any text or commentary, speak a phrase for me in the state you had before your parents were born.”23 Kyōgen searches several times for something to say, but he is not able. He deeply regrets the state of his body and mind, and looks through books that he has kept for years, but he is still dumbfounded. In the end, he burns all the writings he has collected over the years, and says, “A rice cake that is painted in a picture24 cannot stave off hunger. Upon my oath, I shall not desire to understand the Buddha-Dharma in this life. I only want to be the monk who serves the morning gruel and midday meal.” So saying, he spends years and months as a server of meals. “The monk who serves the morning gruel and midday meal” means one who waits upon the other monks at breakfast and the midday meal;25 he would be like a “liveried waiter”26 in this country. While he is thus occupied, he says to 39b Daii, “Chikan is dull in body and mind and cannot express the truth. Would the master say something for me?” Daii says, “I would not mind saying something for you, [but if I did so,] perhaps you would bear a grudge against me later.” After spending years and months in such a state, [Chikan] enters Butōzan, following the tracks of National Master Daishō,27 and makes a thatched hut on the remains of the National Master’s hermitage. He has planted bamboo and made it his friend. One day, while he is sweeping the path, a piece of tile flies up and strikes a bamboo with a crack. Hearing this sound, he suddenly realizes the great state of realization. He bathes and purifies himself,

and, facing Daiizan, he burns incense and does prostrations. Then, directing himself to [Master] Daii, he says, “Great Master Daii! If you had explained it to me before, how would this thing have been possible? The depth of your kindness surpasses that of a parent.” Finally, he makes the following verse:

At a single stroke I lost recognition.

No longer need I practice self-discipline.

[I am] manifesting behavior in the way of the ancients, Never falling into despondency.

There is no trace anywhere:

[The state] is dignified action beyond sound and form. People everywhere who have realized the truth, All will praise [these] supreme makings.

He presents the verse to Daii. Daii says, “This disciple is complete.”28

[218] Another case: Zen Master Reiun Shigon29 is a seeker of the truth for thirty years. One day, while on a ramble in the mountains, he stops for a rest at the foot of a hill and views the villages in the distance. It is spring, and the peach blossoms are in full bloom. Seeing them, he suddenly realizes the truth. He makes the following verse and presents it to Daii:

For thirty years, a traveler in search of a sword.30 How many times have leaves fallen and buds sprouted? After one look at the peach blossoms,

I have arrived directly at the present and have no further doubts.

Daii says, “One who has entered by relying on external phenomena will never regress or falter.”31 This is his affirmation. What person who has entered

could not rely on external phenomena? What person who has entered could regress or falter? [Isan’s words] are not about [Shi]gon alone. Finally, [Shigon] succeeds to the Dharma of Daii. If the form of the mountains were not the pure body, how would things like this be possible?

[220] A monk asks Zen Master Chōsha [Kei]shin,32 “How can we make mountains, rivers, and the earth belong to ourselves?” The master says, “How can we make ourselves belong to mountains, rivers, and the earth?”33 This says that ourselves are naturally ourselves, and even though ourselves are mountains, rivers, and the earth, we should never be restricted by belonging. [221] Master Ekaku of Rōya, [titled] Great Master Kōshō,34 is a distant descendant of Nangaku.35 One day [Chōsui] Shisen,36 a lecturer of a philosophical sect, asks him, “How does pure essentiality suddenly give rise to mountains, rivers, and the earth?” Questioned thus, the master preaches, “How does pure essentiality suddenly give rise to mountains, rivers, and the earth?”37 Here we are told not to confuse mountains, rivers, and the earth which are just pure essentiality, with “mountains, rivers and the earth.” However, because the teacher of sutras has never heard this, even in a dream, he does not know mountains, rivers, and the earth as mountains, rivers, and the earth.

[222] Remember, if it were not for the form of the mountains and the voices of the river valley, picking up a flower could not proclaim anything,38 and the one who attained the marrow could not stand at his own place.39 Relying on the virtue of the sounds of the river valley and the form of the mountains, “the earth and all sentient beings realize the truth simultaneously,”40 and there are many buddhas who realize the truth on seeing the bright star. Bags of skin in this state are the wise masters of the past, whose will to pursue the Dharma was very deep. People of the present should study their traces without fail. Now also, real practitioners who have no concern for fame and gain should establish similar resolve. In [this] remote corner in recent times, people who honestly pursue the Buddha-Dharma are very rare. They are not absent, but they are difficult to meet. There are many who drift into the monk- 40a hood, and who seem to have left the secular world, but who only use Buddhism as a bridge to fame and gain. It is pitiful and lamentable that they do not regret the passing of this life41 but vainly go about their dark and dismal business. When can they expect to become free and to attain the truth? Even if they met a true master, they might not love the real dragon.42 My late [master, the eternal] buddha, calls such fellows “pitiful people.”43 They are like this because of the bad they have done in past ages. Though they have received a life, they have no will to pursue the Dharma for the Dharma’s sake, and so, when they meet the real Dharma  they doubt the real dragon, and when they meet the right Dharma they are disliked by the right Dharma. Their body, mind, bones, and flesh have never lived following the Dharma, and so they are not in mutual accord with the Dharma; they do not receive and use [in harmony] with the Dharma. Founders of sects, teachers, and disciples have continued a transmission like this for a long time. They explain

the bodhi-mind as if relating an old dream. How pitiful it is that, having been born on the treasure mountain, they do not know what treasure is and they do not see treasure. How much less could they [actually] get the treasure of Dharma? After they establish the bodhi-mind, even though they will pass through the cycle of the six states44 or the four modes of birth,45 the causes and conditions of that cyclical course will all become the actions and vows of the state of bodhi. Therefore, though they have wasted precious time in the past, as long as their present life continues they should, without delay, make the following vow: “I hope that I, together with all living beings, may hear the right Dharma through this life and through every life hereafter. If I am able to hear it, I will never doubt the right Dharma, and I will never be disbelieving. When I meet the right Dharma, I will discard secular rules and

receive and retain the Buddha-Dharma so that the earth and sentient beings may finally realize the truth together.” If we make a vow like this, it will naturally become the cause of, and conditions for, the authentic establishment of the mind. Do not neglect, or grow weary of, this attitude of mind. In this country of Japan, a remote corner beyond the oceans, people’s minds are extremely stupid. Since ancient times, no saint has ever been born [here], nor anyone wise by nature: it is needless to say, then, that real men of learning the truth are very rare. When [a person] tells people who do not know the will to the truth about the will to the truth, the good advice offends their ears, and so they do not reflect upon themselves but [only] bear resentment toward the other person. As a general rule concerning actions and vows which are the bodhi-mind, we should not intend to let worldly people know whether or not we have established the bodhi-mind, or whether or not we are practicing the truth; we should endeavor to be unknown. How much less could we boast about ourselves? Because people today rarely seek what is real, when the praises of others are available, they seem to want someone to say that their practice and understanding have become harmonized, even though there is no practice in their body and no realization in their mind. “In delusion adding to delusion”46 describes exactly this. We should throw away this wrongmindedness immediately. When learning the truth, what is difficult to see and to hear is the attitude of mind [based in] right Dharma. This attitude of mind is what has been transmitted and received by the buddhas, buddha to buddha. It has been transmitted and received as the Buddha’s brightness, and as the Buddha’s mind. From the time when the Tathāgata was in the world until today, many people have seemed to consider that our concern in learning the truth47 is to get fame and gain. If, however, on meeting the teachings of a true master, they turn around and pursue the right Dharma, they will naturally attain the truth. We should be aware that the sickness described above might be present in the learning of the truth today. For example, among beginners 40c and novices, and among veterans of long training, some have got the makings to receive the transmission of the truth and to pass on the behavior, and some have not got the makings. There may be some who have it in their nature to learn, in veneration of the ancients. There may also be insulting demons who will not learn. We should neither love nor resent either group. [Yet] how can we have no regret? How can we bear no resentment? Perhaps no one bears resentment because almost no one has recognized the three poisons as the three poisons.48 Moreover, we should not forget the determination we had when we began the joyful pursuit of the Buddha’s truth. That is to say, when we first establish the will, we are not seeking the Dharma out of concern for others, and, having discarded fame and gain [already], we are not seeking fame and gain: we are just single-mindedly aiming to get the truth. We are never expecting the veneration and offerings of kings and ministers. Nevertheless, such causes of and conditions for [the will to fame and gain] are present today. [Fame and gain] are not an original aim, and they are not [true] objects of pursuit. To become caught in the fetters that bind human beings and gods is [just] what we do not hope for. Foolish people, however, even those who have the will to the truth, soon forget their original resolve and mistakenly expect the offerings of human beings and gods, feeling glad that the merit of the Buddha-Dharma has come to them. If the devotions of kings and ministers are frequent, [foolish people] think, “It is the realization of my own moral way.” This is one of the demons [that hinder] learning of the truth. Though we should not forget the mind of compassion, we should not rejoice [to receive devotion]. Do you remember the golden words of the Buddha, “Even while the Tathāgata is alive, there are many who have hate and envy.”49 Such is the principle that the stupid do not recognize the wise, and small animals make enemies of great saints.

            [230] Further, many of the ancestral masters of the Western Heavens  41a

have been destroyed by non-Buddhists, by the two vehicles,50 by kings, and

so on;51 but this is never due to superiority on the part of the non-Buddhists, or lack of farsightedness on the part of the ancestral masters. After the First Patriarch52 came from the west, he hung up his traveling stick in the Suzan Mountains,53 but neither Bu (Ch. Wu) of the Liang dynasty nor the ruler of the Wei dynasty knew who he was.54 At the time, there was a pair of dogs known as Bodhiruci Sanzō55 and Precepts Teacher Kōzu. Fearing that their empty fame and false gain might be thwarted by a right person, they behaved as if looking up at the sun in the sky and trying to blot it out.56 They are even more terrible than Devadatta,57 who [lived when the Buddha] was in the world. How pitiful they are. The fame and profit that they58 love so deeply is more disgusting than filth to the ancestral master. That such facts occur is not due to any imperfection in the power of the Buddha-Dharma. We should remember that there are dogs who bark at good people. Do not worry about barking dogs. Bear them no grudge. Vow to lead them and to guide them. Explain to them, “Though you are animals, you should establish the bodhimind.” A wise master of the past has said, “These are just animals with human faces.” But there may also be a certain kind of demon which devotes itself and serves offerings to them. A former buddha has said, “Do not get close to kings, princes, ministers, rulers, brahmans, or secular people.”59 This is truly the form of behavior that people who want to learn the Buddha’s truth should not forget. [When] bodhisattvas are at the start of learning, their virtue, in accordance with their progress, will pile up.

[232]     Moreover, there have been examples since ancient times of thegod Indra coming to test a practitioner’s resolve, or of Māra-pāpīyas60 coming to hinder a practitioner’s training. These things always happened when [the practitioner] had not got rid of the will to fame and gain. When the [spirit of] great benevolence and great compassion is profound, and when the vow

41b to widely save living beings is mature, these hindrances do not occur. There are cases when the power of practice naturally takes possession of a nation. There are cases when [a practitioner] seems to have achieved worldly fortune. At such times, reexamine the case carefully. Do not slumber on without regard to the particular case. Foolish people delight in [worldly fortune] like stupid dogs licking a dry bone. The wise and the sacred detest it as worldly people hate filth and excrement.

[233]     In general, a beginner’s sentimental thinking cannot imagine the Buddha’s truth—[the beginner] fathoms but does not hit the target. Even though we do not fathom [the truth] as beginners, we should not deny that there is perfect realization in the ultimate state. [Still,] the inner depths61 of the perfect state are beyond the beginner’s shallow consciousness. [The beginner] must just endeavor, through concrete conduct, to tread the path of the ancient saints. At this time, in visiting teachers and seeking the truth, there are mountains to climb and oceans to cross. While we are seeking a guiding teacher, or hoping to find a [good] counselor, one comes down from the heavens or springs out from the earth.62 At the place where we meet him, he makes sentient beings speak the truth and makes non sentient beings63 speak the truth, and we listen with body and listen with mind. “Listening with the ears” is everyday tea and meals, but “hearing the sound through the eyes”64 is just the ambiguous,65 or the undecided,66 itself. In meeting Buddha, we meet ourselves as buddha and others as buddha, and we meet great buddhas and small buddhas. Do not be surprised by or afraid of a great buddha. Do not doubt or worry about a small buddha. The great buddhas and small buddhas referred to here are recognized, presently, as the form of the mountains and the voices of the river valley. In this the wide and long tongue exists, and eighty-four thousand verses exist; the manifestation is “far transcendent,” and the insight is “unique and exceptional.”67 For this reason, secular [teachings] say “It gets higher and higher, and harder and harder.”68 And a past buddha says, “It pervades69 the sky and pervades the meridians.” Spring pines possess constant freshness, and an autumn chrysanthemum possesses sublime beauty, but they are nothing other than the direct and concrete.70 When good counselors arrive in this field of earth,71 they may be great masters to human beings and gods. Someone who randomly affects the forms of teaching others, without arriving in this field of earth, is a great nuisance to 41c human beings and gods. How could [people] who do not know the spring pines, and who do not see the autumn chrysanthemum, be worth the price of their straw sandals? How could they cut out the roots?

[236] Furthermore, if the mind or the flesh grow lazy or disbelieving, we should wholeheartedly confess before the Buddha. When we do this, the power of the virtue of confessing before the Buddha saves us and makes us pure. This virtue can promote unhindered pure belief and fortitude. Once pure belief reveals itself, both self and the external world are moved [into action], and the benefit universally covers sentient and non sentient beings. The general intention [of the confession] is as follows:

I pray that although my many bad actions in the past have accumulated one after another, and there are causes and conditions which are obstructing the truth, the buddhas and the patriarchs who attained the truth by following the Buddha’s Way will show compassion for me, that they will cause karmic accumulations to dissolve, and that they will remove obstacles to learning the truth. May their virtue, and their gates of Dharma, vastly fill and pervade the limitless Dharma world. Let me share in their compassion. In the past, Buddhist patriarchs were [the same as] us, and in the future we may become Buddhist patriarchs. When we look up at Buddhist patriarchs, they are one Buddhist patriarch, and when we reflect upon the establishment of the mind, it is one establishment of the mind. When [the Buddhist patriarchs] radiate their compassion in all directions,72 we can grasp favorable opportunities and we fall upon favorable opportunities. Therefore, in the words of Ryūge, “If we did not attain perfection in past lives, we should attain perfection in the present. With this life we can deliver the body that is the accumulation of past lives. The eternal buddhas, before they realized the truth, were the same as people today. After realizing the truth, people today will be eternal buddhas.”

Quietly, we should master this reasoning. This is direct experience of realizing the state of buddha. When we confess like this, the mystical help

of the Buddhist patriarchs is invariably present. Disclosing the thoughts in our mind and the form of our body, we should confess to the Buddha. The power of confession causes the roots of wrongdoing to dissolve. This is right training of one color;74 it is right belief in the mind and right belief in the body. At the time of right training, the voices of the river valley and the form of the river valley, the form of the mountains and the voices of the mountains, all do not begrudge their eighty-four thousand verses. When the self does not begrudge fame and gain and body and mind, the river valley and the mountains, similarly, begrudge nothing. Even though the voices of the river

valley and the form of the mountains continue throughout the night to produce, and not to produce, eighty-four thousand verses, if you have not yet understood with all your effort that river valleys and mountains are demonstrating themselves as river valleys and mountains, who could see and hear you as the voices of the river valley and the form of the mountains?

                                        Shōbōgenzō Keisei-sanshiki

 Preached to the assembly at Kannondōrikō shōhōrinji five days after the start of the  retreat in the second year of Enō.75

 

Notes

1            Symbolizing dogged perseverance in pursuing the truth. 2              Master Taiso Eka. See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji.

3     that his master, Dīpaṃkara Buddha, could walk over it.In a past life as a bodhisattva, the Buddha spread his hair over a muddy puddle so

4     The Chinese poet So Tōba (1036–1101). Tōba was the poet’s pen name. in China often had many different names. Used for a lay Buddhist (see Chapter Eight, his formal name. He also used the name Shisen. Like Buddhist monks, men of literatureRaihai-tokuzui, note 49). Soshoku wasKoji is a title

5     Hitsukai, lit., “the ocean of the brush.”

6     He read the writings of excellent Buddhist masters.

7     Master Dōgen praised his ability as a poet.

8     A region of China famed for its beautiful scenery.

9     Master Shōkaku Jōsō (1025–1091), successor of Master Ōryū Enan.

10    The wide and long tongue is one of the thirty-two distinguishing marks of the Buddha.

11    Master Fukaku.Master Ōryū Enan (1002–1069), successor of Master Sekisō Soen. He lived on MountŌryū and was regarded as the founder of the Ōryū sect. His posthumous title is Zen

12    Master Jimyō (Sekisō) Soen (986–1039), successor of Master Fun’yō Zenshō.

13    Master Butsuin Ryōgen (1032–1098). Zen Master Butsuin is his posthumous title.

14    kiteśvara, who appears in different bodies in order to preach the Dharma to different from chapter 25 (beings. See LS 3.252.Genshin-seppō, “manifesting body and preaching Dharma.” The expression derives Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon) of the Lotus Sutra, on Bodhisattva Avalo -

15    (Should we see them (idealistically) as an inclusive whole, or should we see them materialistically) as a concrete half?

16    In other words, the study of nature is a gate of entry into Buddhism. lit., “mountains flow, waters do not flow,” expresses the relativity of nature. Sanryū-sui-furyū,

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17    Mujō-seppō, about the preaching of Dharma by the none motional (i.e., nature).is the title of Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III), which contains several stories

18    His body did not somersault into the state of action under the master’s words. 19 Isshō is a measure of capacity, approximately equal to 1.8 liters.

20    China of making government decisions before the emperor in the morning. In this Chōshū, lit., “morning homage.” The expression derives from the ancient custom in and idealism: only seeing things as isolated and concrete, and only revering general and the preceding sentence, Master Dōgen denies the two extreme views of materialism abstractions.

21    the precepts under Master Isan’s master, Hyakujō Ekai, and later became a student Master Kyōgen Chikan (d. 898), successor of Master Isan Reiyū. He originally tookof Master Isan himself. He wrote more than two hundred poems.

22    Master Isan Reiyū (771–853), successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. Daii (or Isan) is the founder of the Igyō sect. became a student of Master Hyakujō when he was twenty-three. He is known as the posthumous title Zen Master Daien. He became a monk when he was fifteen, and name of the mountain where he lived (Daiizan). The Tang emperor Sensō gave him

23    In other words, on the basis of the reality that transcends past, present, and future. 24 See Chapter Forty (Vol. II), Gabyō.

25 Monks only ate light snacks after the midday meal, so gruel for breakfast and the midday meal were the only two meals. 26 Baisenekisō. The job of the baisenekisō was to wait on someone of high rank. 27 Master Nan’yō Echū (d. 775), successor of the Sixth Patriarch, Master Daikan Enō.

National Master Daishō was his title as the emperor’s teacher. After he retired, he built a hut on Mount Butō and lived there alone. 28 Chinese characters, is slightly different from the version in this chapter.Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 17. The version recorded in the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, in 29 Master Reiun Shigon (dates unknown), also a successor of Master Isan Reiyū.

30    Symbolizing something very sharp and definite, or extreme.

31    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 55.

32    Master Chōsha Keishin (d. 868), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. At first he taught Buddhism by moving from place to place, without a temple of his own. After that heTiger,” because his teachings were so sharp and fast. Quoted several times in Chapterlived on Chōshazan. People at that time called him Shin Daichu or “Keishin theJuppō.

Sixty (Vol. III),

33    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 16.

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34    posthumous title. Rōya is the name of a mountain and of a district.Master Rōya Ekaku, successor of Master Fun’yō Zenshō. Great Master Kōshō is his 35 eration after Master Nangaku Ejō, who was a successor of the Sixth Patriarch, MasterDaikan Enō.Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744). Master Rōya Ekaku belonged to the eleventh gen36 study of the Chōsui Shisen (984–1038). He belonged to the Kegon sect, which is based on thehad studied the Avataṃsaka-sūtraŚūraṃgama-sūtra.(Garland Sutra). Before joining the Kegon sect, he

37    genzō,rhetorical question suggested that the two factors are not different. See Chōsui Shisen’s question and Master Rōya’s question are exactly the same. Shisenasked about the relation between abstract essence and concrete reality. The master’spt. 1, no. 6.    Shinji-shōbō-

38    Mahākāśyapa. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. IV), Refers to the story of the transmission between Gautama Buddha and MasterUdonge.

39    Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Refers to the story of the transmission between Master Bodhidharma and MasterTaiso Eka, who prostrated himself three times and then stood at his own place. SeeKattō.

40    The Buddha’s description of his realization of the truth, as quoted in several sutras, forShugyōhongikyō. example, the second volume of the

41    Kōin, lit., “light and shade,” means passing time.

42    of dragons, a real dragon decided to pay him a visit. But when Shoko saw the real Shoko was a man who loved images of dragons. Seeing that Shoko’s house was full in the Chinese book dragon, he was struck with horror. The story of Shoko and the real dragon is containedSōji.

43    The words are originally from the gama-sūtra). They were frequently used by Master Tendō Nyojō.Ryogonkyō (the Chinese translation of the Śūraṃ 44 Rokushu, the six miserable states through which we pass according to the law of cause and effect: hell (symbolizing the state of suffering), hungry ghosts (symbolizingthe state of greed), animals, asuras or angry demons, human beings, and gods. 45 Shishō, metamorphosis. In Sanskrit, they are: the four modes of birth: from the womb, from eggs, from moisture, and from jarāyuja, aṇḍaja, saṃsvedaja, and upapāduka. 46 Mei-chū-yū-mei.Chapter Three, Genjō-kōan. Master Dōgen used the same expression in the second paragraph of

47    Gakudō no yōjin, as in Master Dōgen’s text Gakudōyōjinshū.

48    Sandoku, the three poisons: anger, greed, and delusion.

49    The Lotus Sutra, Hōsshi (“A Teacher of the Dharma”) chapter. See LS 2.152.

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50    dhists), Nijō, the first two of the four vehicles, which are namely: pratyekabuddhas (sensory Buddhists), bodhisattvas (practical Buddhists),śrāvakas (intellectual Budand buddhas.

51    The Western Heavens means India. It is said that Master Kāṇadeva, the fifteenth patri-hikṣu, the twenty-fourth patriarch, was executed by the king of Kaśmira (present-dayarch, was killed by non-Buddhists; Buddhamitra, the teacher of the twenty-first patriarchVasubandhu, was defeated by non-Buddhists in a philosophical discussion; and Siṃhab-

Kashmir).

52    Master Bodhidharma. The twenty-eighth patriarch in India, and the First Patriarch in China.

53    In Chinese, Songshan. The Suzan Mountains have two main peaks. The eastern peak is called Taishitsu, and the western peak is called Shōshitsu. There were many Buddhist temples in these mountains. Shaolin (Jp. Shōrin) Temple, where Master Bodhidharma faced the wall in zazen, was on Shōshitsu Peak.

54    Related stories are in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji.

55    A north Indian who arrived in Luoyang in 508 and translated many Sanskrit texts into Chinese. “Sanzō” was a title given to those versed in the Tripiṭaka.

56    They reportedly tried to poison Master Bodhidharma.

57    Devadatta was a cousin of the Buddha who became a monk in the Buddha’s order, but later turned against him and tried to destroy the Buddhist order in cooperationwith King Ajātaśatru (Jp. Ajase). 58 Nanji is literally “you”—an impolite form of address that Master Dōgen uses for the third person when criticizing.

59    In the princes, ministers, and administrators.” See LS 2.244.Buddha says to Mañjuśrī: “A bodhisattva Anrakugyō (“Peaceful and Joyful Practice”) chapter of the mahāsattva should not get close to kings,Lotus Sutra, the

60    III), A deadly demon or devil. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms and Chapter Seventy (Vol.Hotsu-bodaishin.

61    Dō-ō, lit., “inner sanctum.”

62    Jū-chi-yūshutsu,Lotus Sutra.“Springing Out from the Earth,” is the title of the fifteenth chapter of the

63    In general, beings. Mujō,ujō,“nonsentient beings,” or “the nonemotionally,” means, for example,“ sentient beings” means, for example, birds, animals, and humanMujō-seppō. grass, trees, and stones. See Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III),

64    References to Master Tōzan’s poem, quoted in Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III), “How very wonderful! How very wonderful! The nonemotionally preachingMujōseppō:

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Dharma is a mystery. If we listen with the ears, it is ultimately too difficult to under-stand. If we hear the sound through the eyes, we are able to know it.”

65    Kahitsu, or “why should it necessarily be?” See Chapter Three, Genjō-kōan, note 11. 66 Fuhitsu, or “not necessarily.”

67    are taken from Master Ungo Dōyō’s preaching in the The words “far transcendent” (keidatsu) and “unique and exceptional” Rentōeyō, chapter 22: “When(dokubatsu)

something. So not necessary. And many are not useful.” a single word is far transcendent, and unique and exceptional, then many words are keidatsu, or “far transcendent,” suggests the state in which things are Datsu, “transcendent,” means to get rid of as they are, being far removed from the superfluous.

68    praises Confucius (or his teaching) as follows: “When I look up at him, he gets higher From the Rongo, the fundamental text of Confucianism. Ganen, a student of Confucius, and higher, and when I bore into him, he gets harder and harder.”

69    “More and more” and “pervades” are originally the same character, in the first quotation as an adverb (iyo-iyo) and in the second quotation as a verb mi, iyo-iyo,(usedmi).

70    “The direct and concrete” is Soku-shin-ze-butsu.sokuze. These two characters are explained in detail in Chapter Six,

71    Denchi, or “paddy field,” a symbol of the concrete state.

72    Shichitsu-hattatsu su, lit., “make into seven paths and eight destinations.” 73 Master Ryūge Kodon (835–923). A successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai. 74 “Of one color” means pure or unadulterated. 75 1240.

 

[Chapter Ten] Not Doing Wrongs

Shoaku-makusa

Translator’s Note: Sho means “many” or “miscellaneous,” aku means “wrong” or “bad,” maku means “not” or “don’t,” and sa means “to do.” So shoaku makusa means “not doing wrong.”1 These words are quoted from a short poem called “The Seven Buddhas’ Universal Precept”:2 “Don’t do wrong; do right; then our minds become pure naturally; this is the teaching of the many buddhas.” This poem tells us how closely the teaching of Buddhism is related to morals. In this chapter Master Dōgen teaches us the Buddhist theory of morality. Morality or ethics is, by its nature, a very practical problem. But most people are prone to forget the practical character of morality, and usually only discuss it with words or as an abstract theory. However, talking about morality is not the same as being moral. Morality is just doing right or not doing wrong. Here Master Dōgen explains real morality, quoting an interesting story about Master Chōka Dōrin and a famous Chinese poet called Haku Kyoi. [3] The eternal buddha says, Not to commit wrongs,3

To practice the many kinds of right,4 Naturally purifies the mind;5

This is the teaching of the buddhas.6

This [teaching], as the universal precept of the ancestral patriarchs, the Seven Buddhas, has been authentically transmitted from former buddhas to later buddhas, and later buddhas have received its transmission from former buddhas. It is not only of the Seven Buddhas: “It is the teaching of all the buddhas.” We should consider this principle and master it in practice. These words of Dharma of the Seven Buddhas always sound like words of Dharma of the

Seven Buddhas. What has been transmitted and been received one-to-one is

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just clarification of the real situation7 at this concrete place. This already “is the teaching of the buddhas”; it is the teaching, practice, and experience of hundreds, thousands, and tens of thousands of buddhas.

[5]    In regard to the “wrongs”8 that we are discussing now, among “rightness,” “wrongness,” and “indifference,” there is “wrongness.” Its essence9 is just nonappearance.10 The essence of rightness, the essence of indifference, 42b and so on are also nonappearance, are [the state] without excess,11 and are real form. At the same time,12 at each concrete place these three properties13 include innumerable kinds of dharmas. In “wrongs,” there are similarities and differences between wrong in this world and wrong in other worlds. There are similarities and differences between former times and latter times. There are similarities and differences between wrong in the heavens above and wrong in the human world. How much greater is the difference between moral wrong, moral right, and moral indifference in Buddhism and in the secular world. Right and wrong are time; time is not right or wrong. Right and wrong are the Dharma; the Dharma is not right or wrong. [When] the Dharma is in balance, wrong is in balance.14 [When] the Dharma is in balance, right is in balance. This being so, when we learn [the supreme state of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, when we hear the teachings, do training, and experience the fruit, it is profound, it is distant, and it is fine.

[6]    We hear of this supreme state of bodhi “sometimes following [good] counselors and sometimes following sutras.”15 At the beginning, the sound of it is “Do not commit wrongs.” If it does not sound like “Do not commit wrongs,” it is not the Buddha’s right Dharma; it may be the teaching of demons. Remember, [teaching] that sounds like “Do not commit wrongs” is the Buddha’s right Dharma. This [teaching] “Do not commit wrongs” was not intentionally initiated, and then intentionally maintained in its present form, by the common person: when we hear teaching that has [naturally] become the preaching of bodhi, it sounds like this. What sounds like this is speech which is the supreme state of bodhi in words. It is bodhi-speech already, and so it speaks bodhi.16 When it becomes the preaching of the supreme state of bodhi, and when we are changed by hearing it, we hope “not to commit wrongs,” we continue enacting “not to commit wrongs,” and wrongs go on not being committed; in this situation the power of practice is instantly realized. This realization is realized on the scale of the whole earth, the whole world, the whole of time, and the whole of Dharma. And the scale of this [realization] is the scale of “not committing.” For people of just this 42c reality, at the moment of just this reality17—even if they live at a place and come and go at a place where they could commit wrongs, even if they face circumstances in which they could commit wrongs, and even if they seem to mix with friends who do commit wrongs—wrongs can never be committed at all. The power of not committing is realized, and so wrongs cannot voice themselves as wrongs, and wrongs lack an established set of tools.18 There is the Buddhist truth of taking up at one moment, and letting go at one moment.19 At just this moment, the truth is known that wrong does not violate a person, and the truth is clarified that a person does not destroy wrong.20 When we devote our whole mind to practice, and when we devote the whole body to practice, there is eighty or ninety percent realization21 [of not committing wrongs] just before the moment, and there is the fact of not having committed just behind the brain.22 When you practice by garnering your own body and mind, and when you practice by garnering the body and mind of “anyone,”23 the power of practicing with the four elements and the five aggregates is realized at once;24 but the four elements and five aggregates do not taint25 the self. [All things,] even the four elements and five aggregates of today, carry on being practiced; and the power which the four elements and five aggregates have as practice in the present moment makes the four elements and five aggregates, as described above, into practice.26 When we cause even the mountains, rivers, and the earth, and the sun, moon, and stars, to do practice, the mountains, rivers, and the earth, the sun, moon, and stars, in their turn, make us practice.27 [This is] not a onetime eye; it is vigorous eyes at many times.28 Because [those times] are moments in which the eye is present as vigorous eyes, they make the buddhas and the patriarchs practice, make them listen to the teachings, and make them experience the fruit. The buddhas and the patriarchs have never made the teachings, practice, and experience tainted, and so the teachings, practice, and experience have never hindered the buddhas and the patriarchs.29 For this reason, when [teachings, practice, and experience] compel the Buddhist patriarchs to practice, there are no buddhas or patriarchs who flee, before the moment or after the moment,

in the past, present, or future.   43a [10] In walking, standing, sitting, and lying down through the twelve hours,30 we should carefully consider the fact that when living beings are becoming buddhas and becoming patriarchs, we are becoming Buddhist patriarchs, even though this [becoming] does not hinder the [state of a] Buddhist patriarch that has always belonged to us. In becoming a Buddhist patriarch, we do not destroy the living being, do not detract from it, and do not lose it; nevertheless, we have got rid of it. We cause right-and-wrong, cause-and-effect, to practice; but this does not mean disturbing, or intentionally producing, cause-and-effect. Cause-and-effect itself, at times, makes us practice. The state in which the original features of this cause-and-effect have already become conspicuous is “not committing,” it is [“the state] without appearance,” it is [“the state] without constancy,” it is “not being unclear,” and it is “not falling down”—because it is the state in which [body and mind] have fallen away.31

[11] When we investigate them like this, wrongs are realized as having become completely the same as “not committing.” Aided by this realization, we can penetrate32 the “not committing” of wrongs, and we can realize it decisively by sitting.33 Just at this moment—when reality is realized as the “not committing” of wrongs at the beginning, middle, and end—wrongs do not arise from causes and conditions; they are nothing other than just “not committing.”34 Wrongs do not vanish due to causes and conditions; they are nothing other than just “not committing.” If wrongs are in balance, all dharmas are in balance. Those who recognize that wrongs arise from causes and conditions, but do not see that these causes and conditions and they themselves are [the reality of] “not committing,” are pitiful people. “The seeds of Buddhahood arise from conditions” and, this being so, “conditions arise from the seeds of buddhahood.” It is not that wrongs do not exist; they are nothing other than “not committing.” It is not that wrongs exist; they are nothing other than not committing. Wrongs are not immaterial; they are “not committing.” Wrongs are not material; they are “not committing.” Wrongs are not “not committing;” they are nothing other than “not committing.”35 [Similarly,] for

43b example, spring pines are neither nonexistence nor existence; they are “not committing.”36 An autumn chrysanthemum is neither existence nor nonexistence; it is “not committing.” The buddhas are neither existence nor nonexistence; they are “not committing.” Such things as an outdoor pillar, a stone lantern, a whisk, and a staff are neither existence nor nonexistence; they are “not committing.” The self is neither existence nor nonexistence; it is “not committing.” Learning in practice like this is the realized universe and it is universal realization—we consider it from the standpoint of the subject and we consider it from the standpoint of the object. When the state has become like this already, even the regret that “I have committed what was not to be committed” is also nothing other than energy arising from the effort “not to commit.” But to purport, in that case, that if “not committing” is so we might deliberately commit [wrongs], is like walking north and expecting to arrive at [the southern country of] Etsu. [The relation between] “wrongs” and “not committing” is not only “a well looking at a donkey”;37 it is the well looking at the well, the donkey looking at the donkey, a human being looking at a human being, and a mountain looking at a mountain. Because there is “preaching of this principle of mutual accordance,” “wrongs” are “not committing.”

The Buddha’s true Dharma body38 Is just like space.

It manifests its form according to things, Like the moon [reflected] in water.39

Because “not committing” is “accordance with things,” “not committing” has “manifest form.” “It is just like space”: it is the clapping of hands to the left and the clapping of hands to the right.40 “It is like the moon [reflected] in water”: and the water restricted by the moon.41 Such instances of “not committing” are the realization of reality which should never be doubted at all.

[14] “Practice the many kinds of right.”42 These many kinds of right are [classed] within the three properties43 as “rightness.” Even though the many kinds of right are included in “rightness,” there has never been any kind of right that is realized beforehand and that then waits for someone to do it.44 There is none among the many kinds of right that fails to appear at the very moment of doing right. The myriad kinds of right have no set shape but they converge on the place of doing right faster than iron to a magnet,45 and with 43c a force stronger than the vairambhaka winds.46 It is utterly impossible for the earth, mountains and rivers, the world, a nation, or even the force of accumulated karma, to hinder [this] coming together of right.47 At the same time, the principle that recognitions differ from world to world,48 in regard to right,

is the same [as in regard to wrong]. What can be recognized [as right] is called right, and so it is “like the manner in which the buddhas of the three times preach the Dharma.” The similarity is that their preaching of Dharma when they are in the world is just temporal. Because their lifetime and body size also have continued to rely totally upon the moment, they “preach the Dharma that is without distinction.”49 So it is like the situation that right as a characteristic of devotional practice50 and right as a characteristic of Dharma practice,51 which are far removed from each other, are not different things. Or, for example, it is like the keeping of the precepts by a śrāvaka being the violation of the precepts by a bodhisattva. The many kinds of right do not arise from causes and conditions and they do not vanish due to causes and conditions. The many kinds of right are real dharmas, but real dharmas are not many kinds of right. Causes and conditions, arising and vanishing, and the many kinds of right are similar in that if they are correct at the beginning, they are correct at the end. The many kinds of right are “good doing”52 but they are neither of the doer nor known by the doer, and they are neither of the other nor known by the other. As regards the knowing and the seeing of the self and of the other, in knowing there is the self and there is the other, and in seeing there is the self and there is the other, and thus individual vigorous eyes exist in the sun and in the moon. This state is “good doing” itself. At just this moment of “good doing” the realized universe exists but it is not “the creation of the universe,” and it is not “the eternal existence of the universe.” How much less could we call it “original practice”?53 Doing right is “good doing,” but it is not something that can be fathomed intellectually. “Good doing” in the present is a vigorous eye, but it is beyond intellectual consideration. [Vigorous eyes] are not realized for the purpose of considering the Dharma intellectually. Consideration by vigorous eyes is never the same

as consideration by other things. The many kinds of right are beyond existence and nonexistence, matter and the immaterial, and so on; they are just nothing other than “good doing.” Wherever they are realized and whenever they are realized, they are, without exception, “good doing.” This “good doing” inevitably includes the realization of the many kinds of right. The realization of “good doing” is the universe itself, but it is beyond arising and vanishing, and it is beyond causes and conditions. Entering, staying, leaving, and other [concrete examples of] “good doing” are also like this. At the place where

we are already performing, as “good doing,” a single right among the many kinds of right, the entire Dharma, the whole body,54 the real land, and so on are all enacted as “good doing.” The cause-and-effect of this right, similarly, is the universe as the realization of “good doing.” It is not that causes are before and effects are after. Rather, causes perfectly satisfy themselves and effects perfectly satisfy themselves; when causes are in balance the Dharma is in balance and when effects are in balance the Dharma is in balance. Awaited by causes, effects are felt, but it is not a matter of before and after; for the truth is present that the [moment] before and the [moment] after are balanced [as they are].

[19]    The meaning of “Naturally purifies the mind” is as follows: What is “natural” is “not to commit,” and what “purifies” is “not to commit.” “The [concrete state”]55 is “natural,” and the “mind”56 is “natural.” “The [concrete state”] is “not committing,” the “mind” is “not committing.” The “mind” is “good doing,” what “purifies” is “good doing,” “the [concrete state”] is “good doing,” and what is “natural” is “good doing.” Therefore it is said that “This is the teaching of the buddhas.” Those who are called “buddhas” are, in some cases, like Śiva,57 [but] there are similarities and differences even among Śivas, and at the same time not all Śivas are buddhas. [Buddhas] are, in some cases, like wheel-turning kings,58 but not all sacred wheel-turning kings are buddhas. We should consider facts like these and learn them in practice. If we do not learn how buddhas should be, even if we seem to be fruitlessly enduring hardship, we are only ordinary beings accepting suffering; we are not practicing the Buddha’s truth. “Not committing” and “good doing” are 44b

“donkey business not having gone away and horse business coming in.”59

[20]    Haku Kyoi60 of Tang China is a lay disciple of Zen Master Bukkō Nyoman,61 and a second-generation disciple of Zen Master Kōzei Daijaku.62

When he was the governor of Hangzhou63 district he practiced in the order of Zen Master Chōka Dōrin.64 In the story, Kyoi asks, “What is the great intention of the Buddha-Dharma?”

Dōrin says, “Not to commit wrongs. To practice the many kinds of right.”65

Kyoi says, “If it is so, even a child of three can express it!”

Dōrin says, “A child of three can speak the truth, but an old man of

eighty cannot practice it.”

Thus informed, Kyoi makes at once a prostration of thanks, and then

leaves.

[21]    Kyoi, though descended from Haku Shōgun,66 is truly a wizard of the verse who is rare through the ages. People call him one of the twenty four [great] men of letters. He bears the name of Mañjuśrī, or bears the name of Maitreya. Nowhere do his poetical sentiments go unheard and no one could fail to pay homage to his authority in the literary world. Nevertheless, in Buddhism he is a beginner and a late learner. Moreover, it seems that he has never seen the point of this “Not to commit wrongs. To practice the many kinds of right,” even in a dream. Kyoi thinks that Dōrin is only telling him “Do not commit wrongs! Practice the many kinds of right!” through recognition of the conscious aim. Thus, he neither knows nor hears the truth that the time-honored67 [teaching] of the “not committing” of wrongs, the “good doing” of rights, has been in Buddhism from the eternal past to the eternal present. He has not set foot in the area of the Buddha-Dharma. He does not have the power of the Buddha-Dharma. Therefore he speaks like this. Even though we caution against the intentional commitment of wrongs, and even though we encourage the deliberate practice of rights, this should be in the reality of “not committing.” In general, the Buddha-Dharma is [always] the

44c same, whether it is being heard for the first time under a [good] counselor, or whether it is being experienced in the state which is the ultimate effect. This is called “correct in the beginning, correct at the end,” called “the wonderful cause and the wonderful effect,” and called “the Buddhist cause and the Buddhist effect.” Cause-and-effect in Buddhism is beyond discussion of [theories] such as “different maturation” or “equal streams”;68 this being so, without Buddhist causes, we cannot experience the Buddhist effect. Because Dōrin speaks this truth, he possesses the Buddha-Dharma. Even if wrong upon wrong pervade the whole universe, and even if wrongs have swallowed the whole Dharma again and again, there is still salvation and liberation in “not committing.” Because the many kinds of right are “right at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end,”69 “good doing” has realized “nature, form, body, energy,” and so on “as they are.”70 Kyoi has never trodden in these tracks at all, and so he says “Even a child of three could express it!” He speaks like this without actually being able to express an expression of the truth. How pitiful, Kyoi, you are. Just what are you saying? You have never

heard the customs of the Buddha, so do you or do you not know a three-year old child? Do you or do you not know the facts of a newborn baby? Someone who knows a three-year-old child must also know the buddhas of the three times. How could someone who has never known the buddhas of the three times know a three-year-old child? Do not think that to have met face to face is to have known. Do not think that without meeting face-to-face one does not know. Someone who has come to know a single particle knows the whole universe, and someone who has penetrated one real dharma has penetrated the myriad dharmas. Someone who has not penetrated the myriad dharmas has not penetrated one real dharma. When students of penetration penetrate to the end, they see the myriad dharmas and they see single real dharmas; therefore, people who are learning of a single particle are inevitably learning of the whole universe. To think that a three-year-old child cannot speak the Buddha-Dharma, and to think that what a three-year-old child says 45a must be easy, is very stupid. That is because the clarification of life,71 and the clarification of death, are “the one great purpose”72 of Buddhists. A master of the past73 says, “Just at the time of your birth you had your share of the lion’s roar.”74 “A share of the lion’s roar” means the virtue of the Tathāgata to turn the Dharma wheel, or the turning of the Dharma wheel itself. Another master of the past75 says, “Living-and-dying, coming-and-going, are the real human body.” So to clarify the real body and to have the virtue of the lion’s roar may truly be the one great matter, which can never be easy. For this reason, the clarification of the motives and actions of a three-year-old child are also the great purpose. Now there are differences between the actions and motives of the buddhas of the three times [and those of children]; this is why Kyoi, in his stupidity, has never been able to hear a three-year-old child speaking the truth, and why, not even suspecting that [a child’s speaking of the truth] might exist, he talks as he does. He does not hear Dōrin’s voice, which is more vivid than thunder, and so he says, “Even a child of three could express it!” as if to say that [Master Dōrin himself] has not expressed the truth in his words. Thus [Kyoi] does not hear the lion’s roar of an infant, and he passes vainly by the Zen master’s turning of the Dharma wheel. The Zen master, unable to contain his compassion, went on to say, “A child of three can speak the truth, but an old man of eighty cannot practice it.” What he was saying is this:

A child of three has words which express the truth, and you should investigate this thoroughly. Old men of eighty say, “I cannot practice it,” and you should consider this carefully. I leave you to decide whether an infant speaks the truth, but I do not leave the infant to decide. I leave 45b you to decide whether an old man can practice, but I do not leave the old man to decide.76

It is the fundamental principle to pursue, to preach, and to honor the Buddha-Dharma like this.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Shoaku-makusa

                                        Preached to the assembly at Kōshōhōrinji                                         on the evening of the moon77 in the [second]                                         year of Enō.78

Notes

1 sometimes be interpreted as the imperative “Don’t do wrong” or the ideal “not to doThe meaning of shoaku-makusa changes in this chapter according to context. It can wrong.” But sometimes it represents Master Dōgen’s idea that morality is only aproblem of action—the not-committing of wrong. 2 buddhas who preceded him. See Chapter Fifteen, Shichibutsu-tsūkai. Shichibutsu refers to Śākyamuni Buddha and the six legendary Busso.

3     Shoaku-makusa, lit., “Do not commit wrongs.” ShoAkumeans various, miscellaneous,means evil, bad, wrongdoing, or all, and sometimes it simply expresses plurality. or wrong. Makusa, “wrongs,” suggests individual instances of wrongdoing as concrete Maku, or naka[re], means “must not” or “don’t!” facts, rather than wrong as an abstract problem. a suggestion of intention. It is useful to distinguish the characters both mean to do, but Sa, or tsukusa[ruhas more of a feeling of doing intentionally. This chapter], means to make, to produce, or to commit—it includessa and gyō; they contains the idea that, naturally, wrongdoing does not occur; i.e., without our intentional commitment, there is no wrong.

4     “good doing,” has a feeling of doing what is natural, as opposed to intentional com-or Shūzen-bugyō,right. the many kinds of right.” Shūzen, or “the many kinds of right,” suggests concrete instances of right aslit., “devoutly practice the many kinds of good,” or “good doing ofShū means many or many kinds of. Bu is a prefix denoting reverence or devotion. Zen means good, orBugyō,Gyō,or opposed to right as an abstraction. okona[u], means to do, to perform, to enact, or to keep moving along. mitten.

5     Jijō-go-I The interpretation here is that the verse is not a recommendation to be moral but a According to context, ji can be interpreted either as by oneself or as naturally. but here the meaning is more practical: it suggests the state of the mind (and body)somind. Accordingly, proclamation of the Buddha’s teaching that moral conduct is just purification of the[no], means “that,” suggesting something concrete and specific. ji has been translated as “naturally.” means to purify. I means intention Go, or in action.

6     In Pāli, the poem is: Ze-shobutsu-kyō. ShobutsuSabba-pāpass akaraṇam,/kuselassūpasampada,/sacitta-pariy-can be interpreted as “the buddhas” or as “all the buddhas.” odapanaṃ,/etam buddhana sasanaṃ.

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7     opening up, running through (or universality, as in “Clarification of the real situation” is tsūshōsoku. Tsutsukai,suggests penetration, clarification, universal precept). Shōsoku from someone, news, actual circumstances, the real situation. Originally means exhalation and inhalation, and by extension something that is heard

8     Shoaku, as in the original poem.

9     Shō.is essence.” akushō, In the previous sentence, “rightness” is lit., “bad-essence”; and “indifference” is zenshō, lit., “good-essence”; “wrongness”muki sho, lit., “not-described-

10    state at the moment of the present.by introducing the idea of instantaneousness. Nonappearance (In this sentence Master Dōgen begins his conceptual explanation of right and wrongmushō) describes the

11    āsravaMurō, lit., “without leakage,” from the Sanskrit (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms under), suggests the state in which things are as they are.

12    Master Dōgen is explaining right and wrong as reality. In the previous sentences he crete phase. Here he explains them as concrete, individual, and relative facts, at the second or con-began by explaining them as inclusive concepts, in the first or conceptual phase. From

13    Rightness, wrongness, and indifference.

14    state in which a bad fact is seen as it is. Hōtō-akutō, or “Dharma in equilibrium, bad in equilibrium,” suggests the balanced

15    Waku-jū-chishiki genzō.  and waku-jū-kyōgan. These phrases appear frequently in the Shōbō-

16    “Dōgen affirms “Do not do wrong” as words of the truth. From the next sentence, heBodhi-speech” is bodai-go; “speaking bodhi” is go-bodai. Up to this sentence Master looks at the concrete reality of practice.

17    place. Shōtō-inmo-ji no shōtō-inmo-nin. Shōtō,ShōbōgenzōShoto-inmo-ji,.      or “at just this moment” is a very common expression in theor “exact,” suggests exactly this time and

18    Master Dōgen emphasizes that if we do not do wrong, there can never be any wrong. 19 Ichinen-ippō,positive action. lit., “one pinch, one release.” Hō, to release, symbolizes passive action.Nen, to twist, pinch, or grasp, symbolizes 20 Master Dōgen denies the idea that something exists that can be called wrong, bad,or evil outside of our own conduct.

21    Hakkujō. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon.

22    kisen-kigo, Nōgo.brain,” suggests the area in which action has taken place already. The usual expression, which appears in the last sentence of this paragraph, is “before the moment, after the moment.” The variation nōgo, “behind the Chapter Ten

23    described. Tare, lit., “who,” suggests someone ineffable, or a person whose state cannot be 24 The four elements and five aggregates symbolize all physical things and mental phe-nomena.

25 physical things but they do not make us impure. Enna sezu, “not tainted,” expresses something as is. When we act we have to use 26 Buddhist practice.In this sentence, Master Dōgen suggests the oneness of concrete circumstances and

27 nature—in a more poetic style.This sentence also suggests the mutual relation between a Buddhist practitioner and 28 many times.The Buddhist view is not a once-and-for-all realization, but it appears vigorously at

29    practice, and experience exist as they are. Buddhas and patriarchs live freely and “Unhindered” and “untainted” both express something as it is. Buddhist teachings, independently, as they are.

30    day was divided into twelve periods. See Chapter Eleven, Juni-ji, lit., “twelve hours,” means the twenty-four hours of a day—at that time, the Uji. 31 and “the state without constancy” (“Not committing” is makusa, as in the poem. “The state without appearance” (mujō) suggest concrete reality at the moment of mushō) the present from two sides—denial of momentary appearance and denial of continuous of body and mind.” quoted Master Tendo Nyojō’s words that zazen is nine [Vol. IV], cause-and-effect (see Chapter Seventy-six [Vol. IV], into [cause and effect]” (existence. “Not being unclear [about cause and effect]” (Shinjin-ingafuraku). “Falling away” is ) represent opposing viewpoints about the reality ofdatsuraku.shinjin-datsuraku,Dai-shugyō;fumaiMaster Dōgen frequently) and “not falling down“the falling awayChapter Eighty-

32    Kentokutetsu, or “can see thoroughly.”

33    Zatokudan, or “can sit decisively.” Master Dōgen often uses the word zadan, “sitcut” or “sit away,” to mean transcending a problem by practicing zazen (see for exam-danple, Chapter Seventy-three [Vol. IV], is an adverb; “decisively.” Sanjushichi-bon-bodai-bunpō). But in this case,

34    of our momentary action. Master Dōgen denies the idea that something called wrongness manifests itself fromreal circumstances, as if the wrongness and the reality might be two different things.In this paragraph he emphasizes that there is no wrongness separate from the reality

35    Master Dōgen emphasized that wrong is only the problem of not doing wrong. 36 In other words, pine trees in spring exist as they are, without any intentional activity.

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37    the Buddha’s true Dharma body is just like space, and it manifests its form accordingsays, ‘Your words are extremely nice words, but they only express eighty or ninetySee to things, like the moon [reflected] in water. How do you preach this principle ofmutual accordance?’ Toku says, ‘It is like a donkey looking into a well.’ The masterShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 25. “Master Sōsan asks Ācārya Toku, ‘It is said that well looking at the donkey.’” The story expresses the mutual relation between subject and object. percent.’ Toku says, ‘What would the master say?’ Master Sōsan says, ‘It is like the

38    Hōsshin, the spiritual or abstract face of reality, and space represents the physical or objective from the Sanskrit dharmakāya. In this case, the Dharma body represents face of reality. The poem suggests the oneness of the two faces.

39    Toku, is also quoted in Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III), This verse from the Konkōmyōkyō, quoted in the story of Master Sōzan and ĀcāryaTsuki.

40    In this sentence, space means the place where action is done.

41    The image of the moon can be compared to the individual subject, and the water which surrounds the image can be compared to objective circumstances. Water reflect water suggests the fact from the other side, with subject and object reversed. Ing the moon symbolizes the oneness of subject and object. The moon restricting

42    Shūzen-bugyō, lit., “devoutly practice the many [kinds of] good,” as in the original poem.

43    The three properties are rightness, wrongness, and indifference, as explained in the second paragraph.

44    action in the moment of the present. Even though we can consider rightness abstractly, right itself can only be realized by 45 Even though abstract rightness cannot manifest any form, in action right can manifest itself at once. 46 Very strong winds mentioned in ancient Indian legends.

47    right when realized by action. From the next sentence he explains right as something IN these opening sentences of the paragraph, Master Dōgen affirms the existence of relative.

48    human beings see as water, and demons see as blood or pus.The usual example is water which fish see as a palace, gods see as a string of pearls,

Lotus Sutra.

49    Dharma,/So now do I also/Preach the Dharma which is without distinction.” (LSMufunbetsu      [“In the same manner that the buddhas of the three times/Preach theno] [o] toku, from the Hōben (“Expedient Means”) chapter of the

1.128)

50    Shingyō, of the Pure Land sects. or “practice based on belief” suggests, for example, the devotional practice Chapter Ten

51    Hogyō,practice of the so-called Zen sects. or “practice based on the teaching of Dharma,” suggests, for example, the

52    Bugyō, or “devout practicing” as in the original poem.

53    of action. done in the past, or sometimes practice done in past lives. See Chapter Seventeen,Hokke-ten-hokke.Hongyō, “original practice,” suggests practice done as our original situation, or practiceIn this case, hongyō is one example of an abstract understanding

54    Zenshin. See Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III), Nyorai-zenshin.

55    “The” is go, sono, which means “that,” suggesting the concrete, real state. See note 5.

56    “Mind” is way, but the message of this chapter is that the mind of morality is natural. i, lit., “intention.” In general, human intention is opposed to the natural 57 Jizaiten represents the god called Śiva in Sanskrit, the god of destruction and regeneration in the Hindu triad of Brahmā (creator), Śiva, and Viṣṇu (preserver). SeeGlossary of Sanskrit Terms.

58    to a realistic understanding of what buddhas are.Ten-rin-jō-ō, from the Sanskrit cakravarti-rāja. Master Dōgen is urging us to come

59    Master Chōkei Eryō asks Master Reiun Shigon, “What is the Great Intention of the business coming in.” See Buddha-Dharma?” Master Reiun says, “Donkey business being unfinished, but horseShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 56.

60    Haku Kyoi, died in in 846 at the age of seventy-six. Haku was his family name. Kyoihis district and practicing zazen.Rakuten. It is said that he attained the truth under Master Bukkō Nyoman, after which(he became the governor of several districts, visiting masters whose temples were inlit., Sitting Easy) was one of his pen names as a poet. He was also called Haku

61    Successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Dates unknown.

62    in Chinese pronunciation) was the name of the district where Master Baso lived. ZenMaster Baso Dōitsu (704–788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejō. Kōzei (or JiangxiMaster Daijaku is his posthumous title. 63 The capital of Chekiang, located at the head of Hangzhou Bay (an inlet of the East China Sea).

64 from Master Kinzan Kokuitsu, who belonged to a side lineage (going back to theFourth Patriarch Daii Dōshin, but not going through Master Daikan Enō). Master Chōka Dōrin, died in 824 at the age of eighty-four. He received the Dharma Chōka house. means bird’s nest; it is said that Master Chōka practiced zazen in, and lived in, a tree65 Shoaku-makusa, shūzen-bugyō, as in the original poem.

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66    Hakki, a general of the founder of the Jin dynasty (who reigned from 255 to 250B.C.E.military ability and ability as a poet are opposed.). The general was famed for his excellence in military strategy. In this sentence,

67    Senko-banko, lit., “thousand-ages old, ten-thousand ages old.”

68    expresses the scientific view of cause and effect; that is, the view that is not concerned with subjective evaluation of cause and effect. The opposing theory is represented by the word The theory that moral and immoral behavior produce different results is represented ijuku, lit., “different maturation.” This expresses the moral viewpoint. toru, lit., “equal streams.” This by the word

69    that they should preach is good in the beginning, middle, and end.” (LS 1.40; seeShochūgo-zen, also Chapter Seventeen, from the Introductory chapter (Hokke-ten-hokke.) Jo) of the Lotus Sutra: “The Dharma 70 Alludes to the Hōben (“Expedient Means”) chapter of the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.68.

71    Sho means both birth and life.

72    Ichidaiji no innen. See Chapter Seventeen, Hokke-ten-hokke.

73    The quotation is paraphrased from prajñāpāramitā-śāstra. This treatise was largely compiled by Master Nāgārjuna.Daichidoron, the Chinese translation of the Mahā-

74    The Buddha’s preaching was said to be like the roar of a lion.

75    Master Engo Kokugon. This quotation also appears in Chapter Fifty (Vol. III), jissō.    Shohō-

76    A child’s expression of the truth and an old man’s ability to practice are just reality— they do not rely upon interpretation by the subject.

77    day.The fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month, often the day of the year on which theShōbōgenzō were preached on this moon is most conspicuous. Many chapters of the 78 1240.

[Chapter Eleven] Uji Existence-time

Translator’s Note: U means “existence” and ji means “time,” so uji means “existent time,” or “existence-time.” In this chapter Master Dōgen teaches us the meaning of time in Buddhism. As Master Dōgen explains in other chapters, Buddhism is realism. Therefore, the view of time in Buddhism is always very realistic. Specifically, time is always related with existence and existence is always related with momentary time. So in reality, the past and the future are not existent time; the present moment is the only existent time— the point at which existence and time come together. Also, time is always related with action here and now. Action can only be realized in time, and time can only be realized in action. Thus, the view of time in Buddhism reminds us of existentialism in modern philosophy. It is very important to understand the Buddhist view of time in order to grasp the true meaning of Buddhism.

[29]    An eternal buddha1 says,

Sometimes2 standing on top of the highest peak,

Sometimes moving along the bottom of the deepest ocean. Sometimes three heads and eight arms,3

Sometimes the sixteen-foot or eight-foot [golden body].4

Sometimes a staff or a whisk,5

Sometimes an outdoor pillar or a stone lantern.6 Sometimes the third son of Chang or the fourth son of Li, Sometimes the earth and space.

[30]    In this word “sometimes,” time is already just existence, and all existence is time. The sixteen-foot golden body is time itself. Because it is time, it has the resplendent brightness of time. We should learn it as the twelve hours7 of today. The three heads and eight arms are time itself. Because they are time, they are completely the same as the twelve hours of today. We can

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never measure how long and distant or how short and pressing twelve hours is; at the same time, we call it “twelve hours.”8 The leaving and coming of the directions and traces [of time] are clear, and so people do not doubt it. They do not doubt it, but that does not mean they know it. The doubts which living beings, by our nature, have about every thing and every fact that we do not know, are not consistent; therefore our past history of doubt does not always exactly match our doubt now. We can say for the present, however, that doubt is nothing other than time. We put our self in order, and see [the resulting state] as the whole universe. Each individual and each object in this whole universe should be glimpsed as individual moments of time.9

Object does not hinder object in the same way that moment of time does not

hinder moment of time. For this reason, there are minds which are made up in the same moment of time, and there are moments of time in which the same mind is made up. Practice, and realization of the truth, are also like this.10 Putting the self in order, we see what it is. The truth that self is time is like this. We should learn in practice that, because of this truth, the whole earth includes myriad phenomena and hundreds of things, and each phenomenon and each thing exists in the whole earth. Such toing-and-froing is a first step [on the way] of practice. When we arrive in the field of the ineffable,11 there is just one [concrete] thing and one [concrete] phenomenon, here and now, [beyond] understanding of phenomena and non-understanding of phenomena, and [beyond] understanding of things and non-understanding of things. Because [real existence] is only this exact moment, all moments of existence-time are the whole of time, and all existent things and all existent phenomena are time. The whole of existence, the whole universe, exists in individual moments of time.12 Let us pause to reflect whether or not any of the whole of existence or any of the whole universe has leaked away from the present moment of time. Yet in the time of the common person who does not learn the Buddha-Dharma there are views and opinions: when he hears the words “existence-time” he thinks, “Sometimes I became [an angry demon with] three heads and eight arms, and sometimes I became the sixteen-foot or eight-foot [golden body of Buddha]. For example, it was like crossing a river or crossing a mountain. The mountain and the river may still exist, but now that I have crossed them and am living in a jeweled palace with crimson towers, the mountain and the river are [as distant] from me as heaven is from

the earth.” But true reasoning is not limited to this one line [of thought]. That is to say, when I was climbing a mountain or crossing a river, I was there in that time. There must have been time in me. And I actually exist now, [so] time could not have departed. If time does not have the form of leaving and coming, the time of climbing a mountain is the present as existence-time.13 If time does retain the form of leaving and coming, I have this present moment of existence-time, which is just existence-time itself.14 How could that time of climbing the mountain and crossing the river fail to swallow, and fail to 46a vomit, this time [now] in the jeweled palace with crimson towers?15 The three heads and eight arms were time yesterday; the sixteen-foot or eight foot [golden body] is time today. Even so, this Buddhist principle of yesterday and today is just about moments in which we go directly into the mountains and look out across a thousand or ten thousand peaks; it is not about what has passed. The three heads and eight arms pass instantly as my existence time; though they seem to be in the distance, they are [moments of] the present. The sixteen-foot or eight-foot [golden body] also passes instantly as my existence-time; though it seems to be yonder, it is [moments of] the present. This being so, pine trees are time, and bamboos are time. We should not understand only that time flies. We should not learn that “flying” is the only ability of time. If we just left time to fly away, some gaps in it might appear. Those who fail to experience and to hear the truth of existence-time do so because they understand [time] only as having passed. To grasp the pivot and express it: all that exists throughout the whole universe is lined up in a series and at the same time is individual moments of time.16 Because [time] is existence-time, it is my existence-time.17 Existence-time has the virtue of passing in a series of moments.18 That is to say, from today it passes through a series of moments to tomorrow; from today it passes through a series of moments to yesterday; from yesterday it passes through a series of moments to today; from today it passes through a series of moments to today; and from tomorrow it passes through a series of moments to tomorrow. Because passage through separate moments is a virtue of time, moments of the past and present are neither piled up one on top of another nor lined up in a row; and, for the same reason, Seigen19 is time, Ōbaku20 is time, and Kōzei21 and Sekitō22 are time.23 Because subject-and-object already is time, practice-and-experience is moments of time. Going into the mud and going

into the water,24 similarly, are time. The view of the common person today,

46b and the causes and conditions of [that] view, are what the common person experiences but are not the common person’s reality.25 It is just that reality, for the present, has made a common person into its causes and conditions. Because he understands this time and this existence to be other than reality itself, he deems that “the sixteen-foot golden body is beyond me.” Attempts to evade [the issue] by [thinking] “I am never the sixteen-foot golden body” are also flashes of existence-time; they are glimpses of it by a person who has yet to realize it in experience and to rely upon it. The [existence-time] that also causes the horse and the sheep26 to be as they are arranged in the world today, is a rising and falling which is something ineffable abiding in its place in the Dharma. The rat is time, and the tiger is time; living beings are time, and buddhas are time. This time experiences the whole universe using three heads and eight arms, and experiences the whole universe using the sixteen-foot golden body. To universally realize the whole universe by using the whole universe is called “to perfectly realize.”27 Enactment of the sixteen-foot golden body28 by using the sixteen-foot golden body is realized as the establishment of the mind, as training, as the state of bodhi, and as nirvana; that is, as existence itself, and as time itself. It is nothing other than the perfect realization of the whole of time as the whole of existence; there is nothing surplus at all. Because something surplus is just something surplus, even a moment of half-perfectly realized existence-time is the perfect realization of half-existence-time.29 Even those phases in which we seem to be blundering heedlessly are also existence. If we leave it utterly up to existence,30 even though [the moments] before and after manifest heedless blundering, they abide in their place as existence-time. Abiding in our place in the Dharma in the state of vigorous activity is just existence-time. We should not disturb it [by interpreting it] as “being without,”31 and we should not enforce ably call it “existence.” In regard to time, we strive to comprehend only how relentlessly it is passing; we do not understand it intellectually as what is yet to come. Even though intellectual understanding is time, no circumstances are ever influenced by it. [Human] skin bags recognize [time] as leaving and coming; none has penetrated it as existence-time abiding in its place: how much less could any experience time having passed through the gate?32 Even [among those who] are conscious of abiding in their place, 46c who can express the state of having already attained the ineffable? Even [among those who] have been asserting for a long time that they are like this, there is none who is not still groping for the manifestation before them of the real features. If we leave [even bodhi and nirvana] as they are in the existence-time of the common person, even bodhi and nirvana are—[though] merely a form which leaves and comes—existence-time.33

[38] In short, without any cessation of restrictions and hindrances,34 existence-time is realized. Celestial kings and celestial throngs, now appearing to the right and appearing to the left, are the existence-time in which we are now exerting ourselves. Elsewhere, beings of existence-time of land and sea are [also] realized through our own exertion now. The many kinds of being and the many individual beings which [live] as existence-time in darkness and in brightness, are all the realization of our own effort, and the momentary continuance of our effort. We should learn in practice that without the momentary continuance of our own effort in the present, not a single dharma nor a single thing could ever be realized or could ever continue from one moment to the next.35 We should never learn that passage from one moment to the next is like the movement east and west of the wind and rain. The whole universe is neither beyond moving and changing nor beyond progressing and regressing; it is passage from one moment to the next. An example of the momentary passing of time is spring. Spring has innumerable different aspects, which we call “a passage of time.”36 We should learn in practice that the momentary passing of time continues without there being any external thing. The momentary passing of spring, for example, inevitably passes, moment by moment, through spring itself.37 It is not that “the momentary passing of time” is spring; rather, because spring is the momentary passing of time, passing time has already realized the truth in the here and now of springtime.38 We should study [this] in detail, returning to it and leaving it again and again. If we think, in discussing the momentary passing of time, that circumstances are [only] individual things on the outside, while something which can pass from moment to moment moves east through hundreds of thousands of worlds and through hundreds of thousands of kalpas, then we are not devoting ourselves solely to Buddhist learning in practice.39

[40] Great Master Yakusan Kōdō,40 the story goes, at the suggestion of Great Master Musai,41 visits Zen Master Kōzei Daijaku.42 He asks, “I have more or less clarified the import of the three vehicles and the twelve divisions 47a of the teaching.43 But just what is the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?”44

Thus questioned, Zen Master Daijaku says, “Sometimes45 I make him46 lift an eyebrow or wink an eye, and sometimes I do not make him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye; sometimes to make him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is right, and sometimes to make him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is not right.”

Hearing this, Yakusan realizes a great realization and says to Daijaku,

“In Sekitō’s order I have been like a mosquito that climbed onto an iron ox.”

[42] What Daijaku says is not the same as [what] others [can say]. [His] “eyebrows” and “eyes” may be the mountains and the seas, because the mountains and the seas are [his] “eyebrows” and “eyes.” In his “making himself lift [an eyebrow],” he may be looking at the mountains; and in his “making himself wink,” he may be presiding over the seas. “Being right” has become familiar to “him,” and “he” has been led by “the teaching.”47 Neither is “not being right” the same as “not making himself [act],” nor is “not making himself [act]“ the same as “not being right.”48 All these [situations] are “existence time.” The mountains are time, and the seas are time. Without time, the mountains and the seas could not exist: we should not deny that time exists in the mountains and the seas here and now. If time decays, the mountains and the seas decay. If time is not subject to decay, the mountains and the seas are not subject to decay. In accordance with this truth the bright star appears, the Tathāgata appears, the eye appears, and picking up a flower appears,49 and this is just time. Without time, it would not be like this.

[44] Zen Master Kishō50 of the Shōken region is a Dharma descendant of Rinzai, and the rightful successor of Shuzan.51 On one occasion he preaches to the assembly:

Sometimes52 the will is present but the words are absent,

Sometimes the words are present but the will is absent, Sometimes the will and the words are both present,

Sometimes the will and the words are both absent.53

[44] The will and the words are both existence-time. Presence and absence are both existence-time. The moment of presence has not finished, but the moment of absence has come—the will is the donkey and the words are the horse;54 horses have been made into words and donkeys have been made into will.55 Presence is not related to having come, and absence is not related to not 47b having come.56 Existence-time is like this. Presence is restricted by presence itself; it is not restricted by absence.57 Absence is restricted by absence itself; it is not restricted by presence. The will hinders the will and meets the will.58 Words hinder words and meet words. Restriction hinders restriction and meets restriction. Restriction restricts restriction. This is time. Restriction is utilized by objective dharmas, but restriction that restricts objective dharmas has never occurred.59 I meet with a human being, a human being meets with a human being, I meet with myself, and manifestation meets with manifestation. Without time, these [facts] could not be like this. Furthermore, “the will” is the time of the realized universe,60 “the words” are the time of the pivot that is the ascendant state,61 “presence” is the time of laying bare the substance,62 and “absence” is the time of “sticking to this and parting from this.”63 We should draw distinctions, and should enact existence-time,64 like this. Though venerable patriarchs hitherto have each spoken as they have, how could there be nothing further to say? I would like to say:

The half-presence of will and words is existence-time, The half-absence of will and words is existence-time.

There should be study in experience like this.

Making oneself65 lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is half existence-time,

Making oneself lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is mixed-up     existence-time,

Not making oneself lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is half     existence-time,

Not making oneself lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is mixed-up     existence-time.

When we experience coming and experience leaving, and when we experience presence and experience absence, like this, that time is existence-time.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Uji

                                        Written at Kōshōhōrinji on the first day of                                         winter in the first year of Ninji.66

                                        Copied during the summer retreat in the                                         [first] year of Kangen67—Ejō.

 

Notes

1     Master Yakusan Igen. Keitokudentōroku, chapter 18.

2     and meaning “sometimes.” In the chapter title, Uji, or aru toki, as in the chapter title. In this case, ujiujiis a compound word, “existence-is an adverb, read as a[ru]toki, time.”

3     This phrase refers to the wrathful images of Buddhist guardian deities, such as Aizen-myōō, the King of Love (Skt. Rāgarāja), whose figure generally has three angry facesand six arms.

4     Jōroku-hasshaku.Jōroku Buddha. Buddha. suggests the sixteen-foot golden body, the idealized image of the standingHasshaku One can be interpreted as representing the balanced image of the sittingequals ten shaku, and one shaku is slightly less than a foot.

5     These are concrete things that have religious meaning. ceremonies. Shujō is a staff used by Buddhist monks on their travels, and also used in BuddhistHossu was originally a fly whisk, but its function has become ceremonial. 6 common objects. In China and Japan, temple roofs have long eaves supported by pillars that stand outside of the temple building itself; temple pillars and stone lanterns are thus very

7     periods. Master Dōgen suggests that magnificent real time in the balanced state isJūni-ji,not different from the ordinary time of concrete daily life. Lit., “twelve times.” In Master Dōgen’s age, a day was divided into twelve

8     When we are waiting, twenty-four hours is long, and when we are pressed for time, twenty-four hours is short. So the length of a day is relative but we measure it as” twenty-four hours.”

9     thing.” “Individual moments of time” is “Each individual” is zu-zu, lit., “head-head.” “Each object” is ji-ji, lit., “time-time.”butsu-butsu, lit., “thing-

10    and real time.Like the will to the truth, Buddhist practice and realization are both real existence

11    state.Inmo no denchi. Inmo). Den means field and means something ineffable (see Chapter Twenty-nine [Vol. II],chi means earth. Denchi suggests a concrete area, or real

Inmo

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12    “Individual moments of time” is ji-ji no ji.

13    process—like crossing a mountain—is moments of the present.“Time that does not have the form of leaving and coming” means instantaneous time,as opposed to time as a linear progression. If we see time in this way, even a continuous

14    in this way, even though the moment of the present has arrived and it will depart, it“Time that retains the form of leaving and coming” means linear time. If we see time point and the view of time as a line, as well as the view of time as reality itself. Exists now. Master Dōgen’s view of real time embraces both the view of time as a 15 Past time swallowing present time suggests the inclusive character of time. Past time vomiting present time suggests the independence of the past and the present.

16    “Individual moments of time” is ji-ji. See notes 9 and 12.

17    Go-uji, “my existence-time,” emphasizes that existence-time is not only a concept but our own real life itself.

18    Kyōryakuyomitime: it represents the linear aspect of time. separate, successive stages; it represents the momentary aspect of time.     A note on pronunciation: In Japanese, a Chinese character is read either in its form (the native Japanese reading) or in its or keireki. Kyō or kei means passing through, experience, the passage ofRyakuon-yomior rekiform (imitating the Chinese suggests a process throughout-

images the pronunciation used in the Wu dynasty (222–258 from age to age, so different readings of the Japan are usually read according to the pronunciation used in the Wu dynasty. Pronunciation). However, the pronunciation of Chinese characters in China variedon-yomi are possible. C.E.). Keireki ). Buddhist sutras inKyōryakuapproximatesapproxthe pronunciation used in the Han dynasty (206 B.C.E.–25 C.E.

19    Master Seigen Gyōshi, died 740.

20    Master Baso. Master Ōbaku Kiun, died between 855 and 859. A second-generation descendant of 21 Master Baso Dōitsu (704–788). See note 42.

22    Master Sekitō Kisen (700–790). A successor of Master Seigen Gyōshi. See note 41.

23    The lives of all Buddhist masters are just moments of the present.

24    Symbols of daily struggles. 25 Hō, or Dharma.

26    midnight), ox (2:00 The twelve hours of the Chinese day were represented by twelve animals: rat (12:00snake (10:00  A.M.), horse (12:00 noon), sheep (2:00 A.M.), tiger (4:00 A.M.), rabbit (6:00 P.M.), monkey (4:00 A.M.), dragon (8:00 P.M.), chicken A.M.), represent directions, the rat indicating north, the horse south, etc.(6:00 P.M.), dog (8:00 P.M.), and boar (10:00 P.M.).

27    The original sentence is constructed with combinations of only three Chinese char-kai, jin, kai, gu.“world,” works as a noun. “Universally realize” is “The whole universe” is jin su, “realize,” works as a verb. “Perfectly realize” is jinkai; jin, jin,(1:68):s are real form.”“realize,” works as a verb.  “Buddhas alone, together with“whole,” works as an adjective,kai-jin su; kai, “universally,”Gujingujin appears in the key sentence of the buddhas, can perfectly realize that all su; gu,works as an adverb and“perfectly,” works as an adverb, and Lotus Sutradharma

28    it were a verb.Jōroku-konjin suru, lit., “to sixteen-foot golden body”—a noun phrase is used as if

29    or real, as opposed to an ideal (as in the verse in the final paragraph of this chapter).Han-uji. Master Dōgen sometimes uses half to suggest something concrete, individual, 30 “Him” refers to existence in the previous sentence.Literally, “If we leave it utterly up to him,” i.e., if we let go of subjective worries. 31 See for example, Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), Mu, “nonexistence.” U and mu, “existence and nonexistence,” are usually opposed.Busshō. 32 The gate suggests the dualism of illusions and their negation, or idealism and materialism.

33 The fact that all things—even however the fact is interpreted.bodhi and nirvana—are existence-time does not change, 34 Rarō, lit., “nets and cages.” In China, silk nets (ra) and bamboo cages (ro) are used to catch and to keep small birds.

35    “Momentary continuance” and “continue from one moment to the next” are translationsof kyōryaku. See note 18.

36    birds are singing, etc. At the same time, we see it as an inclusive continuing process. “The momentary passing of time” and “a passage of time” are also translations of Spring has separate momentary aspects: the air is warm, flowers are open, kyōryaku.

37    When we think about “passing” we usually imagine a subject passing through anexternal object, but this does not apply to the passing of time, because the momentary passing of time is complete in itself.

38    In the first clause, passing time and spring are separated; “the momentary passing of

Master Dōgen suggested the real springtime as the oneness of the conceptual and the vidual situations of spring—flowers blooming, birds singing, etc. In the second clause, time” means the concept of the season spring, and “spring” means the concrete Indi concrete.

39    Time is not a factor within the universe, it is the universe itself.

40    Master Yakusan Igen (745–828). He became a monk at the age of seventeen and eventually succeeded Master Sekitō Kisen. Great Master Kōdō is his posthumous title.

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41    eventually succeeded Master Seigen Gyōshi. He wrote the poem riencing the StateMaster Sekitō Kisen (700–790). He had his head shaved by Master Daikan Enō and), which is often recited in Sōtō sect temples. Great Master MusaiSandōkai (On Expeis his posthumous title.

42    of Buddhism in China in the eighth century sprang from the efforts of Master Seki -Master Baso Dōitsu (704–788); successor of Master Nangaku Ejō. Kōzei was the name of the district where he lived, and Daijaku is his posthumous name. The spread tō and Master Baso.

43    content of sutras; 3) The three vehicles are the vehicles of the as outlined by the Buddha in the sūtra,vyākaraṇa, independent verses; 5) original texts, sutras; 2) the Buddha’s affirmation that a practitioner is becoming Lotus Sutra.śrāvaka, pratyekabuddha,udāna, The twelve divisions of the teachings geya,spontaneous preaching (usually verses summarizing the prose and bodhisattva, Nidana, are as follows: 1)

historical accounts of causes and conditions; 7) stories of past occurrences (especially stories of past lives of the Buddha’s disciples);the Buddha’s preaching was prompted by questions from his followers); 6) a buddha; 4)  jātaka, stories of the Buddha’s past lives; 10) gāthā, avadāna, parables; 8) itivṛttaka, theoretical discourses. See also Glossary of Sanskrit Terms, and Chapter Twenty-philosophy; 11) 9)four (Vol. II), Bukkyō.ad bhuta-dharma, records of miraculous occurrences; and 12) vaipulya, extensions of Buddhists,

44    The ancestral master means Master Bodhidharma, who introduced real Buddhism to China from India. See Chapter Sixty-seven (Vol. III), Soshi-sairai-no-i.

45    Arutoki, see note 2.

46    Objectively .Kare literally means “him” or “that one.” Master Baso thought about his own behavior

47    verb (pronounced “The teaching” is kyō.seshimuruIn Master Baso’s words, ). Master Dōgen affirmed that Master Baso’s behaviorkyō is used as an auxiliary causative three characters the oneness of Master Baso’s words and his state. Was moral and that he followed the teachings. At the same time, by combining theze, i, and kyō, (right, him, and make/teaching), Master Dōgen suggested

48    is not always immoral—to do nothing is sometimes morally right. Immorality is not only inaction—positive action can also be immoral. And inaction

49    that he realized the truth on seeing the morning star, and that he transmitted the truth(The elements of the sentence suggest real situations in the Buddha’s life—it is said to Master Mahākāśyapa by picking up an Vol. III), Udonge. uḍum bara flower. See Chapter Sixty-eight 50 Shōken was the fourth master in the succession from Master Rinzai, and the ninth master in the succession from Master Nangaku Ejō. It is said that he realized the truth Master Shōken Kishō, dates unknown; a successor of Master Shuzan Shōnen. Master

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Shōken is in modern-day Hunan province in east central China.in the order of Master Shuzan when discussing a story about a shippei (bamboo stick). 51 Fuketsu Enshō.Master Shuzan Shōnen, died in 993 at the age of sixty-eight. A successor of Master 52 Arutoki. See note 2.

53    “Present” is “Absent” is futō, itatō, ita[rite[ra]]zu,, which means to arrive, or to have arrived, to be present. which means not to arrive, or not to have arrived, to be absent.

54    Buddha-Dharma?” Master Reiun says, “Donkey business being unfinished, but horsebusiness coming in.” See Master Chōkei Eryō asks Master Reiun Shigon, “What is the Great Intention of theShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 56.

55    Dōgen interprets that the poem is also about concrete reality. The poem seems to be abstract in content, discussing only words and will, but Master

56    Presence, or “to have arrived,” and absence, or “not to have arrived,” are states at the moment of the present; they do not need to be seen as the results of past processes.

57    Presence restricted by itself means real presence as it is, i.e., presence that is not restricted by worrying about absence. 58 the real will as it is.Both expressions, “the will hinders the will” and “the will meets the will,” suggest 59 not something separate which can hinder real things. “Restriction” means being as it is. It is the state which real things already have, it is

60    Genjō-kōan. See Chapter Three, Genjō-kōan.

61    and feeling. See Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Kōjō-kanrei. Kōjō, “ascendant,” describes the state which is more real than thinkingButsu-kōjō-no-ji.

62    concrete reality.Dattai. Datsu means to get free of, or to shed. Tai means the body, the substance, the 63 Soku-shi-ri-shi suggests real behavior in Buddhist life. This and the three preceding

reality, the concrete state which is more real than a generalization, the clear estab-lishment of concrete facts in reality, and real action in daily life.expressions can be interpreted according to four phases: a general expression of

64    “Enact existence-time” is uji su—uji is used as a verb.

65    Kare, as in Master Baso’s words. See note 46. 66 The first day of the tenth lunar month, 1240. 67 1243.

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[Chapter Twelve]

                                             Kesa-kudoku                                       

The Merit of the Kaṣāya

Translator’s Note: Kesa represents the Sanskrit word kaṣāya, or Buddhist robe, and kudoku means “virtue” or “merit.” So kesa-kudoku means the merit of the kaṣāya. Being a realistic religion, Buddhism reveres our real life. In other words, Buddhism esteems our real conduct in daily life; wearing clothes and eating meals are very important parts of Buddhist life. In particular, the kaṣāya and pātra, or Buddhist bowl, are the main symbols of Buddhist life. In this chapter Master Dōgen explains and praises the merit of the kaṣāya.

[49] The authentic transmission into China of the robe and the Dharma, which are authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch, was done only by the Founding Patriarch of Sūgaku Peak.1 The Founding Patriarch was the twenty-eighth patriarch after Śākyamuni Buddha, the transmission having passed twenty-eight times in India from rightful successor to rightful successor. The twenty-eighth patriarch went to China in person and became the First Patriarch [there]. The transmission then passed through five Chinese [masters] and reached Sōkei,2 the thirty-third patriarch, whom we call “the Sixth Patriarch.” Zen Master Daikan, the thirty-third patriarch, received the authentic transmission of this robe and Dharma on Ōbaizan3 in the middle of the night, after which he guarded and retained [the robe] throughout his life. It is still deposited at Hōrinji on Sōkeizan. Many successive generations of emperors devoutly asked for [the robe] to be brought to the imperial court, where they served offerings and made prostrations to it, guarding it as a sacred object. The Tang dynasty4 emperors Chūsō (Ch. Zhongzong), Shukusō (Ch. Suzong), and Taisō5 (Ch. Daizong) frequently had [the robe] brought to the court and served offerings to it. When they requested it and when they sent it back, they would conscientiously dispatch an imperial emissary and issue an edict. Emperor Taisō once returned the buddha robe to

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Sōkeizan with the following edict: “I now dispatch the great General Ryū Shūkei,6 Pacifier of the Nation, to receive with courtesy7 and to deliver [the robe]. I consider it to be a national treasure. Venerable priests,8 deposit it according to the Dharma in its original temple. Let it be solemnly guarded only by monks who have intimately received the fundamental teaching. Never let it fall into neglect.” Truly, better than ruling a three-thousand-great-thousandfold realm of worlds as countless as the sands of the Ganges,9 to see and to hear and to serve offerings to the Buddha’s robe as the king of a small country where the Buddha’s robe is present, may be the best life among [all] good lives [lived] in life-and-death. Where, in a three-thousandfold world which has been reached by the Buddha’s influence, could the kaṣāya not exist? At the same time, the one who passed on the authentic transmission

of the Buddha’s kaṣāya, having received the face-to-face transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor, is only the ancestral patriarch of Sūgaku Peak. The Buddha’s kaṣāya was not handed down through side lineages.10 The transmission to Bodhisattva Bhadrapāla, a collateral descendant of the twenty-seventh patriarch,11 duly arrived at Dharma teacher Jō,12 but there was no authentic transmission of the Buddha’s kaṣāya. Again, Great Master [Dōshin], the Fourth Patriarch in China,13 delivered Zen Master Hōyū14 of Gozusan but did not pass on the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s kaṣāya. So even without the transmission from rightful successors, the Tathāgata’s right Dharma—whose merit is never empty—confers its wide and great benefit all through thousands of ages and myriads of ages. [At the same time] those who have received the transmission from rightful successors are not to be compared with those who lack the transmission. Therefore, when human beings and gods receive and retain the kaṣāya, they should receive the authentic transmission transmitted between Buddhist patriarchs. In India and in China, in the ages of the right Dharma and the imitative Dharma,15 even laypeople received and retained the kaṣāya. In this distant and remote land in the present degenerate age, those who shave their beard and hair and call themselves the Buddha’s disciples do not receive and retain the kaṣāya. They have never believed, known, or clarified that they should receive and retain [the kaṣāya]; it is lamentable. How much less do they know of the [kaṣāya’s] material, color, and measurements. How much less do they know how to wear it.

[54] The kaṣāya has been called, since ancient time, “the clothing of liberation.” It can liberate16 us from all hindrances such as karmic hindrances, hindrances of affliction, and hindrances of retribution. If a dragon gets a single strand [of the kaṣāya], it escapes the three kinds of heat.17 If a bull touches [a kaṣāya] with one of its horns, its sins will naturally be extinguished. When buddhas realize the truth they are always wearing the kaṣāya. Remember, [to wear the kaṣāya] is the noblest and highest virtue. Truly, we have been born in a remote land in [the age of] the latter Dharma, and we must regret this. But at the same time, how should we measure the joy of meeting the robe and the Dharma that have been transmitted from buddha to buddha, from rightful successor to rightful successor? Which [other] lineage has authentically transmitted both the robe and the Dharma of Śākyamuni in the 48b manner of our authentic transmission? Having met them, who could fail to venerate them and to serve offerings to them? Even if, each day, we [have to] discard bodies and lives as countless as the sands of the Ganges, we should serve offerings to them. Indeed we should vow to meet them, humbly to receive them upon the head,18 to serve offerings to them, and to venerate them in every life in every age. Between us and the country of the Buddha’s birth, there are more than a hundred thousand miles of mountains and oceans, and it is too far for us to travel; nevertheless, promoted by past good conduct, we have not been shut out by the mountains and oceans, and we have not been spurned as the dullards of a remote [land]. Having met this right Dharma, we should persistently practice it day and night. Having received and retained this kaṣāya, we should perpetually receive it upon the head in humility and preserve it. How could this only be to have practiced merit under one buddha or two buddhas? It may be to have practiced all kinds of merit under buddhas equal to the sands of the Ganges. Even if [the people who receive and retain the kaṣāya] are ourselves, we should venerate them, and we should rejoice. We should heartily repay the profound benevolence of the ancestral master in transmitting the Dharma. Even animals repay kindness; so how could human beings fail to recognize kindness? If we failed to recognize kindness, we might be more stupid than animals. The merits of this buddha robe and this Buddha-Dharma were never clarified or known by anyone other than the ancestral master who transmitted the Buddha’s right Dharma. If we want to follow gladly the traces of the buddhas, we should just be glad about this [transmission]. Even after hundred thousand myriads of generations, we should esteem this authentic transmission as the authentic transmission. This [transmission] may be the Buddha-Dharma itself; the proof in due course will become evident. We should not liken [the transmission] to the dilution of milk with water. It is like a crown prince succeeding to the throne. When we want to use milk, if there is no milk other than this diluted milk [described

48c above], although it is diluted milk we should use it. Even when we do not dilute it with water, we must not use oil, we must not use lacquer, and we must not use wine. This authentic transmission may also be like that. Even a mediocre follower of an ordinary master, providing the authentic transmission is present, may be in a good situation to use milk. [But] more to the point, the authentic transmission from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch is like the succession of a crown prince. Even secular [teaching] says, “One does not wear clothing different from the official uniform of the previous reign.”19 How could disciples of the Buddha wear [robes] different from the Buddha’s robe?

[58] Since the tenth year of the Eihei era,20 during the reign of Emperor Kōmei (Ch. Mingdi) of the Later Han dynasty,21 monks and laymen going back and forth between the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands have followed on each other’s heels without cease, but none has claimed to have met in the Western Heavens an ancestral master of the authentic transmission from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch; none has a record of the lineage of the face-to-face transmission from the Tathāgata. They have only followed teachers of sutras and commentaries, and brought back Sanskrit books of sutras and philosophy. None speaks of having met an ancestral master who is a rightful successor to the Buddha’s Dharma, and none mentions that there are ancestral masters who have received the transmission of the Buddha’s kaṣāya. Clearly, they have not entered beyond the threshold of the Buddha’s Dharma. People like this have not clarified the principle of the authentic transmission by Buddhist patriarchs. When Śākyamuni Tathāgata22 passed to Mahākāśyapa the right Dharma-eye treasury and the supreme state of bodhi, he transmitted them together with a kaṣāya received in the authentic transmission from Kāśyapa Buddha.23 Received by rightful successor from rightful successor, [the kaṣāya] reached Zen Master Daikan of Sōkeizan, the thirty-third generation. The material, color, and measurements [of the kaṣāya] had been transmitted intimately. Since then, the Dharma descendants of Seigen and Nangaku24 have intimately transmitted the Dharma, wearing the Dharma of the ancestral patriarchs and keeping the Dharma of the ancestral patriarchs in order. The method of washing [the kaṣāya] and the method of receiving and retaining [the kaṣāya] cannot be known without learning in practice in the inner sanctum of the legitimate face-to-face transmission of 49a those methods.

[60] The kaṣāya is said to include three robes. They are the five-stripe robe, the seven-stripe robe, and the large robe of nine or more stripes. Excellent practitioners receive only these three robes, and do not keep other robes. To use just the three robes serves the body well enough. When we are attending to business or doing chores, and when we are going to and from the toilet, we wear the five-stripe robe. For doing good practices among the sangha, we wear the seven-stripe robe. To teach human beings and gods, and to make them devout, we should wear the large robe of nine or more stripes. Or, when we are in a private place we wear the five-stripe robe, when we go among the sangha we wear the seven-stripe robe, and when we go into a royal palace or into towns and villages we should wear the large robe. Or, when it is nice and warm we wear the five-stripe robe, when it is cold we put on the seven-stripe robe as well, and when the cold is severe we also put on the large robe. Once, in ancient times, the weather on a midwinter night was cold enough to split bamboo. As that night fell, the Tathāgata put on the five-stripe robe. As the night passed and it got colder, he put on the seven-stripe robe as well. Later on in the night, when the coldness reached a peak, he also put on the large robe. At this time, the Buddha thought, “In future ages, when the cold is beyond endurance, good sons should be able to clothe their bodies adequately with these three robes.”25

[62] The method of wearing the kaṣāya: “To bare only the right shoulder”26 is the usual method. There is a method of wearing [the kaṣāya] so that it goes over both shoulders, a form [followed by] the Tathāgata and veterans who are senior in years and experience: both shoulders are covered, while the chest may be either exposed or covered. [The method of] covering both shoulders is for a large kaṣāya of sixty or more stripes. [Usually,] when we wear the kaṣāya, we wear both sides over the left arm and shoulder. The front edge goes over the left side [of the kaṣāya] and hangs over the [left upper] arm.27 In the case of the large kaṣāya, [this] front edge passes over the left shoulder and hangs down behind the back. There are various methods of wearing the kaṣāya besides these; we should take time to study them and should inquire into them.

[64] For hundreds of years, through one dynasty after another—Liang,

49b Zhen, Sui, Tang, and Song28—many scholars of both the Great and the Small Vehicles have abandoned the work of lecturing on sutras, recognizing that it is not the ultimate, and progressed to learn the authentically transmitted Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs; when they do so, they inevitably shed their former shabby robes and receive and retain the authentically transmitted kaṣāya of the Buddhist patriarchs. This is indeed the abandonment of the false and the return to the true. [In discussing] the right Dharma of the Tathāgata, [we see] the Western Heavens as the very root of the Dharma. Many teachers of human beings, past and present, have established small views based on the sentimental and parochial thinking of the common person. Because the world of buddha and the world of living beings are beyond being limited and being unlimited, the teachings, practice, and human truths of the Mahayana and the Hinayana can never fit inside the narrow thoughts of common people today. Nevertheless, [common people] in China, acting at random, have failed to see the Western Heavens as the root, and have considered their newly devised, limited, small views to be the Buddha-Dharma. Such facts should never occur. Therefore if people today who have established the mind want to receive and to retain the kaṣāya, they must receive and retain the kaṣāya of the authentic transmission. They must not receive and retain a kaṣāya newly created according to the idea of the moment. The kaṣāya of the authentic transmission means the one that has been authentically transmitted from Shaolin [Temple] and Sōkei [Mountain],29 the one that has been received by the Tathāgata’s rightful successors without missing a single generation. The kaṣāya worn by their Dharma children and Dharma grandchildren is the traditional kaṣāya. What has been newly created in China is not traditional. Now, the kaṣāya worn by the monks who have come from the Western Heavens, in the past and present, are all worn as the kaṣāya authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs. Not one of these monks [has worn a kaṣāya] like the new kaṣāya being produced in China today by precepts scholars. Dull people believe in the kaṣāya of precepts scholars; those who are clear throw [such robes] away. In general, the merit of the kaṣāya transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch is evident and easy to believe in. Its authentic transmission has been received exactly, its original 49c form has been handed down personally, and it exists really in the present. [The Buddhist patriarchs] have received and retained it, and succeeded to each other’s Dharma, until today. The ancestral masters who have received and retained [the kaṣāya] are all masters and disciples who experienced the state30 and received the transmission of Dharma. This being so, we should make [the kaṣāya] properly, according to the method for making the kaṣāya that has been authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs. This alone is the authentic tradition, and so it has long been experienced and recognized by all common and sacred beings, human beings and gods, and dragons and spirits. Having been born to meet the spread of this Dharma, if we cover our body with the kaṣāya only once, receiving it and retaining it for just a kṣāṇa or a muhūrta,31 that [experience] will surely serve as a talisman to protect us32 in the realization of the supreme state of bodhi. When we dye the body and mind with a single phrase or a single verse, it becomes a seed of everlasting brightness which finally leads us to the supreme state of bodhi. When we dye the body and mind with one real dharma or one good deed, it may be also like this. Mental images arise and vanish instantaneously; they are without an abode. The physical body also arises and vanishes instantaneously; it too is without an abode. Nevertheless, the merit that we practice always has its time of ripening and shedding. The kaṣāya, similarly, is beyond elaboration and beyond non-elaboration, it is beyond having an abode and beyond having no abode: it is that which “buddhas alone, together with buddhas, perfectly realize.”33 Nevertheless, practitioners who receive and retain [the kaṣāya] always accomplish the merit that is thus to be gained, and they always arrive at the ultimate. Those without past good conduct—even if they pass through one life, two lives, or countless lives—can never meet the kaṣāya, can never wear the kaṣāya, can never believe in the kaṣāya, and can never clearly know the kaṣāya. In China and Japan today, we see that there are those who have had the opportunity to clothe their body once in the kaṣāya, and there are

those who have not. [The difference] depends neither upon high or low status nor upon stupidity or wisdom: clearly it was determined by past good conduct.

This being so, if we have received and retained the kaṣāya, we should feel glad about our past good conduct, and should not doubt the accumulation of merit and the piling up of virtue. If we have not got [the kaṣāya] yet, we should hope to get it. We should strive, without delay, to sow the first seeds [of receiving and retaining the kaṣāya] in this life. Those who are prevented by some hindrance from receiving and retaining [the kaṣāya] should repent and confess before the buddha-tathāgatas and the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. How living beings in other countries must wish, “If only the robe and the Dharma of the Tathāgata had been authentically transmitted and were intimately present in our country, as they are in China!” Their shame must be deep, and their sadness tinged with resentment, that the authentic tradition has not passed into their own country. Why are we so fortunate as to have met the Dharma in which the robe and the Dharma of the Tathāgata, the World honored One, have been authentically transmitted? It is the influence of the great merit of praj ñā nurtured in the past. In the present corrupt age of the latter Dharma, [some] are not ashamed that they themselves have no authentic transmission, and they envy others who possess the authentic transmission. I think they may be a band of demons. Their present possessions and abodes which are influenced by their former conduct, are not true and real. Just to devote themselves34 to and to venerate the authentically transmitted Buddha Dharma: this may be their real refuge in learning [the state of] buddha. In sum, remember that the kaṣāya is the object of the buddhas’ veneration and devotion. It is the body of the Buddha and the mind of the Buddha. We call it “the clothing of liberation,”35 “the robe of a field of happiness,”36 “the robe without form,”37 “the supreme robe,” “the robe of endurance,”38 “the robe of the Tathā gata,” “the robe of great benevolence and great compassion,” “the robe that is a banner of excellence,” and “the robe of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” We should receive and retain it like this, humbly receiving it upon the head. Because it is like this, we should never change it according to [our own] mind.

[71] As material for the robe, we use silk or cotton, according to suitability. It is not always the case that cotton is pure and silk is impure. There is no viewpoint from which to hate cotton and to prefer silk; that would be laughable. The usual method39 of the buddhas, in every case, is to see rags40 as the best material. There are ten sorts and four sorts of rags; namely, burned, chewed by an ox, gnawed by rats, from clothes of dead people, and so forth.41 “The people of the five areas of India42 discarded rags like these in streets and fields, as if they were filth, and so they called them ‘filthy rags.’43 Practitioners picked them up, washed them and sewed them, and used them to cover the body.”44 Among those [rags] there are various kinds of silk and various kinds of cotton. We should throw away the view [that discriminates between] silk and cotton, and study rags in practice. When, in ancient times45 [the Buddha] was washing a robe of rags in Lake Anavatapta,46 the Dragon King praised him with a rain of flowers, and made prostrations of reverence. Some teachers of the Small Vehicle have a theory about transformed thread,47 which also may be without foundation. People of the Great Vehicle might laugh at it. What kind [of thread] is not transformed thread? When those teachers hear of “transformation” they believe their ears, but when they see the transformation itself they doubt their eyes. Remember, in picking up rags, there may be cotton that looks like silk and there may be silk that looks like cotton. There being myriad differences in local customs it is hard to fathom [nature’s] creation—eyes of flesh cannot know it. Having obtained such material, we should not discuss whether it is silk or cotton but should call it rags. Even if there are human beings or gods in heaven who have survived as rags, they are never sentient beings, they are just rags. Even if there are pine trees or chrysanthemums that have survived as rags, they are never insentient beings, they are just rags. When we believe the principle that rags are not silk or cotton, and not gold, silver, pearl, or jewel, rags are realized. Before we have got rid of views and opinions about silk and cotton, we have never seen rags even in a dream. On one occasion a monk asks the eternal 50c buddha,48 “Should we see the robe you received on Ōbai [Mountain] in the middle of the night as cotton, or should we see it as silk? In short, as what material should we see it?” The eternal buddha says, “It is not cotton and it is not silk.” Remember, it is a profound teaching49 of the Buddha’s truth that the kaṣāya is beyond silk and cotton.

[74] The Venerable Śāṇavāsa50 is third in the transmission of the Dharma treasury. He has been endowed with a robe since birth. While he is a layman this robe is a secular garment, but when he leaves home51 it turns into a kaṣāya. In another case, the bhikṣuṇī Śukra,52 after establishing the will and being clothed in a cotton robe, has been born with a robe in every life and middle existence. On the day that she meets Śākyamuni Buddha and leaves home, the secular robe that she has had since birth changes instantly into a kaṣāya, as in the case of Venerable Śāṇavāsa. Clearly, the kaṣāya is beyond silk, cotton, and so forth. Moreover, the fact that the virtue of the Buddha Dharma can transform body and mind and all dharmas is as in those examples. The truth is evident that when we leave home and receive the precepts, body and mind, object-and-subject, change at once; it is only because we are stupid that we do not know. It is not true that the usual rule53 of the buddhas applies only to Śāṇavāsa and to Śukra but not to us; we should not doubt that benefit [accrues] in accordance with individual standing. We should consider such truths in detail and learn them in practice. The kaṣāya that covers the body of [the monks whom the Buddha] welcomes54 to take the precepts is not necessarily cotton or silk: the Buddha’s influence is difficult to consider. The precious pearl within the robe55 is beyond those who count grains of sand.56 We should clarify and should learn in practice that which has quantity and that which is without quantity, that which has form and that which is without form, in the material, color, and measurements of the kaṣāya of the buddhas. This is what all the ancestral masters of the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, past and present, learned in practice and transmitted as the authentic tradition. If someone is able to see and to hear [a master] in whom there is nothing to doubt—the authentic transmission from patriarch to patriarch

being evident—but fails, without reason, to receive the authentic transmission from this ancestral master, such smugness would be hard to condone. The extent of [this] stupidity might be due to unbelief. It would be to abandon the real and to pursue the false, to discard the root and to seek after branches. It would be to slight the Tathāgata. People who wish to establish the bodhi mind should always receive the authentic transmission of an ancestral master. Not only have we met the Buddha-Dharma which is so difficult to meet: also, as Dharma descendants in the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s kaṣāya, we have been able to see and to hear, to learn and to practice, and to receive and to retain [the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s kaṣāya]. This is just to see the Tathāgata himself, it is to hear the Buddha’s preaching of Dharma, it is to be illuminated by the Buddha’s brightness, it is to receive

and to use what the Buddha received and used, it is to receive the one-toone transmission of the Buddha’s mind, it is to have got the Buddha’s marrow, it is to be covered directly by Śākyamuni Buddha’s kaṣāya, and it is Śākyamuni Buddha himself directly bestowing the kaṣāya upon us. Because we follow the Buddha, we have devoutly57 received this kaṣāya.

[78] The method of washing the kaṣāya: Put the kaṣāya, unfolded, into a clean tub, then immerse the kaṣāya in fragrant, fully boiled hot water, and leave it to soak for about two hours.58 Another method is to soak the kaṣāya in pure, fully boiled ash-water59 and to wait for the water to cool. Nowadays we usually use [the] hot ash-water [method]. Hot ash-water is what we call aku-no-yu here [in Japan].60 When the ash-water has cooled, rinse [the kaṣāya] again and again in clean and clear hot water. During the rinsing do not put in both hands to scrub [the kaṣāya] and do not tread on it. Continue until any dirt or grease has been removed. After that, mix aloes, sandalwood,61 or other 51b incense into some cold water and rinse [the kaṣāya]. Then hang it on a washing pole62 to dry. After it is thoroughly dry, fold it and put it in a high place, burn incense and scatter petals, walk round it several times [with the kaṣāya] to the right,63 and perform prostrations. After making three prostrations, six prostrations, or nine prostrations, kneel up and join the hands,64 then hold the kaṣāya up with both hands, and in the mouth recite the verse [in praise of the kaṣāya].65 After that stand up and put on [the kaṣāya] according to the method. [80] 66The World-honored One addresses the great assembly: “In the ancient past when I was in the order of Buddha Jewel Treasury,67 I was Bodhisattva Great Compassion.68 At that time, the bodhisattva mahāsattva Great Compassion made the following vow before Buddha Jewel Treasury:

‘World-honored One! If, after I became a buddha, there were living beings who had entered my Dharma and left home and who wore the kaṣāya—even if they were bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās69 who had accumulated heavy sins by violating the grave prohibitions, by enacting false views, or by contemptuously disbelieving the Three Treasures—and in a single moment of consciousness the reverence arose in their mind to honor the saṃghāṭi robe70 and the reverence arose in their mind to honor the World-honored One (the Buddha) or the Dharma and the Sangha but, World-honored One, even one among those living beings could not, in [one of] the three vehicles,71 receive affirmation,72 and as a result regressed or went astray, it would mean that I had deceived the buddhas who are present now in the worlds of the ten directions and in countless, infinite asaṃkheya kalpas, and I surely should not realize anuttara samyak saṃbodhi.

‘World-honored One! After I have become a buddha, if gods, dragons, and demons, and human and nonhuman beings are able to wear this kaṣāya, to venerate, to serve offerings to, to honor, and to praise it, as long as those people are able to see a small part of this kaṣāya, they will be able not to regress while within the three vehicles.

‘When living beings are afflicted by hunger or thirst—whether they are wretched demons, miserable people, or living beings in the state of hungry ghosts—if they are able to obtain a piece of the kaṣāya even as small as four inches,73 they will at once be able to eat and drink their fill and to accomplish quickly whatever they wish.

‘When living beings offend each other, causing ill will to arise and a fight to develop—or when gods, dragons, demons, gandharvas, asuras, garuḍas, kiṃnaras, mahoragas, kum bhāṇḍas, piśācas, and human and nonhuman beings are fighting each other—if they remember this kaṣāya, in due course, by virtue of the power of the kaṣāya, they will beget the mind of compassion, soft and flexible mind, mind free of enmity, serene mind, the regulated mind of virtue, and they will get back the state of purity.

‘When people are in an armed conflict, a civil lawsuit, or a criminal action, if they retain a small piece of this kaṣāya as they go among these combatants, and if in order to protect themselves they serve offerings to, venerate, and honor it, these [other] people will be unable to injure, to disturb, or to make fools of them; they will always be able to beat their opponents and to come through all such difficulties.

‘World-honored One! If my kaṣāya were unable to accomplish these five sacred merits,75 it would mean that I had deceived the buddhas who are present now in the worlds of the ten directions and in countless, infinite asaṃkheya kalpas, and in future I ought not to accomplish anuttara samyak saṃbodhi or to do Buddhist works. Having lost the virtuous Dharma, I would surely be unable to destroy non-Buddhism.’ Good sons!76 At that time Tathāgata Jewel Treasury extended his golden right arm and patted the head of Bodhisattva Great Compassion, praising him with these words:

“Very good! Very good! Stout fellow! What you have said is a great and rare treasure, and is great wisdom and virtue. When you have realized anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, this robe, the kaṣāya, will be able to accomplish these five sacred merits and to produce great benefit.”

Good sons! At that time, the bodhisattva mahāsattva Great Compassion, after hearing the praise of that buddha, jumped endlessly for joy. Then the Buddha [again] extended his golden arm, with its hand of long, webbed fingers77 as soft as the robe of a goddess. When he patted the [bodhisattva’s] head, the [bodhisattva’s] body changed at once into the youthful figure of a man of twenty. Good sons! In that order the great assembly of gods, dragons, deities, gandharvas, and human and nonhuman beings, with folded hands78 venerated Bodhisattva Great Compassion; they served him offerings of all kinds of flowers; they even made music and offered that; and they also praised him in all kinds of ways, after which they abode in silence.79

[86]From the age when the Tathāgata was in the world until today, whenever the merits of the kaṣāya are quoted from the Sutra and the Vinaya80 of bodhisattvas and śrāvakas, these five sacred merits are always considered 52a fundamental. Truly, kaṣāyas are the buddha robes of the buddhas of the three times. Their merits are measureless. At the same time, to get the kaṣāya in the Dharma of Śākyamuni Buddha may be even better than to get the kaṣāya in the Dharma of other buddhas. The reason, if asked, is that in the ancient past, when Śākyamuni Buddha was in the causal state81 as the bodhisattva mahāsattva Great Compassion, when he offered his five hundred great vows before Buddha Jewel Treasury, he pointedly made the above vows in terms of the merits of this kaṣāya. Its merits may be utterly measureless and unthinkable. This being so, the authentic transmission to the present of the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the World-honored One, is the kaṣāya robe. The ancestral masters who have authentically transmitted the right Dharma-eye treasury have, without exception, authentically transmitted the kaṣāya. The living beings who have received and retained this robe and humbly received it upon their heads have, without exception, attained the truth within two or

three lives. Even when people have put [the kaṣāya] on their body for a joke or for gain, it has inevitably become the causes and conditions for their attaining the truth.

[87]The ancestral master Nāgārjuna82 says, “Further, in the Buddha Dharma, people who have left family life,83 even if they break the precepts and fall into sin, after they have expiated their sins, they can attain liberation, as the bhikṣuṇī Utpalavarṇā explains in the Jātakasūtra:84 When the Buddha is in the world, this bhikṣuṇī attains the six mystical powers85 and the state of an arhat.86 She goes into the houses of nobles and constantly praises the method of leaving family life, saying to all the aristocratic ladies, ‘Sisters! You should leave family life.’

The noblewomen say, ‘We are young and our figures are full of life and beauty. It would be difficult for us to keep the precepts. Sometimes we might break the precepts.’

The bhikṣuṇī says, ‘If you break the precepts, you break them. Just leave family life!’

They ask, ‘If we break the precepts we will fall into hell. Why

should we want to break them?’

She answers, ‘If you fall into hell, you fall.’

The noblewomen all laugh at this, saying, ‘In hell we would have to receive retribution for our sins. Why should we want to fall [into hell]?’

The bhikṣuṇī says, ‘I remember in my own past life, once I became

a prostitute, wore all sorts of clothes, and spoke in old-fashioned language.87 One day I put on a bhikṣuṇī robe as a joke, and due to this as a direct and indirect cause, at the time of Kāśyapa Buddha88 I became a bhikṣuṇī. I was still proud then of my noble pedigree and fine features: vanity and arrogance arose in my mind, and I broke the precepts. Because of the wrongness of breaking the precepts I fell into hell and suffered for my various sins, but after I had suffered retribution I finally met Śākyamuni Buddha, transcended family life, and attained the six mystical powers and the truth of an arhat. Thus, I know that when we leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break the precepts, due to the precepts as direct and indirect causes we can attain the truth

of an arhat. If I had only done bad, without the precepts as direct and indirect causes, I could not have attained the truth. In the past I fell into hell in age after age. When I got out of hell I became a bad person, and when the bad person died, I went back into hell, and there was no gain at all. Now therefore I know from experience that when we leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break the precepts, with this as a direct and indirect cause we can attain the bodhi-effect.’”89 [90] The primary cause of this bhikṣuṇī Utpalavarṇā90 attaining the truth as an arhat is just the merit of her putting the kaṣāya on her body for a joke; because of this merit, and no other merit, she has now attained the truth. In her second life she meets the Dharma of Kāśyapa Buddha and becomes a bhikṣuṇī. In her third life she meets Śākyamuni Buddha and becomes a great arhat, equipped with the three kinds of knowledge and the six powers. The three kinds of knowledge are supernatural insight, [knowing] past lives, and ending the superfluous. The six powers are the power of mystical transmutation, the power to know others’ minds, the power of supernatural sight, the power of supernatural hearing, the power to know past lives, and the power to end the superfluous.91 Truly, when she was only a wrongdoer she died and entered hell to no avail, coming out of hell and becoming a wrongdoer again. [But] when she has the precepts as direct and indirect causes, although she has broken the precepts and fallen into hell, they are the direct and indirect causes of her attaining the truth at last. Now, even someone who has worn the kaṣāya for a joke can attain the truth in her third life. How, then, could someone who has established pure belief, and who wears the kaṣāya for the 52c sake of the supreme state of bodhi, fail to accomplish that merit? Still further, if we receive and retain [the kaṣāya] throughout our life, humbly receiving it upon the head, the merit might be universal and great beyond measure. Any human being who would like to establish the bodhi-mind should receive and retain the kaṣāya, and humbly receive it upon the head, without delay. To have met this favorable age but not to have sown a Buddhist seed  would be deplorable. Having received a human body on the southern continent,92 having met the Dharma of Śākyamuni Buddha, and having been born to meet an ancestral master who is a perfectly legitimate successor to the Buddha Dharma, if we idly passed up the chance to receive the kaṣāya which has

been transmitted one-to-one and which is directly accessible, that would be deplorable. Now, in regard to the authentic transmission of the kaṣāya, the one authentic transmission from the ancestral master is right and traditional; other masters cannot stand shoulder to shoulder with him. Even to receive and to retain the kaṣāya following a master who has not received the transmission is still of very profound merit. But much more than that, if we receive and retain [the kaṣāya] from a true master who has quite legitimately received the face-to-face transmission, we may really be the Dharma children and the Dharma grandchildren of the Tathāgata himself, and we may actually have received the authentic transmission of the Tathāgata’s skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. The kaṣāya, in conclusion, has been authentically transmitted by the buddhas of the three times and the ten directions, without interruption; it is what the buddhas, bodhisattvas, śrāvakas, and pratyekabuddhas of the three times and the ten directions have, in like manner, guarded and retained. [93] Coarse cotton cloth is the standard [material] for making the kaṣāya. When there is no coarse cotton cloth, we use fine cotton cloth. When there is neither coarse nor fine cotton cloth, we use plain silk. When there is neither [plain] silk nor cotton cloth, materials such as patterned cloth93 or sheer silk may be used; [these are all] approved by the Tathāgata. For countries where there is no plain silk, cotton, patterned cloth, sheer silk, or anything of the kind, the Tathāgata also permits the leather kaṣāya. Generally, we should dye the kaṣāya blue, yellow, red, black, or purple. Whichever color it is, we 53a should make it a secondary color.94 The Tathāgata always wore a flesh-colored kaṣāya; this was the color of the kaṣāya. The Buddha’s kaṣāya transmitted by the First Patriarch was blue-black, and made of the cotton crepe of the Western Heavens. It is now on Sōkeizan. It was transmitted twenty-eight times in the Western Heavens and transmitted five times in China. Now the surviving disciples of the eternal buddha of Sōkei,95 who have all received and retained the ancient customs of the Buddha’s robe, are beyond other monks. Broadly, there are three kinds of robe: 1) “the robe of rags,” 2) “the robe of fur,” and 3) “the patched robe.” “Rags” are as explained previously. In “the robe of fur,” the fine [down and] hair of birds and beasts is called “fur.” “When practitioners cannot obtain rags, they pick up this [fur] and make it into the robe. ‘The patched robe’ describes our sewing and patching,

and wearing, [cloth] that has become ragged and worn with age; we do not wear the fine clothes of the secular world.”96

[95] 97The venerable monk98 Upāli99 asks the World-honored One, “World-honored Bhadanta!100 How many stripes does the saṃghāṭi robe have?”

The Buddha says, “There are nine kinds. What are the nine kinds? They are [the saṃghāṭi robe] of nine stripes, eleven stripes, thirteen stripes, fifteen stripes, seventeen stripes, nineteen stripes, twenty-one stripes, twenty-three stripes, and twenty-five stripes. The first three of those kinds of saṃghāṭi robe have two long segments and one short segment [in each stripe], and we should keep [the standard] like this. The next three kinds have three long [segments] and one short, and the last three kinds have four long and one short. Anything with more

[segments per] stripe than this becomes an unorthodox robe.”101

Upāli again addresses the World-honored One, “World-honored Bhadanta! How many kinds of saṃghāṭi robe are there?”

The Buddha says, “There are three kinds: larger, medium, and smaller.102 The larger is three cubits long by five cubits wide.103 The smaller is two and a half cubits long by four and a half cubits wide. Anything between these two is called medium.”

Upāli again addresses the World-honored One: “World-honored

Bhadanta! How many stripes does the uttarasaṃghāṭi104 robe have?”

The Buddha says, “It has only seven stripes, each with two long

segments and one short segment.”

Upāli again addresses the World-honored One, “World-honored

Bhadanta! How many kinds of seven-striped [robe] are there?”

The Buddha says, “There are three kinds: larger, medium, and smaller. The larger is three cubits by five, the smaller is a half cubit shorter on each side, and anything between these two is called medium.”

Upāli again addresses the World-honored One: “World-honored

              Bhadanta! How many stripes does the antarvāsa105 robe have?”               

The Buddha says, “It has five stripes, each with one long segment

and one short segment.”

Upāli again addresses the World-honored One, “How many kinds

of antarvāsa robes are there?”

The Buddha says, “There are three kinds: larger, medium, and smaller. The larger is three cubits by five. The medium and the smaller are as before.”106 The Buddha says, “There are two further kinds of antarvāsa robes. What are those two? The first is two cubits long by five cubits wide, and the second is two cubits long by four cubits wide.”

The saṃghāṭi is translated as “the double-layered robe,” the uttarasaṃghāṭi is translated as “the upper robe,” and the antarvāsa is translated as “the under robe” or as “the inner robe.” At the same time, the saṃghāṭi robe is called “the large robe,” and also called “the robe for entering royal palaces” or “the robe for preaching the Dharma.” The uttarasaṃghāṭi is called “the seven-striped robe,” or called “the middle robe” or “the robe for going among the sangha.” The antarvāsa is called “the five-striped robe,” or called “the small robe” or “the robe for practicing the truth and for doing work.”

[98] We should guard and retain these three robes without fail. Among saṃghāṭi robes is the kaṣāya of sixty stripes, which also deserves to be received and retained without fail. In general, the length of a [buddha’s] body depends on the span of its lifetime, which is between eighty thousand years107 and one hundred years.108 Some say that there are differences between eighty thousand years and one hundred years, while others say that they may be equal. We esteem the insistence that they may be equal as the authentic tradition.109 The body measurements of buddhas and of human beings are very different: the human body can be measured, but the buddha body ultimately cannot be measured.110 Therefore, in the present moment in which Śākyamuni Buddha puts on the kaṣāya of Kāśyapa Buddha,111 [the kaṣāya] is not long and not wide. And in the present moment in which Maitreya Tathāgata puts on the kaṣāya of Śākyamuni Buddha, it is not short and not narrow. We should reflect upon clearly, decide conclusively, understand completely, and observe carefully that the buddha body is not long or short. King Brahmā,112 though high in the world of matter, does not see the crown of the Buddha’s head. 53c Maudgal yāyana,113 having gone far into the World of the Bright Banner, does not discern the Buddha’s voice: it is truly a mystery that [the Buddha’s form and voice] are the same whether seen and heard from far or near. All the merits of the Tathāgata are like this,114 and we should keep these merits in mind.

[100] As regards [methods of] cutting out and sewing the kaṣāya, there is the robe of separate stripes,115 the robe of added stripes,116 the robe of pleated stripes,117 and the single-sheet robe,118 each of which is a proper method. We should receive and retain [the kind of robe] that accords with the [material] obtained. The Buddha says, “The kaṣāya of the buddhas of the three times is invariably backstitched.” In obtaining the material, again, we consider pure material to be good, and we consider so-called filthy rags to be the purest of all. The buddhas of the three times all consider [rags] to be pure. In addition, cloth offered by devout donors is also pure. There again, [cloth] bought at a market with pure money is also pure. There are limits on the [number of] days within which the robe should be made,119 but in the present degenerate age of the latter Dharma, in a remote country, it may be better for us to receive and to retain [the robe] by doing the cutting and sewing whenever we are promoted by belief. It is an ultimate secret of the Great Vehicle that laypeople, whether human beings or gods, receive and retain the kaṣāya. King Brahmā and King Śakra120 have now both received and retained the kaṣāya, and these are excellent precedents in [the worlds of] volition and matter. Excellent [precedents] in the human world are beyond calculation. All lay bodhisattvas have received and retained [the kaṣāya]. In China, Emperor Bu121 of the Liang dynasty and Emperor Yang122 of the Sui dynasty123 both received and retained the kaṣāya. Emperors Taisō and Shukusō both wore the kaṣāya, learned in practice from monks, and received and retained the bodhisattva precepts. Other people such as householders and their wives who received the kaṣāya and received the Buddhist precepts are excellent examples in the past and present. In Japan, when Prince Shōtoku124 received and retained the kaṣāya, and lectured on such sutras as the Lotus Sutra and the Śrīmālā Sutra,125 he experienced the miraculous omen of precious flowers raining from the heavens. From that time the Buddha-Dharma spread throughout our country. Though [Prince Shōtoku] was the regent of the whole country, 54a he was just a guiding teacher to human beings and gods. As the Buddha’s emissary, he was father and mother to many living beings. In our country today, although the materials, colors, and measurements of the kaṣāya have all been misunderstood, that we can see and hear the word kaṣāya is due solely to the power of Prince Shōtoku. We would be in a sorry state today if, at that time, he had not destroyed the false and established the true. Later, Emperor Shōmu126 also received and retained the kaṣāya and received the bodhisattva precepts. Therefore, whether we are emperors or subjects, we should receive and retain the kaṣāya and we should receive the bodhisattva precepts without delay. There can be no greater happiness for a human body.

[104]         It has been said that “the kaṣāyas received and retained by laypeople are either called ‘single-stitched’ or called ‘secular robes.’ That is, they are not sewn with backstitches.” It is also said that “when laypeople go to a place of [practicing] the truth, they should be equipped with the three Dharma robes, a willow twig,127 rinsing water,128 mealware, and a sitting cloth;129 they should practice the same pure practices as bhikṣus.”130

[105]         Such were the traditions of a master of the past.131 However, [the tradition] that has now been received one-to-one from the Buddhist patriarchs is that the kaṣāyas transmitted to kings, ministers, householders,132 and common folk, are all backstitched. An excellent precedent is that [Master Daikan Enō] had already received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s kaṣāya as the temple servant Ro (Ch. Lu).133 In general, the kaṣāya is the banner of a disciple of the Buddha. If we have already received and retained the kaṣāya, we should humbly receive it upon the head every day. Placing it on the crown of the head, we join the hands and recite the following verse: Daisai-gedatsu-fuku (How great is the clothing of liberation,) Musō-fukuden-e (Formless, field of happiness, robe!)

Hibu-nyorai-kyō (Devoutly wearing the Tathāgata’s teaching,) Kōdo-shoshujō (Widely I will save living beings.)

After that we put it on. In the kaṣāya, we should feel like [our] master and should feel like a tower.134 We also recite this verse when we humbly receive [the kaṣāya] on the head after washing it.

[107] The Buddha says,

When we shave the head and wear the kaṣāya, We are protected by the buddhas.

                    Each person who transcends family life Is served by gods and humans.

Clearly, once we have shaved the head and put on the kaṣāya, we are protected by all the buddhas. Relying on this protection of the buddhas, [a person] can roundly realize the virtues of the supreme state of bodhi. Celestial throngs and human multitudes serve offerings to such a person.

135The World-honored One says to the bhikṣu Wisdom-Brightness,136 “The Dharma robe has ten excellent merits: 1) It is able to cover the body, to keep away shame, to fill us with humility and to [make us] practice good ways.137 2) It keeps away cold and heat, as well as mosquitoes, harmful creatures, and poisonous insects, [so that we can] practice the truth in tranquility. 3) It manifests the form of a śramaṇa138 who has left family life, giving delight to those who behold it and keeping away wrong states of mind. 4) The kaṣāya is just the manifestation to human beings and gods of a precious flag; those who honor and venerate it are able to be born in a Brahmā heaven.139 5) When we wear the kaṣāya, we feel that it is a precious flag; it is able to extinguish sins and to produce all kinds of happiness and virtue. 6) A fundamental rule in making the kaṣāya is to dye it a secondary color,140 so that it keeps us free from thoughts of the five desires,141 and does not give rise to lust. 7) The kaṣāya is the pure robe of the Buddha; for it eradicates afflictions142 forever and makes them into a fertile field. 8) When the kaṣāya covers the body, it extinguishes the karma of sins and promotes at every moment the practice of the ten kinds of good.143 9) The kaṣāya is like a fertile field; for it is well able to nurture the bodhisattva way. 10) The kaṣāya is also like a suit of armor; for it makes the poisoned arrows of affliction unable to do harm. Wisdom-Brightness! Remember, through these causes, when the buddhas of the three times, and pratyekabuddhas and śrāvakas, and pure monks and nuns, cover the body in the kaṣāya, [these] three groups of sacred beings sit as one on the precious platform of liberation, take up the sword of wisdom to destroy the demons of affliction, and enter together into the many spheres of nirvana which have one taste.” Then the World-honored One speaks again in verse:

Bhikṣu Wisdom-Brightness, listen well!

The traditional Buddhist robe has ten excellent merits: Secular clothes increase tainted Ness from desire, The Tathāgata’s Dharma attire is not like that;

Dharma attire fends off social shame,

But fills us with the humility that produces a field of happiness.

It keeps away cold and heat, and poisonous insects;

Firming our will to the truth, it enables us to arrive at the     ultimate.

It manifests [the form] of a monk and keeps away greed;

It eradicates the five views144 and [promotes] right practice.

                           To look at and bow to the kaṣāya’s form of a precious banner, And to venerate it, produces the happiness of King Brahmā.

When a disciple of the Buddha wears the robe and feels like     a tower,

This produces happiness, extinguishes sins, and impresses     human beings and gods.

True śramaṇas, of modest appearance, showing respect, Are not tainted in their actions by secular defilements. The buddhas praise [the kaṣāya] as a fertile field,

They call it supreme in giving benefit and joy to living beings. The mystical power of the kaṣāya is unthinkable,

It can cause us to practice deeds that plant the seeds of bodhi,145 It makes the sprouts of the truth grow like spring seedlings, The wonderful effect of bodhi being like autumn fruit. [The kaṣāya] is a true suit of armor, as hard as a diamond; The poisoned arrows of affliction can do no harm.

I have now briefly praised the ten excellent merits,

If I had successive kalpas to expound them widely, there would     be no end.

If a dragon wears a single strand [of the kaṣāya],

It will escape [the fate of] becoming food for a garuḍa.146

If people retain this robe when crossing the ocean, They need not fear trouble from dragonfish or demons. When thunder roars, lightning strikes, and the sky is angry, Someone who wears the kaṣāya is fearless.

If one clothed in white147 is able personally to hold and retain     [the kaṣāya],

All bad demons are unable to approach.

If [that person] is able to establish the will and seeks to leave     home,

Shunning the world and practicing the Buddha’s truth,

All the demon palaces of the ten directions will quake and     tremble,

And that person will quickly experience the body of the     Dharma King.148

[113]  These ten excellent merits broadly include all the merits of theBuddha’s truth. We should explicitly learn in practice the merits present in [these] long lines and [short] verses of praise, not just glancing over them and quickly putting them aside, but studying them phrase by phrase over a long period. These excellent merits are just the merits of the kaṣāya itself: they are not the effect of a practitioner’s fierce [pursuit of] merit through perpetual training. The Buddha says, “The mystical power of the kaṣāya is unthinkable”; it cannot be supposed at random by the common person or sages and saints. In general, when we “quickly experience the body of the Dharma King,” we are always wearing the kaṣāya. There has never been anyone, since ancient times, who experienced the body of the Dharma King without wearing the kaṣāya.

[114]  The best and purest material for the robe is rags, whose merits areuniversally evident in the sutras, precepts, and commentaries149 of the Great Vehicle and Small Vehicle. We should inquire into [these merits] under those who have studied them widely. At the same time, we should also be clear 55a about other materials for the robe. [These things] have been clarified and authentically transmitted by the buddhas and the patriarchs. They are beyond lesser beings.

[115]  The Middle Āgama Sutra150 says:

Furthermore, wise friends!151 Suppose there is a man whose bodily behavior is pure but whose behavior of mouth and mind is impure. If wise people see [the impurity] and feel anger they must dispel it. Wise friends! Suppose there is a man whose bodily behavior is impure but whose behavior of mouth and mind is pure. If wise people see [the impurity] and feel anger they must dispel it. How can they dispel it? Wise friends! They should be like a forest bhikṣu152 with rags, looking among the rags for worn cloth to be thrown away, and for [cloth] soiled by feces or urine, or by tears and spit, or stained by other impurities. After inspecting [a rag, the bhikṣu] picks it up with the left hand and stretches it out with the right hand.153 If there are any parts that are not soiled by feces, urine, tears, spit, or other impurities, and which are not in holes, [the bhikṣu] tears them off and takes them. In the same way, wise friends, if a man’s bodily behavior is impure but the behavior of mouth and mind is pure, do not think about his body’s impure behavior. Only be aware of his pure behavior of mouth and mind. If wise people feel anger at what they see, they must dispel it like this.

[117] This is the method by which a forest bhikṣu collects rags. There are four sorts of rags and ten sorts of rags. When gathering those rags, we first pick out the parts that have no holes. We should then also reject [the parts] that cannot be washed clean, being too deeply soiled with long-accumulated stains of feces and urine. We should select [those parts] that can be washed clean.

[117] The ten sorts of rags: 1) Rags chewed by an ox, 2) rags gnawed by rats, 3) rags scorched by fire, 4) rags [soiled by] menstruation, 5) rags [soiled by] childbirth, 6) rags [offered at] a shrine, 7) rags [left at] a graveyard, 8) rags [offered in] petition prayer, 9) rags [discarded by] a king’s officers,154 10) rags brought back from a funeral.155 These ten sorts people throw away; they are not used in human society. We pick them up and make them into

55b the pure material of the kaṣāya. Rags have been praised and have been used by the buddhas of the three times. Therefore these rags are valued and defended by human beings, gods, dragons, and so on. We should pick them up to make the kaṣāya; they are the purest material and the ultimate purity. Nowadays in Japan there are no such rags. Even if we search, we cannot find any. It is regrettable that [this] is a minor nation in a remote land. However, we can use pure material offered by a donor, and we can use pure material donated by human beings and gods. Alternatively, we can make the kaṣāya from [cloth] bought at a market with earnings from a pure live-lihood. Such rags and [cloth] obtained from a pure livelihood are not silk, not cotton, and not gold, silver, pearls, patterned cloth, sheer silk, brocade, embroidery, and so on; they are just rags. These rags are neither for a humble robe nor for a beautiful garment; they are just for the Buddha-Dharma. To wear them is just to have received the authentic transmission of the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the buddhas of the three times, and to have received the authentic transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury. We should never ask human beings and gods about the merit of this [transmission]. We should learn it in practice from Buddhist patriarchs.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Kesa-kudoku

[120] During my stay in Song China, when I was making effort on the long platform, I saw that my neighbor at the end of every sitting156 would lift up his kaṣāya and place it on his head; then holding the hands together in veneration, he would quietly recite a verse. The verse was:

Daisai-gedatsu-fuku (How great is the clothing of liberation,) Musō-fukuden-e (Formless, field of happiness, robe!)

Hibu-nyorai-kyō (Devoutly wearing the Tathāgata’s teaching,)

          Kōdo-shoshujō (Widely I will save living beings.)                                    55c

At that time, there arose in me a feeling I had never before experienced. [My] body was overwhelmed with joy. The tears of gratitude secretly fell and soaked my lapels. The reason was that when I had read the Āgama sutras previously, I had noticed sentences about humbly receiving the kaṣāya on the head, but I had not clarified the standards for this behavior. Seeing it done now, before my very eyes, I was overjoyed. I thought to myself, “It is a pity that when I was in my homeland there was no master to teach this, and no good friend to recommend it. How could I not regret, how could I not deplore, passing so much time in vain? Now that I am seeing and hearing it, I can rejoice in past good conduct. If I had vainly stayed in my home country, how could I have sat next to this treasure of a monk,157 who has received the transmission of, and who wears, the Buddha’s robe itself?” The sadness and joy was not one-sided. A thousand myriad tears of gratitude ran down. Then I secretly vowed: “One way or another, unworthy though I am, I will become a rightful successor to the Buddha-Dharma. I will receive the authentic transmission of the right Dharma and, out of compassion for living beings in my homeland, I will cause them to see and to hear the robe and the Dharma that have been authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs.” The vow I made then has not been in vain now; many bodhisattvas, in families and out of families,158 have received and retained the kaṣāya. This is something to rejoice in. People who have received and retained the kaṣāya should humbly receive it upon the head every day and night. The merit [of this] may be especially excellent and supremely excellent. The seeing and hearing of a phrase or a verse may be as in the story of “on trees and on rocks,”159 and the seeing and hearing may not be limited to the length and breadth of the nine states.160 The merit of the authentic transmission of the kaṣāya is hardly encountered through the ten directions. To [encounter this merit] even if only for one day or for one night may be the most excellent and highest thing.

[123] In the tenth lunar month in the winter of the seventeenth year of Kajō161 in great Song [China], two Korean162 monks came to the city of Kei -

genfu.163 One was called Chigen and one was called Keiun. This pair were always discussing the meaning of Buddhist sutras; at the same time they were also men of letters. But they had no kaṣāya and no pātra, like secular people. It was pitiful that though they had the external form of bhikṣus they did not have the Dharma of bhikṣus.164 This may have been because they were from a minor nation in a remote land. When Japanese who have the external form of bhikṣus travel abroad, they are likely to be the same as Chigen and such. Śākyamuni Buddha received [the kaṣāya] upon his head for twelve years, never setting it aside.165 We are already his distant descendants, and we should emulate this. To turn the forehead away from prostrations idly done for fame and gain to gods, to spirits, to kings, and to retainers, and to turn instead toward the humble reception upon the head of the Buddha’s robe, is joyful.

                                  

Notes

1     China, who introduced the practice of zazen from India. He lived at Shaolin Temple, in the northwest of China.one of the many Buddhist monasteries that already existed in the Songshan MountainsMaster Bodhidharma, the twenty-eighth patriarch in India and the First Patriarch in

2     Master Daikan Enō (638–713), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin. Sōkei is the nameof the mountain where he lived.

3     Ōbai Mountain was where Master Daiman Kōnin had his Buddhist order. 4        Tang dynasty (618–907).

5     of the Tang dynasty. Emperors Shukusō (r. 756–763) and Taisō (r. 763–780) wereChūsō (reigned, with an interruption of several years, 684–710) was the fourth emperor students of Master Nan’yō Echū (d.775). See for example, Chapter Eighty (Vol. IV),Tashintsū.

6     title given to generals. Chingoku Dai Shōgun Ryū Shūkei. Dai shogun means great general.Chingoku, lit., “Pacifier of the Nation,” was a

7     literally means humbly to receive something upon the head, as a sign of respect. Chōdai. Chō means the top of the head, and dai means humbly to receive, so chōdai

8     Kei, “you,” is a term of address for lords, officials of high rank, etc.

9     Muryō-gōga-sha.Sutra. See, for example, LS 2.166 and 3.214.Variations of this expression appear in many places in the Lotus

10    Bōshutsu. Bō,means to depart or to sprout. So lit., “side,” describes a bystander, or something of secondary importance.bōshitsu means collateral descendants or

Shutsucollateral lineages. Master Dōgen revered the one line that he considered to be importance. Master Dōgen’s line is through Master Daikan Enō’s successor, Masterauthentic, and so to some degree, he considered all other lineages of secondary

Nansen Fugan, Jōshū Jūshin, Hyakujō Ekai, Ōbaku Kiun, Rinzai Gigen, Isan Reiyū,Seigen Gyōshi. At the same time, Master Dōgen revered Master Daikan Enō’s other successors, Master Nan’yō Echū and Master Nangaku Ejō. Masters Baso Dōitsu,

Kyōgen Chikan, Kyōzan Ejaku, and Reiun Shigon were some of the descendants of Master Nangaku Ejō. 11 Master Prajñātara, successor of Master Puṇyamitra and master of Master Bodhid harma.

183

kept as a guardian of the temple bathhouse. An image of a bodhisattva called Bhadrapāla (lit., “Good Guardian”) is sometimes

12    used for Buddhist priest-scholars and teachers of theory. As a layman, Jō worked asJō Hōsshi, died in 414 at the age of thirty-one. Hōsshi, “Dharma teacher” was a title

Vimalakīrti Sutraa scribe and studied the thoughts of Laozi and Zhuangzi, but after reading the translation of Buddhist sutras. He came to believe in Buddhism and assisted Kumārajīva in the

13    Master Daii Dōshin, died in 651. See Chapter Fifteen, Busso.

14    Master Gozu Hōyū, died in 657 at the age of sixty-four. He was a collateral successorof Master Daii Dōshin (whose direct successor was Master Daiman Kōnin). It is saidthat after living on Gozu Mountain and devoting himself to zazen, Master Hōyū wasvisited by Master Daii Dōshin and thereupon attained the truth.

15    Buddhist scholars divided time following the Buddha’s death into three periods: 1)“right Dharma,” the first five hundred years during which time Buddhismzōbō, “imitative Dharma,” an intermediate period of one thousand“latter Dharma,” the next ten thousand years during whichsaddharma. shōbō, flourished; 2) years; and 3) Buddhism degenerates. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms under mappō,

16    Gedatsu,vimukti (setting at liberty, release, deliverance, final emancipation used here first as a noun and then as a verb, represents the Sanskrit word).

17    Sannetsu, follows: 1) the pain of hot wind and sand being blown against the skin; 2) the pain the three heats, or the three kinds of burning pain. One explanation is as pain of being eaten by a of a violent wind that takes away jeweled clothes and jeweled ornaments; and 3) thegaruḍa, a dragon-eating bird.

18    Chōdai. See note 7.

19    This quotation appears in the Kōkyō (Book of Filial Piety), a text of Confucianism. It is quoted as an example of reverence of tradition in secular society.

20    67 C.E.

21    The Later (or Eastern) Han dynasty, 25–220 first translated into Chinese and transmitted into China in 67 C.E. It is said that Buddhist sutras wereC.E. 22 Shakamuni-nyorai. ShakamuniSanskrit Śākyamuni—sage of the Śākya clan. the Sanskrit Tathāgata.     is the phonetic rendering in Chinese characters of theNyorai, lit., “thus-come,” represents

23    Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the seven ancient buddhas, Śākyamuni Buddha beingthe seventh.

24    Master Seigen Gyōshi and Master Nangaku Ejō. See note 10.

25    This paragraph is quoted from the Daijōgishō.

26    for example, the opening paragraph of the Hentan-uken. These four characters appear in several places in the Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”Lotus Sutra. See,) chapter (LS 1.222).

the front). The two corners of the top of the hand takes the top left-hand corner of the right-hand corner of the kaṣāya. The kaṣāya

27    round to the front, and then hangs it over the left shoulder and left upper arm. Soedge” refers to the upper border of the part of the with the top of the “both sides” means the left and right sides of the top of the The folded kaṣāya (kaṣāyafolded lengthwise into eight) is first hung over the left shoulder,over the front of the body (so that the single string faceskaṣāyakaṣāyais then opened behind the back, and thekaṣāyaare flush with each other. The leftand the right hand takes the topkaṣāyathat is held in the right hand. under the right arm andkaṣāya, and “the front

right hand brings the top right-hand corner of the

28    618)The Liang dynasty (502–556); the Zhen dynasty (557–589); the Sui dynasty (589–, the Tang dynasty (618–907); and the Song dynasty (960–1279). 29 Master Bodhidharma lived at Shaolin Temple; Master Daikan Enō lived on Sōkei Mountain.

30    fit. “Experienced the state” is Shokai means to experience the same state as the Buddha.shōkai. Shō means to experience; kai means to agree or to

31    Measurements of time in India. According to one explanation, sixty-four in the clicking of the fingers, and thirty Sanskrit Terms.       muhūrtas pass in a day. See Glossary ofkṣāṇas pass

32    mamoriGoshin-fushi,in Japanese, are often sold as talismans at shrines and temples.lit., “a card to guard the body.” Cards bearing lucky words, called o-

33    The that all Lotus Sutradharmas are real form. Master Dōgen is emphasizing that the says that buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realizekaṣāya is instantaneous and real, therefore beyond understanding.

34    Onore also means “our” or “ourselves.” These two sentences also apply to us.

35    Gedatsu-fuku. 36 Fukuden-e.

37 of cloth. These first three phrases all come from the verse which is recited in venerationof the Musō-e.kaṣāya.The kaṣāyaSee paragraph 105 in this chapter.is without form in the sense that it is a simple rectangular sheet 38 Ninniku-e, lit., “enduring-humiliation robe.” Ninniku represents the Sanskrit kṣānti, endurance or patience.

39 common. “Usual method” is means method, or Dharma.jōhō. Jō means constant or eternal, and at the same time usual or 40 by Buddhist monks for their robes. “Rags” is as “a robe of rags,” according to the context.or “to be swept.” funzō-e. Fun which means a dust heap or a collection of rags out of a dust heap usedE means robe, clothes, or clothing. means excrement, and Funzō-e has been translated either as “rags” or(pronounced Funzō represents the Sanskrit) means to sweep pāṃsu-kūla,

41    The ten sorts of rags are given in paragraph 117 in this chapter. The first four of theseare also known as the four sorts of rags.

42    Literally, “people of the five Indias.” Ancient India is said to have been divided into five regions: east, west, central, south, and north. 43 Funzō-e, see note 40.

44    a quotation from a Chinese text.The section beginning with “The people of the five Indias” to here is in the style of

45    Many legends like the one referred to in this sentence appear in stories of the Buddha’spast lives as a bodhisattva.

46    Lake Anavatapta was thought to be located north of the Himalayas as the source of was called the lake where there is no suffering from heat.the four great rivers of India. It was said to be the home of the king of dragons, and

47    while the silkworm is still alive. Some people worried that the production of silk vio-Keshi, “processed thread.” The process of producing silk entails boiling the cocoon as a material for the lated the precept of not taking life in vain, and thought that silk should not be usedkaṣāya. 48 The eternal buddha refers to Master Daikan Enō, who received the kaṣāya from

Master Daiman Kōnin in the middle of the night on Ōbai Mountain. See ChapterThirty (Vol. II), Gyōji. 49 Genkun, lit., “black instruction.”

50    became the third Indian patriarch, succeeding Master Ānanda. The Sanskrit wordBorn about a hundred years after the death of the Buddha, Master Śāṇa vāsa eventuallyliterally means flaxen clothes. śāṇavāsa

51    Shukke,Shukke.lit., “leave home,” means to become a monk. See Chapter Eighty-three (Vol. IV),

52    Senbyaku-bikuni. Senbyaku,bhikṣuṇībright, clear, pure, white, or spotless. Volume 8 of the (Buddhist nun) Śukra was born wearing a pure white robe that never needed“fresh-white” represents the Sanskrit Senjūhyakuenkyōśukrakaṣāya.which meanssays that the washing, and that when she became a nun, the robe changed into a

53    Jōhō. See note 39.

54    “Welcomed” is zenrai, representing the Sanskrit svāgata, “Welcome!” The Pāli scriptures bhikkhu”say that the Buddha accepted his followers into the monkhood simply by saying (“Welcome, monk”).      “Ehi

55    Hundred Disciples”) chapter of the The pearl within the robe alludes to the Lotus Sutra,Gohyaku-deshi-juki which tells the story of a drunken(“Affirmation of Five content with inferior wisdom instead of obtaining the buddha-wisdom (LS 2.114).man whose friend plants a valuable pearl in his clothes. Five hundred arhats compare themselves to the man who unknowingly carries the pearl, because they have been

56    “Those who count grains of sand” means scholars. The original characters “count sand,” come from the poem Shōdōka by Master Yōka Genkaku. He said,sansa, they vainly exhaust themselves by counting grains of sand.”“They know no respite from analyzing concepts and forms; having entered the ocean,

57    The Japanese suffix translated as “devoutly” is the honorificably used by Master Dōgen to express reverence for the Buddha but usually ignoredin this translation due to the lack of a suitable equivalent in English.tate matsuru form, invari-

58    The day was divided into twelve periods. The original characters one such period, that is, two hours.     hito-toki indicate

59    for water, word Aku. The ash must have been used to make the water more alkaline. In this case the aku is written with the Chinese character for ash (sui, but the word aku is originally Japanese, not Chinese. kai) and the Chinese character

60    hot water. the character for hot water (“Hot ash-water” is kaitō, a Chinese word formed by the character for ash (tōAku). Aku-no-yumeans ash-water (see previous note) and are Japanese words written in yukana,kaimeans) andthe phonetic Japanese alphabet.

61    Sendanthe same time, is given in sendanKenkyusha’s New Japanese-English Dictionary originally represents the Sanskrit candana,as margosa. Atsandalwood.

62    head height. See Chapter Seven, Jōkan, lit., “pure pole,” a bamboo or wooden pole suspended horizontally at aboutSenjō.

63    An ancient Indian custom to show reverence for people or sacred objects.

64    holding the palms together, fingers pointing upward, fingertips in front of the nostrils.Chinese noticed that foreigners sometimes kneeled. Joining the hands (Koki-gasshō. Ko means foreign and ki means to kneel with the hips extended, as thegasshō) means 65 Loosely translated: “How great is the clothing of liberation./ Though without formbeings everywhere.” See paragraph 105.The verse is: it is the robe of real happiness./Wearing the Buddha’s teaching,/I will save livingDaisai-gedatsu-fuku/musō-fukuden-e/hibu-nyorai-kyō/kōdo-shoshujō.

66  The following long quotation from the ) is originally one paragraph. It has been divided in this translation for ease ofHigekyō (in Sanskrit, Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka67 Hōzō,who appears in the (a symbol of eternal life) to establish the will to the truth.from the Sanskrit Higekyō.ratnagarbha.He encouraged Śākyamuni Buddha and Amitābha BuddhaRatnagarbha Buddha is a legendary past buddha

68       Daihi,of Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), lit., “great compassion,” from the Sanskrit mahākaruṇā. This is another nameKannon.

69       The four groups of Buddhists: monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen.

70       means the large robe.a robe composed of miscellaneous rags. The The Sanskrit root saṃghāṭ means to join or fasten together, suggesting the saṃghāṭi robe (in Japanese, sōgyari-ekaṣāya as)

71       That is, as either a or bodhisattva (practical Buddhist).śrāvaka (intellectual Buddhist), pratyekabuddha (sensory Buddhist),

72       “Affirmation” is the first of the five sacred merits mentioned later in the paragraph. The first merit isaffirmation that a practitioner will become a buddha in the future. This sentence includeskibetsu,kaṣāyafrom the Sanskrit and the Three Treasures can receive affirmation.vyākaraṇa. Vyākaraṇa is the Buddha’s that all who revere the

73       Originally, four sun. One sun is slightly over an inch.

74       jars,” are demons that feed on human energy, and horses, half-men, are demons that oppose gods, Ancient Indian storytellers invented these colorful beings that later found their wayGandharvagaruḍas are fragrance-devouring celestial beings, s are dragon-eating birds, kumbhāṇḍapiśācas, lit., “having testicles likes are demons that eat flesh.kiṃnaras are half-asuras into Buddhist sutras.

mahoragas are serpents,

75       satisfy hunger and thirst, and other wishes, 4) will be able to remain peaceful in hostilesituations, and 5) will be protected in times of conflict.The five sacred merits are that those who wear, venerate, or retain a piece of the1) will be able to receive affirmation, 2) will not regress, 3) will be able to kaṣāya

76       addressed his Buddhist audiences.Zen-nanshi represents the Sanskrit word kulaputra, with which the Buddha commonly 77 Webbed fingers and toes are the fifth of the thirty-two distinguishing marks of abuddha.

78 Shashu.hand is placed against the chest, the left forearm being held horizontal. The right handIn shashu the fingers of the left hand are curled round the thumb, and the left horizontal.is placed, palm down, on the back of the left hand, the right forearm also being held 79 in past lives).The Higekyō, chapter 8 (the chapter on how the bodhisattvas received their affirmation

80    Sutra and Vinaya are two of the three “baskets” (ings. Vinaya means guidance, discipline, instruction, or teaching; that is, the preceptspiṭakas), or kinds of Buddhist teachand Abhidharma (commentaries).and related writings. The Tripiṭaka (three baskets) consists of Sutra, Vinaya (precepts),

81    Inchi, “causal state,” means the state that caused the Buddha to become a buddha.

82    Master Nāgārjuna was the fourteenth patriarch in India, the successor of Master Kapi-

mala and the teacher of Master Kāṇadeva. He lived sometime around the period 150–250which is thought to have been written and compiled mainly by Master Nāgārjunahimself. C.E. This passage is a Chinese translation of the Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra,

83    Shukken in, or “people who have left home”; monks and nuns.

84    a bodhisattva.Honshōkyō, lit., “Past Lives Sutra.” Legendary stories of the Buddha’s past lives as 85 See explanation in the following paragraph.

86    The ultimate state of a state of buddha. See Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), śrāvaka, or intellectual Buddhist, which is identified with theArakan.

87    It was the custom in Asian pleasure houses for prostitutes to use old-fashioned language.The custom remained in Japan until the end of the Edo era (1868).

88    See note 23.

89    Eighty-six (Vol. IV), Daichidoron, chapter 30. This section is also quoted near the beginning of ChapterShukke-kudoku.

90    is a phonetic rendering of In the Chinese translation of the Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa, the Sanskrit nameUbara

Renge-shiki, “Lotus Flower Color.”Utpalavarṇā, which means “color of the blue lotus,” is represented as Ubara-ke. utpala (blue lotus) and ke means flower. Here the name is

91    See Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), abhijñā.        Jinzu, and the Glossary of Sanskrit Terms under

92    with celestial beings in the north and human beings in the south. So the southern con-Ancient Indians imagined a universe of four continents surrounding a big mountain, tinent means the human world.

93    Ryō, aya. Aya has a pattern woven into a diagonal weave.

94    E-jiki, lit., “broken color,” that is, not a bright, attractive primary color. The kaṣāya is not dyed a primary color.

95    Master Daikan Enō, the Sixth Patriarch in China.

96    characters only, indicating that it was quoted directly from a Chinese text.The section beginning “When practitioners cannot obtain rags” to here is in Chinese

97    From here to paragraph 98 is a passage from the Konponissaiubu hyaku ichi katsuma of Sanskrit Terms and Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), things exist.” Master Dōgen esteemed their teaching especially highly. See Glossaryacters, the Sarvāstivāda school is (One Hundred and One Customs of the Mūla sarvāsti vādin Schoolsetsu-issai-u-bu, “the school that preaches that allKuyō-shubutsu.). In Chinese char-

98    “Venerable monk” is āyuṣmat,guju,a term of reverence used for the Buddha’s disciples. Thelit., “possessing longevity,” which represents the meaning

of the Sanskrit word āyuṣmat literally means a vital or vigorous person, a person of long life.

99    Upāli was one of the Buddha’s ten great disciples, said to be foremost in maintainingthe Vinaya. Before becoming a monk he was a barber at the royal palace.

100  Daitoku-seson,bhadanta, lit., “World-honored Great Virtuous One.” an epithet of the Buddha. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.Daitoku represents the

Sanskrit

101  Hanō, lit., “broken patched-[robe].” Nō, “patches,” suggests the Buddhist robe itself. 102 Jō, chū, ge, lit., “upper, middle, and lower.”

103  Cubit is chū, lit., “elbow,” representing the Sanskrit nobechū in Japanese, is the basic unit of measurement in makinghasta, which means forearm or elbow to the tip of the fist, or the distance from the elbow to the tip of the middlefinger, of the person who will wear the a cubit. The cubit, or kaṣāya. It is not a fixed distance; it is obtained by measuring the distance from thekaṣāya.

104  The Sanskrit for doing prostrations, listening to formal lectures, and the meeting for confession.uttarasaṃghāṭi means an upper- or outergarment. This robe would be worn

105  The Sanskrit antarvāsa means an inner- or undergarment.

106  As in the case of the uttarasaṃghāṭi robe, the smaller is a half cubit shorter on each side, and anything between these two is called medium.

107  thousand years old.It is said that Maitreya Buddha will manifest himself in this world when he is eighty 108 one hundred years.The Fuyōkyō, from the Sanskrit Lalitavistara-sūtra, says that the Buddha lived for

109 time he suggested that, in the phase of action, relative differences are not important.Master Dōgen did not deny the existence of differences in length, but at the same 110 The buddha body is a real state at the moment of the present, not only physical matter.

111  See note 23.

112  The creator deity in Hindu mythology.

113  Śāriputra, the sons of brahmans from neighboring villages, were good friends. Maudgal- Maudgalyāyana was one of the Buddha’s ten great disciples. It is said that he andyāyana was said to be foremost in mystical abilities. The World of the Bright Banner is an imaginary western realm where buddhas are living. The the Sanskrit lyāyana goes into the World of the Bright Banner.Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtra), chapter 10, contains a story in which MaudgaDaihōshakkyō (from-

114  That is, the merits of the Buddha are beyond relative considerations.

115  for this robe the individual segments of each stripe are sewn together, then the stripescharacters. “The robe of separate stripes” is These names are explanatory rather than accurate translations of the original Chinesekatsu-setsu-e, lit., “divided-and-cut robe”;

are sewn together, and finally the borders are sewn and fastening tapes added.

116  uncut cloth onto which long thin strips are sewn to create the stripes and borders. Zetchō-e, lit., “[unknown character]-leaf robe”; this is basically one large sheet of

117  it is pleated to create the stripes.Shō-yō-e, lit., “gathered-leaf robe”; this is again one large sheet of uncut cloth, but

118  cloth with only the fastening tapes added, and sewn only around the borders.Man-e—the meaning of the former character is not known; this is a single sheet of 119 robe, and two days for the five-striped robe.The time limits were five days for the saṃghāṭi robe, four days for the seven-striped

120 (Indian legends say that King Brahmā is king of the world of volition, and King Śakrai.e., Śakra-devānām-indra) is king of the world of matter. 121 Emperor Bu, or Wu, (464–549), reigned from 502 to 549. His conversation with

(Master Bodhidharma when the latter arrived in China is recorded in Chapter ThirtyVol. II), Gyōji. 122 Emperor Yang (569–617), reigned from 605 to 617.

123  Taisō and Shukusō were emperors of the Tang dynasty (618–906), who lived at thetime of Master Nan’yō Echū. See note 5.

124  promoted Buddhism as the state religion.Prince Shōtoku (573–620) was the primary organizer of the early Japanese state. He 125 The full name of the sutra is the Terms. Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanāda-sūtra. See Glossary of Sanskrit 126 Emperor Shōmu, reigned in Japan from 724 to 749.

127  III), The use of the willow twig to clean the teeth is explained in Chapter Fifty-six (Vol.Senmen.

128  Potable water would be kept in a small corked bottle, for drinking or for rinsing the mouth.

129  The sitting cloth, or zagu, is spread on the floor for formal prostrations.

130  Both quotations are from the Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, a Chinese commentary on the founder of the Tendai sect.Makashikan, which is a record of lectures by the Chinese Master Tendai Chigi, 131 “Master of the past” is past.” These words appear frequently in the ko-toku, lit., “ancient merit” or “meritorious person of theMakashikan.

132  “Householder” is koji. See Chapter Eight, Raihai-tokuzui.

133  worked as a temple servant in the order of Master Daiman Kōnin is related in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Ro was Master Daikan Enō’s name before he became a monk. The story of how heGyōji.

134  with wearing the monk. These represent the first two of the eight venerate images, or feelings, associated feeling like the Buddha (“our master”), 3) feeling solitude and peace, 4) feeling com-passion, 5) feeling veneration, 6) feeling humility, 7) feeling repentance, and 8) feelingas if one has dispelled greed, anger, and stupidity and obtained all the teachings of akaṣāya: 1) feeling like a tower (because of sitting up straight), 2)

135  The following passage is from Vol. 5 of Daijōhonshōshinchikankyō. 136 Chikō. The Sanskrit name of this monk is not known.

137  the universe, is the second of the three universal bodhisattva precepts (see Chapter “Good ways” is zenhō,Jukailit., “good law.” Observance of ). zenhō, or the moral rule of

Ninety-four [Vol. IV],

138  The Sanskrit śramaṇa means a striver, a mendicant, or a Buddhist monk.

139  heavens: Brahma-pāriṣadya, Brahma-purohit, and Mahā-brahman. Beings in these The first of the four dhyāna heavens in the world of matter is said to consist of three heavens, having left the world of volition, are not troubled by sexual desire.

140  E-jiki. See note 94.

141  The five desires are desires associated with sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. 142 Bonnō, representing the Sanskrit kleśa.

143  greed, 9) anger, and 10) devotion to wrong views. The ten kinds of good are abstention from the ten kinds of wrong: 1) killing, 2)stealing, 3) adultery, 4) lying, 5) two-faced speech, 6) abusive slander, 7) gossip, 8)

144  Goken, Terms. “five views,” represents the Sanskrit pañca dṛṣṭayaḥ. See Glossary of Sanskrit

145  The Chinese characters bodai, “bodhi,” and the character dō, “truth,” in the next line are used interchangeably.

146  Literally, “a golden-winged king of birds,” that is, a Terms.  garuḍa. See Glossary of Sanskrit 147 Byaku-e, lit., “a white robe,” represents the Sanskrit avadāta-vāsana.

148  Hō-ō, “Dharma King,” is an epithet of the Buddha.

149  Sanskrit Terms.The Tripiṭaka (three baskets) of Buddhist teachings. See note 80 and the Glossary of

150  concrete information about the behavior and speech of the Buddha and his disciplesChūagongyō (Skt. Madhyamāgama; Pāli: Majjhima-nikāya). The Āgama sutras relate in their daily life.

151  addressing an assembly.Shoken, “wise ones” or “(ladies and) gentlemen,” is a term of respect used when

152  bhikṣu(Arannya-biku. ArannyaVol. IV), suggests a monk who lives a solitary life in the forest. See also Chapter NinetyShizen-biku. represents the Sanskrit araṇya which means forest. A forest

153  Traditionally, the right hand is kept pure.

154  Suggests uniforms discarded by promoted officers.

155  and then brought back after the ceremony. Ōkan-e, lit., “robes of going and returning,” that is, cloth used as a funeral shroud

156  the ringing of the bell is called wooden board at the end of zazen is called “End of sitting” is kaijō, lit., “release of stillness.” Traditionally, the clapping of adai-kaijō, “great release of stillness.”shō-kaijō, “small release of stillness,” and

157  Sōbō, or “sangha treasure.”

158  Zaike-shukke, laypeople and monks.

159  recorded in the Nyakuju-nyakuseki,Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra.“trees and rocks,” alludes to the story of the Buddha’s past lifeWhen he was the “Child of the Himalayas” lines, so the child offered his own body as a meal for the demon if it would recite thepassing of pursuing the truth in the mountains, a demon told him the first two lines of a four-line poem: “Actions are without constancy;/ Concrete existence is the arising and dharmas.” The demon said it was too hungry to tell the child the last two ceased,/The stillness is pleasure itself.” The child preserved the verse for posteritylast two lines. So the demon recited the last two lines: “After arising and passing haveby writing it on some nearby trees and rocks in his own blood, before being eaten bythe demon.

160  The nine states means China.

161  horary sign—identify the year as 1223. 1223from two separate lists are combined. These two characters—sentence also identifies the year under the Chinese dating system in which characters. The seventeenth year of the Kajō era was, in fact, 1224. However, the original, mizunoto, the sheep, or the eighth the younger brother of water, or the tenth calendar sign; and mi, hitsuji,

162  states. The state called Kōrai existed from 918 to 1353.“Korean” is Kōrai or Kōma. At that time, the Korean peninsula was divided into three

163  Present-day Ningbo, in eastern China.

164  They did not have the kaṣāya and pātra.

165  Den-e, Alludes to a story originally contained in the Āgama sutras. See Chapter Thirteen, paragraph 143.

166  The first day of winter means the first day of the tenth lunar month.

167  1240.

[Chapter Thirteen] Den-e

The Transmission of the Robe

Translator’s Note: Den means “transmission” and e means “robe,” so den-e means “transmission of the robe.” The content of this chapter is very similar to that of the previous chapter, Kesa-kudoku. Furthermore, the date recorded at the end of each chapter is the same. But whereas the note at the end of Kesa-kudoku says “preached to the assembly at Kannon dōri kō shō hō rinji,” the note to this chapter says “written at Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji. . . .” It thus seems likely that Den-e is the draft of the lecture Master Dōgen was to give on October first, and Kesa-kudoku is the transcript of the lecture he gave on that day.

[125] The authentic transmission into China of the robe and the Dharma, which are authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha,1 was done only by the Founding Patriarch of Shaolin [Temple]. The Founding Patriarch was the twenty-eighth ancestral master after Śākyamuni Buddha. [The robe] had passed from rightful successor to rightful successor through twenty-eight generations in India, and it was personally and authentically transmitted through six generations in China; altogether it was [transmitted through] thirty-three generations in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands. The thirty-third patriarch, Zen Master Daikan, received the authentic transmission of this robe and Dharma on Ōbaizan in the middle of the night, and he guarded and retained [the robe] until his death.2 It is now still deposited at Hōrinji on Sōkeizan. Many generations of emperors in succession requested that it be 56b brought into the palace, where they served offerings to it; they guarded [the robe] as a sacred object. The Tang dynasty emperors Chūsō, Shukusō, and Taisō frequently had [the robe] brought to court and served offerings to it. Both when they requested it and when they sent it back, they would dispatch an imperial emissary and issue an edict; this is the manner in which they honored [the robe]. Emperor Taisō once returned the Buddha’s robe to

195

Sōkeizan with the following edict: “I now dispatch the great General Ryū Shūkei, Pacifier of the Nation, to receive with courtesy and to deliver [the robe]. I consider it to be a national treasure. Venerable priests, deposit it in its original temple. Let it be solemnly guarded by monks who have intimately received the fundamental teaching. Never let it fall into neglect.”

[127] Thus, the emperors of several generations each esteemed [the robe] as an important national treasure. Truly, to retain this Buddha’s robe in one’s country is a superlative great treasure, which surpasses even dominion over the [worlds] as countless as the sands of the Ganges in a three-thousand great-thousandfold world. We should never compare it with Benka’s gem.3 [A gem] may become the national seal of state, but how can it become the rare jewel which transmits the Buddha’s state? From the Tang dynasty4 onward, the monks and laymen5 who admired and bowed to [the kaṣāya] were all, without exception, people of great makings who believed in the Dharma. If not aided by good conduct in the past, how else would we be able to prostrate this body in admiration to the Buddha’s robe which has been directly and authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha? Skin, flesh, bones, and marrow that believe in and receive [the robe] should rejoice; those that cannot believe in and receive [the robe] should feel regret—even though the situation is of their own doing—that they are not the embryos of buddhas. Even secular [teaching] says that to look at a person’s behavior is just to look at that person. To have admired and to have bowed now to the Buddha’s robe is just to be looking at the Buddha. We should erect hundreds, thousands, and tens of thousands of stupas and serve offerings to this buddha robe. In the heavens above and in the ocean’s depths, whatever has mind should value

[the robe]. In the human world too, sacred wheel-turning kings6 and others who know what is true and know what is superior should value [the robe]. It is pitiful that the people who became, in generation after generation, the rulers of the land never knew what an important treasure existed in their own country. Deluded by the teachings of Daoist’s, many of them abolished the Buddha-Dharma. At such times, instead of wearing the kaṣāya, they covered their round heads with [Daoist] caps.7 The lectures [they listened to] were on how to extend one’s lifespan and to prolong one’s years. There were [emperors like this] both during the Tang dynasty and during the Song dynasty. These fellows were rulers of the nation, but they must have been more vulgar

than the common people. They should have quietly reflected that the Buddha’s robe had remained and was actually present in their own country. They might even have considered that [their country] was the buddha land of the robe. [The kaṣāya] may surpass even [sacred] bones8 and so on. Wheel-turning kings have bones, as do lions, human beings, pratyekabuddhas, and the like. But wheel-turning kings do not have the kaṣāya, lions do not have the kaṣāya, human beings do not have the kaṣāya. Only buddhas have the kaṣāya. We should believe this profoundly. Stupid people today often revere bones but fail to know the kaṣāya. Few know that they should guard and retain [their own kaṣāya]. This situation has arisen because few people have ever heard of the importance of the kaṣāya, and [even these few] have never heard of the authentic transmission of the Buddha-Dharma. When we attentively think back to the time when Śākyamuni was in the world, it is little more than two thousand years; many national treasures and sacred objects have been transmitted to the present for longer than this. This Buddha-Dharma and buddha robe are recent and new. The benefit of their propagation through the “fields and villages,” even if there have been “fifty propagations,” is wonderful.9 The qualities of those things10 are obvious [but] this buddha robe can never 57a be the same as those things. Those things are not received in the authentic transmission from rightful successors, but this [robe] has been received in the authentic transmission from rightful successors. Remember, we attain the truth when listening to a four-line verse, and we attain the state of truth when listening to a single phrase. Why is it that a four-line verse and a single phrase can have such mystical effect? Because they are the Buddha-Dharma. Now, each robe and [all] nine kinds of robes11 have been received in the authentic transmission from the Buddha-Dharma itself; [the robe] could never be inferior to a four-line verse, and could never be less effective than a single phrase of Dharma. This is why, for more than two thousand years, all followers of the Buddha—those with the makings of devotional practice and of Dharma practice—have guarded and retained the kaṣāya and regarded it as their body and mind. Those who are ignorant of the right Dharma of the buddhas do not worship the kaṣāya.

[132]     Now, such beings as Śakra-devānām-indra and the Dragon KingAnavatapta, though they are the celestial ruler of laymen and the king of dragons, have guarded and retained the kaṣāya. Yet people who shave the head, people who call themselves disciples of the Buddha, do not know that they should receive and retain the kaṣāya. How much less could they know its material, color, and measurements; how much less could they know the method of wearing it; and how much less could they have seen the dignified conventions for it, even in a dream?

[133]     The kaṣāya has been called since olden times “the clothing that wards off suffering from heat” and “the clothing of liberation.” In conclusion, its merit is beyond measure. Through the merit of the kaṣāya, a dragon’s scales can be freed from the three kinds of burning pain. When the buddhas realize the truth, they are always wearing this robe. Truly, although we were born in a remote land in [the age of] the latter Dharma, if we have the oppor-

57b tunity to choose between what has been transmitted and what has not been transmitted, we should believe in, receive, guard, and retain [the robe] whose transmission is authentic and traditional. In what lineage have both the robe and the Dharma of Śākyamuni himself been authentically transmitted, as in our authentic tradition? They exist only in Buddhism. On meeting this robe and Dharma, who could be lax in venerating them and serving offerings to them? Even if, each day, we [have to] discard bodies and lives as countless as the sands of the Ganges, we should serve offerings to them. Further, we should vow to meet [the robe] and humbly to receive it upon the head in every life in every age. We are the stupid people of a remote quarter, born with a hundred thousand or so miles of mountains and oceans separating us from the land of the Buddha’s birth. Even so, if we hear this right Dharma, if we receive and retain this kaṣāya even for a single day or a single night, and if we master even a single phrase or a single verse, that will not only be the good fortune to have served offerings to one buddha or to two buddhas: it will be the good fortune to have served offerings and paid homage to countless hundred thousand koṭis of buddhas. Even if [the servants] are ourselves, we should respect them, we should love them, and we should value them.

[135]     We should heartily repay the great benevolence of the ancestral master in transmitting the Dharma.12 Even animals repay kindness; how could human beings fail to recognize kindness? If we failed to recognize kindness, we would be inferior to animals, more stupid than animals. People other than the ancestral masters who transmit the Buddha’s right Dharma have never known the merit of this buddha robe, even in a dream. How much less could they clarify its material, color, and measurements? If we long to follow the traces of the buddhas, we should just long for this [transmission]. Even after a hundred thousand myriads of generations, the authentic reception of this authentic transmission will [still] be just the Buddha-Dharma itself. The evidence for this is clear. Even secular [teaching] says, “One does not wear clothing different from the clothing of the past king, and one does not follow laws different from those of the past king.” Buddhism is also like that. We should 57c not wear what is different from the Dharma clothing of past buddhas. If [our clothes] were different from the Dharma clothing of past buddhas, what could we wear to practice Buddhism and to serve buddhas? Without wearing this clothing, it might be difficult to enter the Buddha’s order.

[136]     Since the years of the Eihei period,13 during the reign of Emperor Kōmei of the Later Han dynasty, monks arriving in the Eastern Lands from the Western Heavens have followed on each other’s heels without cease. We often hear of monks going from China to India, but it is not said that they ever met anyone who gave them the face-to-face transmission of the Buddha Dharma. They [have] only names and forms, learned in vain from teachers of commentaries and scholars of the Tripiṭaka.14 They have not heard the authentic tradition of the Buddha-Dharma. This is why they cannot even report that we should receive the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe, why they never claim to have met a person who has received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe, and why they never mention seeing or hearing a person who has received the transmission of the robe. Clearly, they have never entered beyond the threshold of the house of Buddha. That these fellows recognize [the robe] solely as a garment, not knowing that it is in the Buddha-Dharma [an object of] honor and worship, is truly pitiful. Rightful successors to the transmission of the Buddha’s Dharma treasury also transmit and receive the Buddha’s robe. The principle that the ancestral masters who receive the authentic transmission of the Dharma treasury have never gone without seeing and hearing15 the Buddha’s robe is widely known among human beings and in the heavens above. This being so, the material, color, and measurements of the Buddha’s kaṣāya have been authentically transmitted and authentically seen and heard; the great merits of the Buddha’s kaṣāya have been authentically transmitted; and the body, mind, bones, and marrow of the Buddha’s kaṣāya have been authentically transmitted, only in the customs of the traditional lineage. [This authentic transmission] is not

known in the various schools which follow the teaching of the Āgamas.16 The [robes] that individuals have established independently, according to the idea of the moment, are not traditional and not legitimate. When our Great Master Śākyamuni Tathāgata passed on the right Dharma-eye treasury and the supreme state of bodhi to Mahā kāśyapa, he transmitted them together with the buddha robe. Between then and Zen Master Daikan of Sōkeizan, there were thirty-three generations, the transmission passing from rightful successor to rightful successor. The intimate experience and intimate transmission of [the robe’s] material, color, and measurements have long been handed down by the lineages, and their reception and retention are evident in the present. That is to say, that which was received and retained by each of the founding patriarchs of the five sects17 is the authentic tradition. Similarly evident are the wearing [of the robe], according to the methods of former buddhas, and the making [of the robe], according to the methods of former buddhas, which “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,” through generations have transmitted and have experienced as the same state—in some cases for over fifty generations and in some cases for over forty generations—without confusion between any master and disciple. The Buddha’s instruction, as authentically transmitted from rightful successor to rightful successor, is as follows:

Robe of nine stripes                                three long [segments], one                                                                 short [segment];18 or four                                                                 long, one short

Robe of eleven stripes                             three long, one short; or four                                                                 long, one short

Robe of thirteen stripes                           three long, one short; or four                                                                 long, one short

Robe of fifteen stripes                             three long, one short Robe of seventeen stripes                       three long, one short Robe of nineteen stripes                          three long, one short Robe of twenty-one stripes                     four long, one short

Robe of twenty-three stripes                   four long, one short

Robe of twenty-five stripes                     four long, one short Robe of two hundred and fifty stripes     four long, one short

Robe of eighty-four thousand stripes19   eight long, one short

[140] This is an abbreviated list. There are many other kinds of kaṣāya besides these, all of which may be the saṃghāṭi robe. Some receive and retain [the kaṣāya] as laypeople, and some receive and retain [the kaṣāya] 58b as monks and nuns. To receive and to retain [the kaṣāya] means to wear it, not to keep it idly folded. Even if people shave off hair and beard, if they do not receive and retain the kaṣāya, if they hate the kaṣāya or fear the kaṣāya, they are celestial demons20 and non-Buddhists. Zen Master Hyakujō Daichi21 says, “Those who have not accumulated good seeds in the past detest the kaṣāya and hate the kaṣāya; they fear and hate the right Dharma.” [142] The Buddha says, “If any living being, having entered my Dharma, commits the grave sins or falls into wrong views, but in a single moment of consciousness [this person] with reverent mind honors the saṃghāṭi robe, the buddhas and I will give affirmation, without fail, that this person will be able to become buddha in the three vehicles. Gods or dragons or human beings or demons, if able to revere the merit of even a small part of this person’s kaṣāya, will at once attain the three vehicles and will neither regress nor stray. If ghosts and living beings can obtain even four inches of the kaṣāya, they will eat and drink their fill. When living beings offend each other and are about to fall into wrong views, if they remember the power of the kaṣāya, through the power of the kaṣāya they will duly feel compassion, and they will be able to return to the state of purity. If people on a battlefield keep a small part of this kaṣāya, venerating it and honoring it, they will obtain salvation.”22

[143] Thus we have seen that the merits of the kaṣāya are supreme and unthinkable. When we believe in, receive, guard, and retain it, we will surely get the state of affirmation, and get the state of not regressing. Not only Śākyamuni Buddha but all the buddhas also have preached like this. Remember, the substance and form of the buddhas themselves is just the kaṣāya. This is why the Buddha says, “Those who are going to fall into wrong ways hate the saṃghāṭi [robe].” This being so, if hateful thoughts arise when we see and hear of the kaṣāya, we should feel sorry that our own body is going to

58c fall into wrong ways, and we should repent and confess. Furthermore, when Śākyamuni Buddha first left the royal palace and was going to enter the mountains, a tree god, the story goes, holds up a saṃghāṭi robe and says to Śākyamuni Buddha, “If you receive this robe upon your head, you will escape the disturbances of demons.” Then Śākyamuni Buddha accepts this robe, humbly receiving it upon his head, and for twelve years he does not set it aside even for a moment. This is the teaching of the Āgama sutras. Elsewhere it is said that the kaṣāya is a garment of good fortune, and that those who wear it always reach exalted rank. In general, there has never been a moment when this saṃghāṭi robe was not manifesting itself before us in the world. The manifestation before us of one moment is an eternal matter,23 and eternal matters come at one moment. To obtain the kaṣāya is to obtain the Buddha’s banner. For this reason, none of the buddha-tathāgatas has ever failed to receive and to retain the kaṣāya. And no person who has received and retained the kaṣāya has failed to become buddha.

[145] The method of wearing the kaṣāya: “To bare only the right shoulder” is the usual method. There is also a method of wearing [the kaṣāya] so that it covers both shoulders. When we wear both sides over the left arm and shoulder, we wear the front edge on the outside and the back edge on the inside.24 This is one instance of Buddhist dignified behavior. This behavior is neither seen and heard nor transmitted and received by the various groups of śrāvakas: their scriptures on the teaching of the Āgamas do not mention it at all. In general, the dignified behavior of wearing the kaṣāya in Buddhism has been unfailingly received and retained by the ancestral masters who received the transmission of the right Dharma and who are present before us here and now. When receiving and retaining [the kaṣāya], we should unfailingly receive and retain it under such an ancestral master. The traditional kaṣāya of the Buddhist patriarchs has been authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha without irregularity; it is the kaṣāya of former buddhas and of later buddhas, the kaṣāya

of ancient buddhas and of recent buddhas. When they transform25 the state of truth, when they transform the state of buddha, when they transform the past, when they transform the present, and when they transform the future, they transmit the authentic tradition from the past to the present, they transmit the authentic tradition from the present to the future, they transmit the authentic tradition from the present to the past, they transmit the authentic tradition from the past to the past, they transmit the authentic tradition from the present to the present, they transmit the authentic tradition from the future to the future, they transmit the authentic tradition from the future to the present, and they transmit the authentic tradition from the future to the past; and this is the authentic transmission of “buddhas alone, together with buddhas.” For this reason, for several hundred years after the ancestral master came from the west, from the great Tang to the great Song [dynasties], many of those accomplished at lecturing on sutras were able to see through their own behavior; and when people of philosophical schools, of precepts, and so on entered the Buddha-Dharma, they threw away the shabby old robes that had formerly been their kaṣāya, and they authentically received the traditional kaṣāya of Buddhism. Their stories appear one after another in Records of the Torch such as Den[tōroku], [tōroku], Zoku[tōroku], Futōroku, and so on.26 When they were liberated from the small view which is limited thinking about philosophy and precepts and they revered the great truth authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs, they all became Buddhist patriarchs. People today also should learn from the ancestral masters of the past. If we would like to receive and to retain the kaṣāya, we should receive the authentic transmission of, and should believe in, the traditional kaṣāya. We should not receive and retain a fake kaṣāya. The traditional kaṣāya means the kaṣāya now authentically transmitted from Shaolin [Temple] and Sōkei [Mountain];27 its reception from the Tathāgata in the transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor has never been interrupted for even a single generation. For this reason we have exactly received the practice of the truth, and we have intimately obtained, in our own hands, the Buddha’s robe; and this is the reason [we should receive the authentic transmission]. The Buddha’s [state of] truth is authentically transmitted in the Buddha’s [state of] truth; it is not left for lazy people to receive at leisure. A secular proverb says, “Hearing a thousand times is not as good as seeing once, and seeing a thousand times is not as good as experiencing once.” Reflecting on this, [we can say that] even if we see [the kaṣāya] a thousand times and hear of it ten thousand times, that is not as good as getting it once, and never as good as to have received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe. If we can doubt those who have authentic traditions, 59b we should doubt all the more those who have never seen the authentic traditions even in a dream. To receive the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe may be closer [in experience] than to receive and to hear Buddhist sutras. Even a thousand experiences and ten thousand attainments are not as good as one realization in experience. A Buddhist patriarch is the realization of the same state of experience; we should never rank [a Buddhist patriarch] with common followers of philosophy and precepts. In conclusion, with regard to the merits of the kaṣāya of the Patriarch’s lineage, [we can say that] its authentic transmission has been received exactly; [that] its original configuration has been conveyed personally; and [that] it has been received and retained, together with the succession of the Dharma, without interruption until today. The authentic recipients are all ancestral masters who have experienced the same state and received the transmission of Dharma. They are superior even to [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred stages and the three clever stages; we should serve and venerate them and should bow down to them and humbly receive them upon our heads. If this principle of the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe is believed just once by this body and mind, that is a sign of meeting buddha, and it is the way to learn the state of buddha. [A life] in which we could not accept this Dharma would be a sad life. We should profoundly affirm that if we cover the physical body, just once, with this kaṣāya, it will be a talisman that protects the body and ensures realization of the state of bodhi. It is said that when we dye the believing mind with a single phrase or a single verse we never lack the brightness of long kalpas. When we dye the body and mind with one real dharma, [the state] may be “also like this.” Those mental images28 are without an abode and are irrelevant to what I possess; even so, their merits are indeed as described above. The physical body is without an abode; even so, it is as described above. The kaṣāya, too, is without an origin and also without a destination, it is neither our own possession nor the possession of anyone else; even so, it actually abides at the place where it is retained, and it covers the person who receives and retains it. The merits acquired [by virtue of the kaṣāya] may also be like this. When we make the kaṣāya, the making is not the elaboration29 of the common, the sacred, and the like. The import of this is not perfectly realized by [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred or the three clever [stages]. Those who have not accumulated 59c seeds of the truth in the past do not see the kaṣāya, do not hear of the kaṣāya, and do not know the kaṣāya, not in one life, not in two lives, not even if they pass countless lives. How much less could they receive and retain [the kaṣāya]? There are those who attain, and those who do not attain, the merit to touch [the kaṣāya] once with the body. Those who have attained [this merit] should rejoice. Those who have not attained it should hope to do so. Those who can never attain it should lament. All human beings and gods have seen, heard, and universally recognized that the Buddha’s robe is transmitted—both inside and outside the great-thousandfold-world—only in the lineage of the Buddhist patriarchs. Clarification of the configuration of the Buddha’s robe also is present only in the lineage of the patriarchs, it is not known in other lineages. Those who do not know it and [yet] do not blame themselves are stupid people. Even if they know eighty-four thousand samādhi-dhāraṇīs,30 without receiving the authentic transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs’ robe and Dharma, without clarifying the authentic transmission of the kaṣāya, they can never be the rightful successors of the buddhas. How the living beings of other regions must long to receive exactly the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe, as it has been authentically received in China. They must be ashamed, their sorrow in their hearts must be deep, that they have not received the authentic transmission in their own country. Truly, to meet the Dharma in which the robe and the Dharma of the World-honored Tathāgata have been authentically transmitted is the result of seeds of great merit from past-nurtured prajñā. Now, in this corrupt age of the latter Dharma, there are many bands of demons who are not ashamed that they themselves lack the authentic transmission, and who envy the authentic transmission [of others]. Our own possessions and abodes are not our real selves. Just authentically to receive the authentic transmission; this is the direct way to learn the state of buddha.

[153] In sum, remember that the kaṣāya is the body of the Buddha and

the mind of the Buddha. Further, it is called “the clothing of liberation,” called 60a “the robe of a field of happiness,” called “the robe of endurance,” called “the robe without form,” called “the robe of compassion,” called “the robe of the Tathāgata,” and called “the robe of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” We must receive and retain it as such. In the great kingdom of Song today, people who call themselves students of the precepts, because they are drunk on the wine of the śrāvaka, are neither ashamed, regretful, nor aware that they have received the transmission of a lineage which is alien to their own clan. Having changed

the kaṣāya that has been transmitted from the Western Heavens and handed down through the ages from Han to Tang China, they follow small thoughts. It is due to the small view that they are like that, and they should be ashamed of [their] small view. Given that they now wear a robe [based on] their own small thinking, they probably lack many [other] of the Buddhist dignified forms. Such things happen because their learning of, and reception of the transmission of, the Buddhist forms, are incomplete. The fact is evident that the body and mind of the Tathāgata has been authentically transmitted only in the lineage of the patriarchs, and it has not spread into the customs of those other lineages. If they knew only one Buddhist form in ten thousand they would never destroy the Buddha’s robe. Not having clarified even [the meaning of] sentences, they have never been able to hear the fundamental.

[155] There again, to decide that coarse cotton is the only material for the robe runs deeply counter to the Buddha-Dharma; above all it ruins the buddha robe. Disciples of the Buddha should not wear [a robe made according to this rule]. Why? [Because] to uphold a view about cloth ruins the kaṣāya. It is pitiful that the views of the śrāvaka of the Small Vehicle are so tortuous. After their views about cloth have been demolished, the Buddha’s robe will be realized. What I am saying about the use of silk and cotton is not the teaching of one buddha or two buddhas; it is the great Dharma of all the buddhas to see rags as the best and purest material for the robe. When, for the

present, we list the ten sorts of rags among those [rags], they include silk, cotton, and other kinds of cloth too.31 Must we not take rags of silk? If we are like that, we go against the Buddha’s truth. If we hated silk, we would also have to hate cotton. Where is the reason to hate silk or cotton? To hate silk thread because it is produced by killing is very laughable. Is cotton not the habitat of living things? Sentiment about sentience and insentience is not liberated from the sentiment of the common and sentimental: how could it know the Buddha’s kaṣāya? There is further speaking of nonsense by those who bring forth arguments about transformed thread.32 This also is laughable. Which [material] is not a transformation? Those people believe the ears that hear of “transformation,” but they doubt the eyes that see transformation itself. They seem to have no ears in their eyes, and no eyes in their ears. Where are their ears and eyes at the moment of the present?33 Now remember, while we are collecting rags, there may be cotton that looks like silk and there may be

silk that looks like cotton. When we use it, we should not call it silk and we should not call it cotton; we should just call it rags. Because it is rags it is, as rags, beyond silk and beyond cotton. Even if there are human beings or gods who have survived as rags, we should not call them sentient, [but] they may be rags. Even if there are pine trees or chrysanthemums which have become rags, we should not call them insentient, [but] they may be rags. When we recognize the truth that rags are neither silk nor cotton, and that they are beyond pearls and jewels, rags are realized and we meet rags for the first time. Before views about silk and cotton have withered and fallen, we have never seen rags even in a dream. If we retain views about the cloth— even if we have spent a lifetime receiving and retaining coarse cotton cloth as a kaṣāya—that is not the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s robe. At 60c the same time, the various kinds of kaṣāya include cotton kaṣāya, silk kaṣāya, and leather kaṣāya: all of these have been worn by buddhas. They have the Buddhist merits of the Buddha’s robe, and they possess the fundamental principle that has been authentically transmitted without interruption. But people who are not liberated from common sentiment make light of the Buddha Dharma; not believing the Buddha’s words, they aim blindly to follow the sentiment of the common person. They must be called non-Buddhists who have attached themselves to the Buddha-Dharma; they are people who destroy the right Dharma. Some claim to have changed the buddha robe in accordance with the teaching of celestial beings. In that case, they must aspire to celestial Buddhahood. Or have they become the descendants of gods? The Buddha’s disciples expound the Buddha-Dharma for celestial beings; they should not ask celestial beings about the truth. It is pitiful that those who lack the authentic transmission of the Buddha-Dharma are like this. The view of the celestial multitudes and the view of the Buddha’s disciples are very different in greatness, but gods come down to seek instruction in the Dharma from the Buddha’s disciples. The reason is that the Buddhist view and the celestial view are very different. Discard, and do not learn, the small views of śrāvakas of precepts sects. Remember that they are the Small Vehicle. The Buddha says, “One can repent for killing one’s father or killing one’s mother, but one cannot repent for insulting the Dharma.”

[160] In general, the way of small views and foxlike suspicion is not the original intention of the Buddha. The great truth of the Buddha-Dharma is beyond the Small Vehicle. No one outside of the Patriarch’s state of truth, which is transmitted with the Dharma treasury, has known of the authentic transmission of the great precepts of the buddhas. Long ago, [the story goes,] in the middle of the night on Ōbaizan, the Buddha’s robe and Dharma are transmitted authentically onto the head of the Sixth Patriarch.34 This is truly the authentic tradition for transmission of the Dharma and transmission of the robe. It is [possible] because the Fifth Patriarch knows a person.35 Fellows

61a of the fourth effect and the three clever stages, as well as the likes of [bodhisattvas in] the ten sacred stages36 and the likes of commentary teachers and sutra teachers of philosophical schools, would give the [robe and Dharma] to Jinshū;37 they would not transmit them authentically to the Sixth Patriarch. Nevertheless, when Buddhist patriarchs select Buddhist patriarchs, they transcend the path of common sentiment, and so the Sixth Patriarch has already become the Sixth Patriarch. Remember, the truth of knowing a person and of knowing oneself, which the Buddhist patriarchs transmit from rightful successor to rightful successor, is not easily supposed. Later, a monk asks the Sixth Patriarch, “Should we see the robe you received in the middle of the night on Ōbai[zan] as cotton, or should we see it as silk, or should we see it as raw silk?38 In short, as what material should we see it?” The Sixth Patriarch says, “It is not cotton, it is not silk, and it is not raw silk.” The words of the Founding Patriarch of Sōkei are like this. Remember, the buddha robe is not silk, not cotton, and not cotton crepe. Those who, on the contrary, heedlessly recognize [the robe] as silk, as cotton, or as cotton crepe are the sort who insult the Buddha-Dharma. How could they know the Buddha’s kaṣāya? Furthermore, there are episodes of the precepts being taken with [the Buddha’s] “Welcome!” That the kaṣāya gained by these [monks] is utterly beyond discussion of silk and cotton is the Buddha’s instruction in the Buddhist truth. In another case, the robe of Śāṇavāsa when he is a layman is a secular garment, but when he leaves family life it becomes a kaṣāya. We should quietly consider this fact. We should not brush it aside as if we did not see or hear it. Moreover, there is a fundamental principle which has been authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha, and from patriarch to patriarch, and which the sort who count words in sentences cannot sense and cannot fathom. Truly, how could the thousand changes and the myriad transformations of the Buddha’s truth belong in the limited area of ordinary folk? The [real state of] samādhi exists,

and [real practices of] dhāraṇī 39 exist, [but] those who count grains of sand can never find [these] valuable pearls inside their clothes. We should esteem, 61b as the right standard of the kaṣāya of all the buddhas, the material, color, and measurements of the present kaṣāya that has been received in the authentic transmission from Buddhist patriarchs. The precedents for it, in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, going back to ancient times and arriving at the present, are of long standing; and people who have distinguished the right [precedents] from the wrong have already transcended the state of enlightenment. Even though outside of the Buddhism of the patriarchs there are those who claim [to have] the kaṣāya, no original patriarch has ever affirmed [their robes] as the twigs and leaves [of the original kaṣāya]; how could [their robes] germinate the seeds of good roots?40 How much less could they bear real fruit? We now not only are seeing and hearing Buddha-Dharma that we have not met in vast kalpas; we [also] have been able to see and to hear the Buddha’s robe, to learn about the Buddha’s robe, and to receive and to retain the Buddha’s robe. This just exactly means that we are meeting the Buddha, we are hearing the voice of the Buddha, we are radiating the brightness of the Buddha, we are receiving and using the state received and used by the Buddha, we are receiving the one-to-one transmission of the mind of the Buddha, and we are getting the Buddha’s marrow.

[165] For material to make the kaṣāya we invariably use that which is pure. Pure describes material offered by a donor of pure faith, or bought at a market, or sent by celestial beings, or donated by dragons, or donated by demons, or donated by kings and ministers, or [even] pure leather. We may use all such material. At the same time, we esteem the ten sorts of rags as pure. The ten sorts of rags are namely:

1) Rags chewed by an ox, 2) rags gnawed by rats, 3) rags scorched by fire, 4) rags [soiled by] menstruation, 5) rags [soiled by] childbirth, 6) rags [offered at] a shrine, 7) rags [left at] a graveyard, 8) rags [offered in] petitional prayer, 9) rags [discarded by] a king’s officers, 10) rags brought back [from a funeral].

       [166] We esteem these ten sorts as especially pure material. In secular          

society they throw them away, [but] in Buddhism we use them. From these customs we can know the difference between the secular world and Buddhism. So when we want pure [material] we should look for these ten sorts. Finding them, we can know what is pure and we can intuit and affirm what is not pure. We can know mind and we can intuit and affirm body. When we obtain these ten sorts, whether they are silk or whether they are cotton, we should consider their purity and impurity. If we understand that the reason we use these rags is to idly make ourselves shabby with shabby robes, that might be extremely stupid. Rags have [always] been used in Buddhism for their splendor and beauty. In Buddhism, what makes our attire shabby is clothes which have come from impurity—[clothes of] brocade, embroidered silk, silk twill, and sheer silk, [clothes of] gold, silver, precious gems, and so on. This is the meaning of shabbiness. In general, whether in the Buddhism of this land or of other worlds, when we use pure and beautiful [cloth], it should be of these ten sorts. Not only has it transcended the limitations of purity and impurity, it also is beyond the limited sphere of the superfluous and the absence of the superfluous.41 Do not discuss it as matter or mind. It is not connected with gain and loss. [The fact] is only that those who receive and retain the authentic transmission are Buddhist patriarchs; for when we are in the state of a Buddhist patriarch we receive the authentic transmission. To receive and to retain this [transmission] as a Buddhist patriarch does not depend on manifestation or no manifestation of the body, and does not depend on upholding or non-upholding of the mind, [but] the authentic transmission goes on being received. Absolutely, we should regret that in this country, Japan, monks and nuns of recent ages have, for a long time, gone without wearing the kaṣāya; and we should be glad that we can receive and retain [the kaṣāya] now. Even laymen and laywomen who receive and keep the

Buddhist precepts should wear the five-stripe, seven-stripe, and nine-stripe

kaṣāya. How then could people who have left family life fail to wear [the kaṣāya]? It is said that [everyone] from King Brahmā and the gods of the six heavens,42 down to secular men, secular women, and male and female slaves, should receive the Buddhist precepts and wear the kaṣāya; how could bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs fail to wear it? It is said that even animals should receive the Buddhist precepts and wear the kaṣāya; how could disciples of the Buddha fail to wear the Buddha’s robe? So those who want to become disciples of the Buddha, regardless of whether they are gods above, human beings, kings of nations, or government officials, and irrespective of whether they are laypeople, monks, slaves, or animals, should receive and keep the Buddhist precepts and should receive the authentic transmission of the kaṣāya. This is just the direct way to enter authentically into the state of buddha. [170] “When washing the kaṣāya, you should mix miscellaneous powdered incense into the water. After drying [the kaṣāya] in the sun, fold it and put it in a high place, serve offerings to it of incense and flowers, and make three prostrations. Then, kneeling up, humbly receive it upon the head and, with the hands joined, render devotion by reciting the following verse:

How great is the clothing of liberation, Formless, field of happiness, robe! Devoutly wearing the Tathāgata’s teaching, Widely I will save living beings.

After reciting [this verse] three times, stand up on the ground and wear [the kaṣāya] devoutly.”43

[170] During my stay in Song China, making effort on the long platform, I saw that my neighbor every morning, at the time of releasing the stillness, would lift up his kaṣāya and place it on his head; then, holding his hands together in veneration, he would silently recite the verse. At that time, there arose in me a feeling I had never before experienced. [My] body was overfilled with joy, and tears of gratitude secretly fell and moistened the lapels of my gown. The reason was that when I had read the Āgama sutras previously, I had noticed sentences about humbly receiving the kaṣāya upon the head, but I had not clarified the standards for this behavior and had not understood it clearly. Seeing it done now, before my very eyes, I was overjoyed. I thought to myself, “It is a pity that when I was in my homeland there was no master to teach [me] this, and no good friend to tell [me] of it. How could I not regret, how could I not deplore, passing so much time in vain? Seeing it and hearing 62b it now, I can rejoice in past good conduct. If I had been idly rubbing shoulders in the temples of my home country, how could I have sat shoulder-to-shoulder with this treasure of a monk who is actually wearing the Buddha’s robe?” Sadness and joy were not one-sided. Tears of gratitude fell in thousands and tens of thousands. Then I secretly vowed, “One way or another, unworthy though I am, I will receive the authentic transmission of the right traditions

of the Buddha-Dharma and, out of compassion for living beings in my homeland, I will cause them to see and to hear the robe and the Dharma that have been authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha.” The vow made at that time has not now been in vain; the bodhisattvas, in families and out of families, who have received and retained the kaṣāya are many. This is a matter in which to rejoice. People who have received and retained the kaṣāya should humbly receive it upon their head every day and night. The merit [of this] may be especially excellent and supremely excellent. The seeing and hearing of a phrase or a verse may be as in the story of “on trees and on rocks,” [but] the merit of the authentic transmission of the kaṣāya is hardly encountered through the ten directions. In the tenth lunar month, in the winter of the seventeenth year of Kajō in great Song [China], two Korean44 monks came to the city of Keigenfu. One was called Chigen, the other Keiun. Both of them were always discussing the meaning of Buddhist sutras, and they were also men of letters. But they had no kaṣāya and no pātra; they were like secular people. It was pitiful that though they had the external form of bhikṣus they did not have the Dharma of bhikṣus. This may have been because they were from a minor nation in a remote land. When people from our country who have the external form of bhikṣus travel abroad, they are likely to be the same as those two monks. Śākyamuni Buddha himself received [the kaṣāya] upon his head for twelve years, never setting it aside. As already his distant descendants, we should emulate this. To turn the forehead away from prostrations

62c idly done for fame and gain to gods, to spirits, to kings, and to retainers, and to turn it now toward the humble reception upon the head of the Buddha’s robe, is a joyful and great happy event.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Den-e

                                        The first day of winter, in the first year of                                         Ninji.45

                                        Written at Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji                                         —a śramaṇa who entered Song [China] and                                         received the transmission of Dharma, Dōgen.

Notes

1     Chapter Twelve, and from patriarch to patriarch.” The difference presumably arose from Master Dōgen’sKesa-kudoku, begins butsu-butsu so-so, “from buddha to buddha, feeling on the day.

2     lit., “throughout his life.” Again, the difference is incidental.“Until his death” is shōzen, lit., “life-before.” In Kesa-kudoku the expression is isshō,

3     offered it to three kings, but none of them valued the gem at all. In this context,Benka was a man in ancient China who found a huge gem, one foot in diameter. He not on the same level as the Benka’s gem is simply used as an example of something that is very valuable, butkaṣāya.

4     619–858.

5     “Monks and laymen” is originally “black and white,” symbolizing the clothes of monks and laymen respectively.

6     “Sacred wheel-turning kings” is ten-rin-jō-ō, from the Sanskrit cakravarti-rājya. These legendary kings were said to govern the four continents east, west, north, and south with the silver wheel rules all continents but the north, the king with the copper wheel of Mount Sumeru. The king with the gold wheel rules all four continents, the king tinent. rules the east and south, and the king with the iron wheel rules only the southern con7 Yōkin, lit., “leaf-cloth.”

8 Shari suggests the Buddha’s relics. Represents the Sanskrit śarīra, which literally means bones but which often 9 Nyakuden-nyakuri,to a passage in the eighteenth chapter of the 74. “fields and villages,” and Lotus Sutragojū-tenden,, Zuiki-kudoku.“fifty propagations,” alludeSee LS 3.72-

10    National treasures and sacred relics.

11    The nine kinds of robe are the robes of nine stripes, eleven stripes, thirteen stripes, stripes, and twenty-five stripes.fifteen stripes, seventeen stripes, nineteen stripes, twenty-one stripes, twenty-three

12    Refers to Master Bodhidharma’s transmission of the Dharma into China.

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13    58 to 76 C.E.

14    namely: precepts (Vinaya), Sutra, and commentaries (Abhi dharma).Sanzō, lit., “three storehouses,” represents the Sanskrit Tripiṭaka, or three baskets, 15 principles. “Seeing” means knowing the concrete form, and “hearing” means understanding the 16 Many Hinayana Buddhist traditions are based on the teachings of the Āgama sutras. 17 Chapter Forty-nine, Master Tōzan, Master Rinzai, Master Hōgen, Master Isan, and Master Unmon. See Butsudō. 18 That is, three long segments and one short segment in each stripe.

19    In Buddhist sutras, eighty-four thousand signifies a very large number.

20    Tenma, celestial demons, symbolize idealistic people who disturb Buddhism.

21    Master Hyakujō Ekai (749–814), a successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Zen Master Daichi is his posthumous title.

22    This is a summarized list of the five sacred merits of the Higekyō (Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtra). A longer enumeration of the five sacred merits,Kesa-kudoku, kaṣāya, from chapter 8 of paragraph 80. from the same sutra, appears in Chapter Twelve, the

23    Chōgō no ji, lit., “a matter in long kalpas.”

24    When the kaṣāya has been opened behind the back and the strings tied, and the left kaṣāya, the border running vertically the “front edge” around the front of the body and over the left shoulder. down from the right hand is down from the left hand is and right hand are holding the top corners of the koto,zento,“the back edge.” The right hand brings the top of“the front edge,” and the border running vertically

25    transform,” that is, to teach, to educate, or to instruct.“Transform” is ke. The character often appears in the compound kyoke, lit., “teach-

26    Kōtōroku of the Keitoku era. It contains the histories of one thousand seven hundred and oneBuddhists, from the seven ancient buddhas to Master Hōgen Bun’eki (855–958). 2)piled by the layman Ri Junkyoku during the Tenshō era (1023–1031). 3) Transmission of the Torch(960–1297)Refers to the or, namely: 1) Tenshōkō tōrokuGotōroku (Five Records of the TorchDentōroku), completed by a monk called Dōgen in 1004, the first year(Tenshō Era Record of the Widely Extending Torchor Keitokudentō roku), compiled during the Song period(Keitoku Era Record of theZokutōroku), com-

or in 1101, during the Kenchū-seikoku era. 4) Continuation of the Torch(Supplementary Record of the TorchKataifutōroku (Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch), completed in 1183 and published in 1189. 5) ), completed by Master Ihaku of Bukkōku Temple Rentōeyō (Collection of Essentials for), compiled by Master Futōroku

Shōju of Raian Temple during the Katai era (1201–1204).

27    That is, from Master Bodhidharma and Master Daikan Enō.

Chapter Thirteen

28    Of the believing mind described above.

29    “without elaboration” or “un adorned,” that is, natural. Sa, describes elaboration or artificiality. to produce, to make, or to do, sometimes represents the Sanskrit Shoaku-makusa.Sa thus includes the connotation of international Master Dōgen describes zazen as saṃskṛta, which Musa, effort. See Chapter Ten,

30    Samādhidhāraṇītitioner into the balanced states are mystical formulae, the incantation of which is supposed to lead the prac-means the balanced state, and dhāraṇī means a mystical formula. So samādhi31 The ten sorts of rags are given at the end of paragraph 165 in this chapter. The point of the classification is to determine how rags were discarded, not their original mate-rial. 32 not natural. Some people thought that silk is the result of an artificial process, and is therefore

33    To hear with the eyes and to see with the ears suggests inclusive intuition, as opposed to discriminating intellectual recognition and sensory perception.

34    is contained in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), the behavior of placing the story of the transmission between Master Daiman Kōnin and Master Daikan Enōkaṣāya on the head in veneration.Gyōji. Chōjō ni, “on top of the head,” suggests

35    a laborer at the temple. III), The ability to know a true person is discussed at the end of Chapter Fifty-two (Vol.Bukkyō. At the time of the transmission, Master Daikan Enō was employed as

36    sakṛdāgāmin A belief, thirty states classified as the three clever stages, ten sacred stages, the balance dis not subject to returning), and 4) arhat (the fourth effect, which is the ultimate state of the state of truth (śrāvakaśrāvakapasses through four stages: 1) (tōkaku)the state of being subject to one return), 3) . A bodhisattva passes through fifty-two stages or states: ten stages of), and finally the fine state of truth srotāpanna((myōkakuanāgāminentry into the stream), ). (the state which2)

37    Ācārya Jinshū was the most intelligent monk in Master Daiman Kōnin’s order, accom-plished at poetry and revered by emperors. See Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Kokyō.

38    “Raw silk” means silk that has not been dyed.

39    Chapter Fifty-five (Vol. III), Master Dōgen interpreted dhāraṇīDarani.s as concrete practices that have real power. See

40    Zenkon means good conduct as the root of happiness.

41    and murō, which represent the Sanskrit āsrava and anāsrava, suggest the presence and absence of emotional distress.

42    case) the gods therein.Rokuten or roku-yoku-ten, are the six heavens of the world of volition, or (as in this

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43    chapter, the same as the second half of paragraph 78 on washing the is written in Chinese characters only.This paragraph is in the form of a quotation from a sutra in Chinese. The content isKesa-kudoku. But that paragraph is written in Japanese, whereas this paragraphkaṣāya in the previous

44    the name of one of the three states comprising the Korean peninsula at that time.“ Korean” is sankan, “three Koreas.” In Kesa-kudoku the word is Kōrai, which was

45    The first day of the tenth lunar month, 1240.

[Chapter Fourteen] Sansuigyō

The Sutra of Mountains and Water

Translator’s Note: San means “mountains,” sui means “water”—rivers, lakes, and so on. Sansui suggests natural scenery, or nature itself. Kyō or gyō means Buddhist sutras. So Sansuigyō means mountains and water, or nature, as Buddhist sutras. Buddhism is basically a religion of belief in the universe, and nature is the universe showing its real form. So to look at nature is to look at the Buddhist truth itself. For this reason Master Dōgen believed that nature is just Buddhist sutras. In this chapter he explains the real form of nature, giving particular emphasis to relativity in nature.

[175]           The mountains and water of the present are the realization of the wordsof eternal buddhas. Both [mountains and water] abide in place in the Dharma, having realized ultimate virtue. Because they are in the state before the kalpa of emptiness, they are vigorous activity in the present. Because they are the self before the sprouting of creation, they are real liberation. The virtues of the mountains are so high and wide that we always realize moral virtue which can ride the clouds by relying on the mountains, and we unfailingly liberate the subtle effectiveness which follows the wind by relying on the mountains.

[176]           Master Kai1 of Taiyōzan preaches to the assembly, “The Blue Mountains are constantly walking. The Stone Woman bears children by night.” Mountains lack none of the virtues with which mountains should be equipped. For this reason, they are constantly abiding in stillness and constantly walking. We must painstakingly learn in practice the virtue of this walking. The walking of mountains must be like the walking of human beings; there- 63a fore, even though it does not look like human walking,2 do not doubt the walking of the mountains. The words preached now by the Buddhist Patriarch are already pointing to “walking,” and this is his attainment of the fundamental. We should pursue to the ultimate his preaching to the assembly about “constant walking”: it is because [the mountains] are walking that they are “constant.”3

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The walking of the Blue Mountains is swifter than the wind, but human beings in the mountains do not sense it or know it. Being “in the mountains”4 describes the “opening of flowers” in the “[real] world.”5 People out of the mountains never sense it and never know it—people who have no eyes to see the mountains do not sense, do not know, do not see, and do not hear this concrete fact. If we doubt the walking of the mountains, we also do not yet know our own walking. It is not that we do not have our own walking, but we do not yet know and have not yet clarified our own walking. When we know our own walking, then we will surely also know the walking of the Blue Mountains. The Blue Mountains are already beyond the sentient and beyond the insentient. The self is already beyond the sentient and beyond the insentient. We cannot doubt the present walking of the Blue Mountains. [Though] we do not know how many Dharma worlds we should use as a scale when taking in the Blue Mountains, we should investigate in detail the walking of the Blue Mountains as well as our own walking. There should be investigation both of backward steps6 and of stepping backward.7 We should investigate the fact that just at the moment before the sprouting of creation, and since before the King of Emptiness,8 walking—in forward steps and backward steps—has never stopped even for an instant. If the walking ceased, the Buddhist patriarchs could not manifest themselves in reality. If there were an end to the walking, the Buddha-Dharma could not reach the present day. Forward walking never ceases, and backward walking never ceases. The moment of forward walking does not oppose backward walking, and the moment of backward walking does not oppose forward walking.9

63b We call this virtue “the mountains flowing,” and we call it “the flowing mountains.” The Blue Mountains master in practice the act of walking and the East Mountain learns in practice the act of moving on water; therefore, this learning in practice is the mountains’ learning in practice. The mountains, without changing their body and mind, with the face and eyes of mountains, have been traveling around learning in practice. Never insult them by saying that the Blue Mountains cannot walk or that the East Mountain cannot move on water. It is because of the grossness of the viewpoint of the vulgar that they doubt the phrase “the Blue Mountains are walking.” It is due to the poorness of their scant experience that they are astonished at the words “flowing mountains.” Now, not even fully understanding10 the words “flowing water,” they are drowned in prejudice and ignorance. This being so, they esteem as defining concepts, and esteem as lifeblood, their enumeration of the accumulated virtues [of mountains].11 The act of walking exists, the act of flowing exists, and moments in which mountains give birth to mountain children exist. By virtue of the fact that mountains become Buddhist patriarchs, Buddhist patriarchs have manifested themselves in reality like this.12 Though there may be eyes in which grass, trees, soil, stones, fences, and walls are realized, that moment is beyond doubt and beyond disturbance; it is not “total realization.” Though moments are realized in which [the mountains] are seen to be adorned with the seven treasures, [those moments] are not “the real refuge.” Though visions are realized [of the mountains] as the area in which buddhas practice the truth, [those visions] are not necessarily something to be loved. Though some have got the brains to realize a vision [of the mountains] as the unthinkable merit of the buddhas, reality is not merely this.13 Every “realization” is an instance of object and subject. We do not esteem such [“realizations”] as the Buddhist patriarchs’ action in the state of truth: they are one-sided and narrow views.14 The moving of circumstances and the moving of mind are criticized by the Great Saint.15 Explanations of mind and explanations of the nature16 are not affirmed by the Buddhist patriarchs. Seeing the mind and seeing the nature17 is the animated activity of non-Buddhists. Staying in words and staying in phrases is not the speech of liberation. There is [a state] that has got free from states like these: it is expressed “the

Blue Mountains are constantly walking” and “the East Mountain moves on      63c water.” We should master it in detail.

[182]          [In the words] “The Stone Woman bears children by night” time,in which the Stone Woman bears children, is called night. In general, there are male stones and female stones, and there are neither male nor female stones, whose practical function supports the heavens and supports the earth. There are heavenly stones and there are earthly stones—as the secular say, but few people know.18 We should know the facts of childbirth: At the time of childbirth, are parent and child both transformed? How could we learn in practice only that childbirth is realized as [the parent] becoming the parent of a child? We should learn in practice, and should penetrate to the end, that the time of [the child] becoming the child of the parent is the practice-andexperience of the reality of childbirth.

[183]          Great Master Unmon Kyōshin19 says, “The East Mountain moves on water.” The point realized in these words is that all mountains are an East Mountain, and every East Mountain moves on water.20 Thus [mountains] such as the nine mountains of Mount Sumeru have been realized, and they have practiced and experienced.21 This state is called “the East Mountain.” Nevertheless, how could Unmon be liberated in the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, the practice-and-experience, and the vigorous activity of the East Mountain.22

[184]          At the present time in the great kingdom of Song, there is a groupof unreliable23 fellows who have now formed such a crowd that they cannot be beaten by a few real [people]. They say that the present talk of the East Mountain moving on water, and stories such as Nansen’s sickle,24 are stories beyond rational understanding. Their idea is as follows: “A story which involves images and thoughts is not a Zen story of the Buddhist patriarchs. Stories beyond rational understanding are the stories of the Buddhist patriarchs. This is why we esteem Ōbaku’s use of the stick and Rinzai’s shout,25 which are beyond rational understanding and which do not involve images and thoughts, as the great realization before the sprouting of creation. The reason that the expedient means of many past masters employ tangle-cutting26 phrases is that [those phrases] are beyond rational understanding.” Those fellows

64a who speak like this have never met a true teacher and they have no eyes of learning in practice; they are small dogs who do not deserve to be discussed. For the last two or three hundred years in the land of Song there have been many such demons and shavelings [like those] in the band of six.27 It is pitiful that the great truth of the Buddhist Patriarch is going to ruin. The understanding of these [shavelings] is inferior even to that of śrāvakas of the Small Vehicle; they are more stupid than non-Buddhists. They are not laypeople, they are not monks, they are not human beings, and they are not gods; they are more stupid than animals learning the Buddha’s truth. What the shavelings call “stories beyond rational understanding” are beyond rational understanding only to them;28 the Buddhist patriarchs are not like that. Even though [rational ways] are not rationally understood by those [shavelings], we should not fail to learn in practice the Buddhist patriarchs’ ways of rational understanding. If ultimately there is no rational understanding, the reasoning which those [shavelings] have now set forth also cannot hit the target. There are many of

this sort in all directions of Song China, and I have seen and heard them before my own eyes. They are pitiful. They do not know that images and thoughts are words and phrases, and they do not know that words and phrases transcend images and thoughts. When I was in China I laughed at them, but they had nothing to say for themselves and were just wordless. Their present negation of rational understanding is nothing but a false notion. Who has taught it to them? Though they lack a natural teacher, they have the non Buddhist view of naturalism. Remember, this “The East Mountain moves on water” is the bones and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs. Waters are realized at the foot of the East Mountain;29 thereupon mountains ride the clouds and walk through the sky. The crowns of the waters are mountains, whose walking, upward or downward, is always “on water.”30 Because the mountains’ toes can walk over all kinds of water, making the waters dance, the walking is free in all directions31 and “practice-and-experience is not nonexistent.”32 Water is neither strong nor weak, neither wet nor dry, neither 64b moving nor still, neither cold nor warm, neither existent nor nonexistent, neither delusion nor realization. When it is solid it is harder than a diamond; who could break it? Melted, it is softer than diluted milk; who could break it? This being so, it is impossible to doubt the real virtues that [water] possesses. For the present, we should learn in practice the moments in which it is possible to put on the eyes and look in the ten directions at the water of the ten directions. This is not learning in practice only of the time when human beings and gods see water; there is learning in practice of water seeing water.33 Because water practices and experiences water, there is the investigation in practice of water speaking water. We should manifest in reality the path on which self encounters self. We should advance and retreat along the vigorous path on which the external world exhausts in practice the external world, and we should spring free.

[189] In general, ways of seeing mountains and water differ according to the type of being [that sees them]: There are beings which see what we call water as a string of pearls,34 but this does not mean that they see a string of pearls as water. They probably see as their water a form that we see as something else. We see their strings of pearls as water. There are [beings] which see water as wonderful flowers; but this does not mean that they use flowers as water. Demons see water as raging flames, and see it as pus and blood. Dragons and fish see it as a palace, and see it as a tower. Some see [water] as the seven treasures and the maṇi gem;35 some see it as trees and forests and fences and walls; some see it as the pure and liberated Dharma nature; some see it as the real human body;36 and some see it as [the oneness of] physical form and mental nature. Human beings see it as water, the causes and conditions of death and life. Thus, what is seen does indeed differ according to the kind of being [that sees]. Now let us be wary of this. Is it that there

64c are various ways of seeing one object? Or is it that we have mistakenly assumed the various images to be one object? At the crown of effort, we should make still further effort. If the above is so, then practice-and-experience and pursuit of the truth also may not be [only] of one kind or of two kinds; and the ultimate state also may be of thousands of kinds and myriad varieties. When we keep this point in mind, although there are many kinds of water, it seems that there is no original water, and no water of many kinds. At the same time, the various waters which accord with the kinds of beings [that see water] do not depend on mind, do not depend on body, do not arise from karma, are not self-reliant, and are not reliant upon others; they have the liberated state of reliance on water itself. This being so, water is beyond earth, water, fire, wind, space, consciousness, and so on. Water is beyond blue, yellow, red, white, or black and beyond sights, sounds, smells, tastes, sensations, or properties; at the same time, as earth, water, fire, wind, space, and so on, water is naturally realized. Because the nations and palaces of the present are like this, it may be difficult to state by what and into what they are created. To assert that they hang on the circle of space and the circle of wind37 is not true to ourselves and not true to others; it is to speculate on the basis of the suppositions of the small view. People make this assertion because they think that, without somewhere to hang, [dharmas] would not be able to abide.38

[193] The Buddha says, “All dharmas are ultimately liberated; they are without an abode.”39 Remember, although they are in the state of liberation, without any bonds, all dharmas are abiding in place.40 Even so, when human beings look at water, the only way we see it is as flowing ceaselessly. This flowing takes many forms, each of which is an example of the human view: [Water] flows over the earth, flows through the sky, flows upward, and flows downward. It flows in a single winding brook, and it flows in the nine [great] 65a depths.41 It rises up to form clouds, and it comes down to form pools. The Bunshi42 says, “The way of water is to ascend to the sky, forming rain and dew, and to descend to the earth, forming rivers and streams.” Now even the words of a secular person are like this. It would be most shameful for people who call themselves the descendants of the Buddhist Patriarch to be more ignorant than secular people. We can say that the way of water is beyond the recognition of water, but water is able actually to flow. Water is [also] beyond non-recognition, but water is able actually to flow.

[195] “It ascends to the sky and forms rain and dew.” Remember, water rises up immeasurably high into the sky above to form rain and dew. Rain and dew are of various kinds corresponding to [the various kinds of] worlds. To say that there are places not reached by water is the teaching of śrāvakas of the Small Vehicle, or the wrong teaching of non-Buddhists. Water reaches into flames, it reaches into the mind and its images, into wit, and into discrimination, and it reaches into realization of the buddha-nature.43

[195] “It descends to the earth to form rivers and streams.” Remember, when water descends to the earth, it forms rivers and streams. The vitality of rivers and streams can become sages. Common and stupid folk today assume that water is always in rivers, streams, and oceans. This is not so. Rivers and oceans are realized in water.44 Thus, water also exists in places which are not rivers and oceans; it is just that when water descends to the earth, it takes effect as rivers and oceans. Further, we must not understand that social worlds cannot exist or that buddha lands cannot exist at a place where water has formed rivers and oceans.45 Even inside a single drop, countless buddha lands are realized. This does not mean that there is water within buddha lands, and does not mean that there are buddha lands inside water. The place where water exists is already beyond the three times and beyond the world of Dharma. 65b Even so, it is the universe in which water has been realized. Wherever Buddhist patriarchs go water goes, and wherever water goes Buddhist patriarchs are realized. This is why Buddhist patriarchs without exception, when taking up water, have treated it as [their] body and mind and have treated it as [their] thinking. This being so, that water rises up is not denied in any text, within [Buddhism] or without. The way of water pervades upward and downward, vertically and horizontally. At the same time, in the Buddhist sutras, “fire and wind rise upward, earth and water settle downward.” There is something to be learned in practice in this “upward” and “downward.” That is, we [must]

learn in practice the Buddha’s teaching of “upward” and “downward,” as follows: The place where earth and water go, we think of as “downward.”46 We do not think of downward as a place where earth and water go.47 The place where fire and wind go is “upward.” The “world of Dharma” should not always be related to measurements upward, downward, and in the four diagonals;48 at the same time, the four elements, the five elements, the six elements, and so on, relying on the concrete place to which they go, just momentarily establish the four-cornered Dharma world.49 It is not to be assumed that the Heaven of Thoughtlessness50 is above and that the Avīci51 Hell is below. Avīci is the whole world of Dharma, and Thoughtlessness is the whole world of Dharma. Still, when dragons and fish see water as a palace, they are probably like people looking at a palace, utterly unable to recognize that it is flowing away. If an onlooker were to explain to them, “Your palace is flowing water,” the dragons and fish would likely be as startled as we were now to hear the assertion that mountains are flowing. Further, it may also be possible to maintain and to rely upon [the assertion] that there is such preaching in [every] railing, stair,

65c and outdoor pillar of a palace or a mansion. Quietly, we should have been considering this reasoning and we should go on considering it.

[199]          If we are not learning the state of liberation at the face of thisplace, we have not become free from the body and mind of the common person, we have not perfectly realized the land of Buddhist patriarchs, and we have not perfectly realized the palaces of the common person. Although human beings now are profoundly confident that the inner content of the seas and the inner content of the rivers is water, we still do not know what dragons, fish, and other beings view as water and use as water. Do not stupidly assume that every kind of being uses as water what we view as water. When people today who are learning Buddhism want to learn about water, we should not stick blindly in only the human sphere; we should move forward and learn water in the Buddha’s state of truth. We should learn in practice how we see the water that Buddhist patriarchs use. Further, we should learn in practice whether there is water or whether there is no water in the houses of Buddhist patriarchs.

[200]          Mountains have been the dwelling places of great saints since beyond the past and present. All the sages and all the saints have made the mountains into their inner sanctum and made the mountains into their body and mind; and by virtue of the sages and the saints the mountains have been realized. We tend to suppose, with respect to mountains in general, that countless great saints and great sages might be gathered there; but after we have entered the mountains there is not a single person to meet. There is only the realization of the vigorous activity of mountains. Not even the traces of our having entered remain. When we are in the secular world gazing at the mountains, and when we are in the mountains meeting the mountains, their heads and eyes are very different. Our notion that [the mountains] are not flowing and our view that [the mountains] are not flowing may not be the same as the view of dragons and fish.52 While human beings and gods, in our own world, are in our element, other beings doubt this [notion and view of ours], or they may not even doubt it. This being so, we should study the phrase “mountains flow” under Buddhist patriarchs; we should not leave it open to doubt.53 Acting once54 is just “flowing”; acting once [more] is just “not flowing.” One time round is “flowing”; one time round is “not flowing.” Without this investigation in practice, it is not the right Dharma wheel of the Tathāgata. An eternal buddha55 says, “If you want to be able not to invite the karma of incessant [hell],56 do not insult the right Dharma wheel of the Tathāgata.” We should engrave these words on skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, we should engrave them on body and mind, on object-and-subject, we should engrave them on the immaterial, and we should engrave them on matter; they are [already] engraved “on trees and on rocks”57 and they are [already] engraved “in fields and in villages.”58 We generally say that mountains belong to a country, but [mountains] belong to people who love mountains. Mountains always love their occupiers, whereupon saints and sages, people of high virtue, enter the mountains. When saints and sages live in the mountains, because the mountains belong to these [sages and saints], trees and rocks abound and flourish, and birds and animals are mysteriously excellent. This is because the sages and saint have covered them with virtue. We should remember the fact that mountains like sages and the fact that [mountains] like saints. That many emperors have gone to the mountains to bow before sages and to question great saints is an excellent example in the past and the present. At such times, [the emperors] honor [the sages and saints] with the formalities due to a teacher, never conforming to secular norms. Imperial authority exerts no control whatever over the mountain sages. Clearly, the mountains are beyond the human world. On Kōdō59 [Mountain] in the bygone

days of Kahō,60 the Yellow Emperor61 visited Kōsei, crawling on his knees and kowtowing to beg [instruction]. Śākyamuni Buddha left the palace of his father, the king, to enter the mountains, but his father, the king, did not resent the mountains. The royal father did not distrust those in the mountains who would teach the prince, whose twelve years of training in the truth were mostly spent in the mountains. The revelation of [the prince’s] destiny as the Dharma King also took place in the mountains. Truly, not even the wheel[turning] kings hold sway over the mountains. Remember, the mountains are beyond the boundaries of the human world and beyond the boundaries of the heavens above; we can never know the mountains with the human intellect. If [their flowing] is not to be compared with flowing in the human world, who can doubt the flowing, the non-flowing, and the other activities of the mountains?

[205] Again, since the ancient past, there have been from time to time sages and saints who lived by the water. When they live by the water, there are those who fish fishes, those who fish human beings, and those who fish the state of truth. Each of these is in the traditional stream of those who are “in the water.” Going further, there may be those who fish themselves, those who fish fishing, those who are fished by fishing, and those who are fished by the state of truth.62 In days of old, when Master Tokujō63 suddenly left Yakusan Mountain to live amidst the river’s mind, he got the sage64 of the Katei River. Was this not fishing fishes? Was it not fishing human beings? Was it not fishing water? Was it not fishing himself? A person who is able to meet Tokujō is Tokujō;65 and Tokujō’s “teaching people”66 is [a human being] meeting a human being. It is not only that there is water in the world; there are worlds in the world of water. And it is not only in water that such [worlds] exist. There are worlds of sentient beings in clouds, there are worlds of sentient beings in wind, there are worlds of sentient beings in fire, there

are worlds of sentient beings in earth, there are worlds of sentient beings in the world of Dharma, there are worlds of sentient beings in a stalk of grass, and there are worlds of sentient beings in a staff. Wherever there are worlds of sentient beings, the world of Buddhist patriarchs inevitably exists at that place. We should carefully learn in practice the truth which is like this. In conclusion then, water is the palace of real dragons; it is beyond flowing

and falling. If we recognize it as only flowing, the word “flowing” insults water, because, for example, [the word] forces [water] to be what is other than flowing itself. Water is nothing but water’s “real form as it is.” Water is just the virtues of water itself; it is beyond “flowing.” When we master the flow and master the non-flow of a single body of water, the perfect realization of the myriad dharmas is realized at once. With mountains too, there are mountains contained in treasure, there are mountains contained in marshes, there are mountains contained in space, there are mountains contained in mountains,67 and there is learning in practice in which mountains are contained in containment.68 An eternal buddha69 says, “Mountains are mountains. Water is water.” These words do not say that “mountains” are “mountains”; they say that mountains are mountains. This being so, we should master the mountains in practice. When we are mastering the mountains in practice, that is effort “in the mountains.” Mountains and water like this naturally produce sages and produce saints.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Sansuigyō70

                                        Preached to the assembly at Kannondōri kō                                         shōhōrinji on the eighteenth day of the tenth                                         lunar month in the first year of Ninji.71

 

Notes

1     Master Fuyō Dōkai (1043–1118), a Buddhist patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage, title and a purple robe from the emperor and was banished. When he was eventually the forty-fifth patriarch from the Buddha. Having succeeded Master Tōsu Gisei, Master Fuyō preached Buddhism on Mount Taiyō and elsewhere until he refused a ancient patriarchs. pardoned, he built a thatched hut on Mount Fuyō and lived there in the style of the

2     Gyōho, mentary the expression is or “going steps.” In the quotation, and elsewhere in Master Dōgen’s com-unpo, or “transporting steps.” Both expressions mean walking.

3     things balanced (for example, pedaling a bicycle) and action gives things eternalmeans both constant and eternal. Both meanings are relevant here: action makes meaning.

4     character to mean “in the state of reality.” So the reality of the mountains. Sanchū. Chū means “in” or “in the state of,” and Master Dōgen sometimes uses thesanchu means in the mountains or in

5     II), Sekairi no kekai.opening of flowers is the occurrence of the world,” suggesting that the real worlditself is just the appearance of phenomena. See for example Chapter Forty-three (Vol.Kūge.    This alludes to the words of Master Prajñātara, kekai-sekai-ki, “the

6     Taiho.(to our original state). In the FukanzazengiTaihoMaster Dōgen describes zazen as means concrete backward steps. taiho, a backward step

7     Hotai means stepping backward as a principle. We should not only investigate concrete drawing inferences from trial and error in daily life, etc.). having a bath, etc.) but also investigate the meaning of stepping backward (for example, by reading the backward steps (for example, by sitting in zazen, lifting weights, doing prostrations, Shōbōgenzō, studying the function of the autonomic nervous system,

8     gyō-bosatsu buddha to appear in the Kū-ō is identified with Bhīṣmagarjitasvararāja, or King of Majestic Voice, the first(“Bodhisattva Never Despise”kalpa of emptiness. See the ).    Lotus Sutra, chapter 20, Jōfu-

9     Each action is done at an independent moment of the present.

10    “Fully understand” is at eight destinations,” suggesting thorough understanding from many viewpoints. shichitsu-hattatsu, lit., “pass through seven directions and arrive

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11    Vulgar people do not value the unthinkable reality of mountains, but they esteem thecharacteristics of mountains which they are able to enumerate.

12    gotokuKakunogotoku, in Chinese characters is “like this,” indicates what is already present here and now. nyoze, which Master Dōgen uses as an expression ofHokke-ten-hokke. Kakunoreality as it is. See Chapter Seventeen,

13    By denying the four views Master Dōgen emphasized the fact that reality cannot be grasped by intellectual thinking.

14    Ichigu no kanken, lit., “one-corner pipe-views.”

15    of the story and the words here are slightly different, the point is the same: that sep-“Great Saint” means the Buddha. Moving circumstances (like a pot) and moving Godai Impō (see Chapter Eighty-one [Vol. IV], mind (like water) is the theme of a story about Master Nansen Fugan and MasterŌ-saku-sendaba). Though the words a ration between subject and object can be transcended by action in the moment ofthe present.

16    Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), Sesshin-sesshō, or “expounding the mind and expounding the nature,” is the title ofSesshin-sesshō.

17    Kenshin-kenshō.Buddhist stories) often call the enlightenment they pursue People in Japan who pursue enlightenment by thinking about kenshō, “seeing the nature.”kōans

(

18    is beyond subjective and objective views. A Buddhist knowing of stones is more real than the romantic descriptions found, for example, in secular Chinese literature. Subjectively or romantically, we assign gender or other human characteristics tothings in nature. Objectively or scientifically, we do not. Master Dōgen’s viewpoint

19    Master Unmon Bun’en (864–949), a successor of Master Seppō Gison, who was asixth-generation descendant of Master Seigen Gyōshi. It is said that there were neverless than a thousand students in Master Unmon’s order, and that in his thirty years of spreading Buddhism he produced more than ninety successors. Great MasterKyōshin is his posthumous title as founder of the Unmon sect.

20    An East Mountain means a real mountain.

21    Master Dōgen illustrated the principle in the previous sentence with the concreteexample of Mount Sumeru and the eight mountains that surround it.

22    Master Dōgen criticizes Master Unmon in, for example, Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III),Bukkyō. 23 “Unreliable” is zusan, lit., “edited by Zu [or To].” It is said that poems edited by To the time used the words “edited by Zu (or To)” to represent unreliability.Moku of the Song dynasty were very irregular and unreliable. Therefore people of 24 doing chores on the mountain. A monk comes by and asks the master, “Where doesMaster Gan of Mount Nansen in Chishu district (Master Nansen Fugan, 748–834) is Chapter Fourteen

what Master Nansen considered to be the aim of his life, but he asked his question as it, it is really handy.” (sickle. Where does Nansen’s road lead?” The master says, “And now that I can use thirty pennies.” The monk says, “I didn’t ask about you paying thirty pennies for the Nansen’s road lead?” The master holds up his sickle and says, “I got this sickle for Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 54). The monk wanted to know only of the idealistic aim but also to recognize concrete facts. The monk insisted that if asking for directions. Master Nansen recommended the monk not to be conscious that he was acting in reality. he also wanted to know what the real aim of our life is. Master Nansen’s answer was

25    to achieve the same result by yelling Master Ōbaku Kiun (d. c. 855) was known for striking his disciples, including Master and feeling (see for example Rinzai Gigen (c. 815–867), to impress on them that reality is different from thinking Shinji-shōbōgenzō,katsu! (ibid.).pt. 1, no. 27). Master Rinzai used

26    Kattō, “arrowroot and wisteria,” “entanglement,” or “the complicated,” is the titleKattō. of Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III),

27    Rokugon-tokushi.one who becomes a monk in form but who has no will to the truth.Upananda, Kālodāyin, Chanda, Aśvaka, and Punarvasu. It is said that their misconduct caused the formulation of precepts. The band of six shavelings in the Buddha’s order were Nanda,Tokushi, shaveling (lit., “bald child”) means some-

28    The original word, directing criticism at someone to whom he does not need to be polite. nanji, means “you.” Master Dōgen usually uses this form when 29 Rivers, streams, lakes, etc. are not only an abstraction but are realized at the foot of a real mountain.

30    In other words, on the basis of reality.

31    Shichijū-hachi-ō, lit., “seven horizontals and eight verticals.”

32    Sixty-two (Vol. III), zazen. See Chapter Seven, Shushō-soku-fu-mu. Master Nangaku Ejō’s expression of practice and experience inHensan.Senjō; Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Inmo; and Chapter

33    Master Dōgen uses the formula A sees A, A meets A, A restricts A, A succeeds A, etc., to suggest the real existence of A. 34 Alludes to the metaphor of issui-shiken, “one water, four views.” The goddesses who

Human beings see water as water. See also Chapter Three, are sometimes depicted floating in the sky in old Buddhist pictures see water as a string of pearls. Fish see water as a palace or as beautiful flowers. Demons hate water as pus and blood, because it puts out their fires and washes away their impurities. Genjō-kōan.

35       The Sanskrit maṇi, which means gem, in this case suggests the cintā maṇi, a fabled gem capable of fulfilling every wish, said to be obtained from the Dragon King ofthe sea.

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36       II), Shinjitsu-nintai,Shinjin-gakudō;Shohō-jissō; Yui-butsu-yo-butsu.the words of Master Chōsha Keishin. See Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol.Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Sangai-yuishin;Hensan; and Chapter Ninety-Chapter Fifty

one (Vol. IV), (Vol. III),

37       wind, and space. (Interpreting the concepts more broadly: solids, liquids, combustion,In ancient Indian cosmology, the physical world is constructed of five elements, calledfive wheels or five circles (pañca-maṇḍalaka in Sanskrit): circles of earth, water, fire, gases, and space.)

38       See also discussion of a steelyard in Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II), Muchū-setsumu. 39 The Daihōshakkyō, fascicle 87.

40    appears in the second sentence of this chapter. Jū-i, “abide in place,” is short for jūhō-i, “abide in place in the Dharma,” which

41    Kyū-en refers to nine famous deep river pools in China.

42    Bunshithe Sui dynasty (581–618) but some scholars suspect that it was written later andfalsely dated earlier.is a Daoist book in ten volumes. The book is said to have been written during

43    Examples such as the humidity of a flame, the dryness of wit, and realization in the sounds of the valley streams, negate the common-sense conception of the scope of water. 44 Rivers and water, or entity and substance, are one.

45 Reality (rivers and oceans) includes both the material (water), and the meaningful(human worlds, Buddhist lands). 46 Concepts like “downward” originate with concrete facts like the location of earth andwater (see Chapter Forty-two [Vol. III], Tsuki).

47    We remember that “downward” is only a concept, not an actual place.

48    Shi-i, or “four corners”—northwest, southwest, southeast, and northeast.

49    to “the world of Dharma” as a religious concept. Hōgū-hokkai. Hōsuggests shigū, suggests the four corners. shihō, the four directions—north, south, east, and west. Hōgū-hokkai suggests concrete reality, as opposed

50    the world of matter. Musōten, from the Sanskrit asaṃjñi-sattvāḥ, is explained as a group of heavens in

51    Avīci is the Sanskrit name for the worst kind of hell.

52    In the view of dragons and fish, mountains may be flowing.

53    upon Buddhist patriarchs’ teaching. Given that even things which we take for granted are open to doubt, we should rely Chapter Fourteen

54    action. Nen-itsu,Itsulit., “to pick up one.” means one. Nen means to pinch, or to pick up; it suggests an

55    Master Yōka Genkaku, in his poem Shōdōka.

56    Mugen-jigoku, Avīci.      “incessant hell,” or “hell without respite,” represents the Sanskrit

57    Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra.Nyakuju-nyakuseki. Alludes to the story of the Buddha’s past life recorded in theSee note 159 in Chapter Twelve, Kesa-kudoku.

58    Nyakuden-nyakuri.teen, Den-e. Alludes to the Lotus Sutra (3.72–74). See note 9 in Chapter Thir-

59    The name of a mountain in modern Kansu province in China. The Daoist sage Kōsei lived in a cave on Kōdō Mountain.

60    Kahō, lit., “Flower Fiefdom,” was a legendary utopian realm.

61    of Chinese history (dates estimated as 2852–2205 Kōtei, the Yellow Emperor, was the third of the five rulers in the legendary periodthe secret of immortality. The story is recorded in volume four of the Daoist textattributed to Zhuangzi.  B.C.E.). He visited Kōsei to ask

Sōshi,

62    uses fishing to suggest the principle of the mutual relation between subject and objectThe action of fishing connects subject (fisherman) and object (fish), so Master Dōgenin action.

63    the river’s waves (that is, if we do the impossible), we can meet the fish with the and hoping to find among his passengers a human being with the will to the truth. Master Tokujō’s brother disciple Master Dōgo Enchi (769–835) recommended Mastergolden scales (realize our ideal) for the first time. Master Kassan covered his ears, Kassan Zenne (805–881) to go and visit Master Tokujō by the river. They had a lively Master Sensu Tokujō (dates unknown), a successor of Master Yakusan Igen (745–conversation, at the conclusion of which Master Tokujō said that if we fish out all and thus received Master Tokujō’s affirmation. Finally, Master Tokujō told Master828)Kassan to go deep into the mountains and just teach the Dharma to one student or half a student. Master Dōgen quoted at length this story about Master Tokujō and Master Kassan in the . After receiving the Dharma from Master Yakusan he went to live on a river in Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 90. sensu means boatman), the Katei Valley of the Shushu district, working as a boatman (

64    Master Kassan Zenne.

65    state of buddha is meeting buddha. In this sentence, he substitutes Tokujō for buddha. In Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Kenbutsu, Master Dōgen teaches that a person in the

66    kōsen shō setsu jin,Hito o sessuru, lit., “to receive people.” The story in the “he received people on a boat on the Katei River.” Shinji-shōbōgenzō says zaike

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67    Treasure (value), marshes (nature), space (the stage of action), and mountains (reality)correspond to the four faces of reality outlined in the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths.

68    In zazen, mountains exist as they are.

69    the sky. The earth is the earth. Mountains are mountains. Water is water. Monks areMaster Unmon Bun’en says, “Venerable monks! Do not have delusions. The sky isUnmonkōroku, Vol. 1). monks. Laymen are laymen” (

70    Acknowledgment is due to Professor Carl Bielefeldt of Stanford University for his exemplary translation of this chapter.

71    1240.

[Chapter Fifteen]

                                                     Busso                                             

The Buddhist Patriarchs

Translator’s Note: Butsu means “buddha” or “Buddhist,” so means “patriarch,” and therefore busso means Buddhist patriarchs. Master Dōgen revered buddhas of the past; he also esteemed the Buddhist transmission from buddha to buddha. Furthermore he believed in the continuity of the Buddhist order; the successive leaders of the Buddhist order held an important place in his thought. Here Master Dōgen enumerates the names of the patriarchs of the Buddhist order, and in doing so, he confirms the Buddhist tradition they maintained.

[209]  The realization of the Buddhist patriarchs1 is [our] taking up the Buddhist patriarchs and paying homage to them. This is not of only the past, the present, and the future; and it may be ascendant even to the ascendant [reality] of buddha.2 It is just to enumerate those who have maintained and relied upon the real features3 of Buddhist patriarchs, to do prostrations to them, and to meet them. Making the virtue of the Buddhist patriarchs manifest and uphold itself, we have dwelled in and maintained it, and have bowed to and experienced it.

[210]  (1) Great Master4 Vipaśyin Buddha

—here5 called Kōsetsu [Universal Preaching]6

(2)    Great Master Śikhin Buddha

—here called Ka [Fire]

(3)    Great Master Viśvabhū Buddha

—here called Issaiji [All Benevolent]

(4)    Great Master Krakucchanda Buddha

—here called Kinsennin [Gold Wizard]

(5)    Great Master Kanakamuni Buddha

—here called Konjikisen [Golden Wizard]

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(6)    Great Master Kāśyapa Buddha

—here called Onkō [Drinking Brightness]

(7)    Great Master Śākyamuni Buddha

—here called Nōninjakumoku [Benevolence and Serenity]

[1] Great Master Mahākāśyapa7 [2] Great Master Ānanda8

[3]  Great Master Śāṇavāsa9

[4]  Great Master Upagupta10 [5] Great Master Dhītika11

[6]  Great Master Micchaka12

[7]  Great Master Vasumitra13

[8]  Great Master Buddhanandhi[9] Great Master Baddhamitra

[10]  Great Master Pārśva14

[11]  Great Master Puṇyayaśas15 [12] Great Master Aśvaghoṣa16

[13] Great Master Kapimala17

                    [14] Great Master Nāgārjuna18

—also [called] Ryūju [Dragon Tree] or Ryūshō [Dragon Excellence] or Ryūmō [Dragon Might]

[15]  Great Master Kāṇadeva19

[16]  Great Master Rāhulabhadra20 [17] Great Master Saṃghanandi21 [18] Great Master Geyāśata

[19]  Great Master Kumāralabdha22

Chapter Fifteen

[20]  Great Master Gayata23

[21]  Great Master Vasubandhu24 [22] Great Master Manura25

[23] Great Master Hakulenayasas26 [24] Great Master Siṃha27

[25]  Great Master Vaśasuta28

[26]  Great Master Puṇyamitra29 [27] Great Master Prajñātara30

[28]  [1] Great Master Bodhidharma31

[29]  [2] Great Master Eka32

[30]  [3] Great Master Sōsan33

[31]  [4] Great Master Dōshin34 [32] [5] Great Master Kōnin35 [33] [6] Great Master Enō36

[34] [7] Great Master Gyōshi37 [35] [8] Great Master Kisen38 [36] [9] Great Master Igen39

[37]  [10] Great Master Donjō40

[38]  [11] Great Master Ryōkai41 [39] [12] Great Master Dōyō42 [40] [13] Great Master Dōhi43

[41]  [14] Great Master Kanshi44

[42]  [15] Great Master Enkan45       67c

[43]  [16] Great Master Kyōgen46

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[44]  [17] Great Master Gisei47

[45]  [18] Great Master Dōkai48

[46]  [19] Great Master Shijun49 [47] [20] Great Master Seiryō50

[48] [21] Great Master Sōkaku51 [49] [22] Great Master Chikan52

[50] [23] Great Master Nyojō53

[222] Dōgen, during the summer retreat of the first year of the Hōgyō era54 of the great kingdom of Song, met and served my late master, the eternal buddha of Tendō, the Great Master. I perfectly realized the act of prostrating to, and humbly receiving upon my head, this Buddhist Patriarch; it was [the

realization of] buddhas alone, together with buddhas.55

                                        Shōbōgenzō Busso

                                        Written at Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji in the Uji

                                           district of Yōshū,56 Japan, and preached to the                                            assembly there on the third day of the first                                            lunar month in the second year of Ninji.57

Notes

1     Busso. So,Dōgen often uses the term past. Therefore, for want of a more neutral alternative, the translation “patriarch” has “patriarch” or “ancestor,” is originally neuter in gender. However, Master so for people of the present as well as for people of the been preferred throughout the present volume.

2     Butsu-kōjō. See Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Butsu-kōjō-no-ji. 3      Menmoku, or “face and eyes.”

4     form of the recitation practiced in Japan .master directly. The corresponding term in Sanskrit is abbot, teacher). In the recitation of the names of the Buddhist patriarchs in Japan, the “Great Master” is daioshō give a natural rhythm to the reciting. Appendix III shows the standard daioshō. The honorific term oshō was used in China to address aupādhyāya (lit., preceptor, word

5     China and Japan.

6     yaku-shōbōgenzōfor Sanskrit names and words are the Williams’s patriarchs. These names were rendered into Sanskrit in Nishijima Roshi’s The names of the seven ancient buddhas and the first twenty-eight patriarchs (with the exception of the twelfth, Master Aśvaghoṣa) are represented by Chinese characters that transliterate the pronunciation of the original Sanskrit name. In general, sources Lents for the names of the twentieth, twenty-second, twenty-third, and twenty-fifthSanskrit-English Dictionary.(Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese These two sources do not give Sanskrit equiv-Zengaku-daijiten) relying on a variety of other and Sir Monier Monier-Gendaigo-

both in Chinese characters representing the Sanskrit pronunciation and in Chinese sources. The names of the seven ancient buddhas and Master Nāgārjuna are given characters that have meaning.

7     consisting of Vinaya (precepts) and Sutra (the Buddha’s discourses)—was codified One of the Buddha’s ten great disciples, said to be foremost among the ten great born into a brahman family on the outskirts of Rājagṛha, and became the Buddha’s disciples in nonattachment, and foremost at the First Council at Rājagṛha. At the First Council, in 483 entered the state of an arhat after only eight days. After the Buddha’s death, Master disciple in the third year after the Buddha’s realization of the truth. It is said that he Mahā kāśyapa succeeded the Buddha as leader of the Buddhist order, and organized dhūta, the practice of austerity. He was B.C.E., the Pāli canon so as to be passed on through recitation to future generations. One hundred years

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later, in 383 Here the existing Vinaya and Sutra were supplemented by commentaries which laterHere two traditions emerged: the School of the Elders (Theravādins), and the members of the Great Community (Mahāsaṃghika, later to develop into the Mahayana). A third Council was held at Patna in 253 B.C.E., a Second Council was held to discuss revision of the Vinaya.B.C.E. under the patronage of King Aśoka.

and Abhi dharma were later written on palm leaves in the monasteries of Sri Lanka become known as the Abhidharma. The Tripiṭaka (three baskets) of Vinaya, Sutra, retired to Kukkuṭapāda Mountain and passed away while sitting in zazen. See florin the first century example Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), B.C.E. Master Mahākāśyapa, having chosen Ānanda as his successor, Yoji.

8     Also one of the Buddha’s ten great disciples, foremost at remembering the Buddha’s preaching. The Buddha’s half brother, and only a few days younger than the Buddha himself, he served the Buddha as an attendant monk. Though a monk for forty-four have become an arhat shortly before the First Council at Rājagṛha, where he was to years, he had not realized the truth when the Buddha died. However, he is said to recall the Buddha’s discourses for posterity.

9     See for example Chapter Twelve, Kesa-kudoku.

10    See for example Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV), Vol. IV), Shizen-biku. Shukke-kudoku; and Chapter Ninety (

11    (A native of the ancient Indian state of Magadha. See for example Chapter Eighty-sixVol. IV), Shukke-kudoku.

12    A native of central India. His name is written either as Micchaka or as Miccaka. 13 Seventy-seven (Vol. IV), where he compiled the A native of the northern Indian state of Gandhāra, born at the end of the first century C.E. He is said to have organized, in the kingdom of Kaniṣka, the Fourth Council, Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣa-śāstra.Kokū. See for example Chapter

14    A native of central India. He is also said to have presided over the Fourth Council. He was called the Side Saint, because he made a vow never to sleep like a corpse, on his back. See for example Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji.

15    A native of the ancient Indian state of Kośala.

16    The Sanskrit name is represented not phonetically but by the Chinese characters aśvaghoṣa literally means “horse whinny” and in the source text the memyō, “horse form. Buddhist writings include the whinny.” A native of Śrāvastī, he was distinguished in music and in literature. HisBuddhacarita, a biography of the Buddha in metric

17    A native of the central Indian state of Magadha. It is said that at first he led a non-Buddhist group of three thousand disciples, but later he met Master Aśvaghoṣa, realized the truth, and spread the Dharma through the west of India.

Chapter Fifteen

18    Ryūju, the Chinese character for tree, each case, The three Chinese names for Master Nāgārjuna are Ryūju, Ryūshō, and Ryūmō. Inryū, “dragon,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit ju, may represent either the sound or the meaningnāga. In the case of of the Sanskrit      Master Nāgārjuna lived in the second or third century arjuna, which is the name of a tree. C.E. He was born into a

five (Vol. IV), and compiled many fundamental Mahayana texts, including the the Mahayana from a venerable old The brahman family in southern India. When he became a monk he first studied the Hinayana canon, but later journeyed to the Himalayas and learned the teachings ofMahā prajñāpāramitopadeśaKesa-kudoku;Shime; Chapter Eighty-nine (Vol. IV), Chapter Seventy (Vol. II), is also attributed to him. See for example, Chapterbhikṣu. Eventually he succeeded Master KapimalaHotsu-bodaishin; Shinjin-inga;Madhyamaka-kārikā.and Chapter NinetyChapter Eighty-

Twelve,

(Vol. IV), Shizen-biku.

19    Also called Āryadeva. He lived in southern India in the third century and is said to Called Kāṇadeva because of his loss of an eye (the Sanskrit kāṇa means one-eyed).

Busshō. have been killed by a non-Buddhist. See for example Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II),

20    A native of Kapilavastu, in present-day Nepal.

21    A native of the city of Śrāvastī, the capital of the ancient state of Kośala.

22    nine (Vol. IV), See for example Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV), Shinjin-inga. Sanji-no-gō; and Chapter Eighty-

23    gō; A native of northern India. See for example Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV), and Chapter Eighty-nine (Vol. IV), Shinjin-inga.  Sanji-no-

24    Born in the fifth century in Puru Sapura (close to present-day Peshawar), the capital of brothers Asaṅga and Buddhasiṃla were also prominent Buddhist philosophers of the Gandhara. His many works include the Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya. Master Vasubandhu’s

Mahayana Buddhism in India. Time. Their teaching formed the basis of the Yogācāra school. The Yogācāra school and the Madhyamika school of Master Nāgārjuna are seen as the two major streams of

25    age of thirty. The son of the king of Nadai (Sanskrit equivalent unknown). Became a monk at the 26 Born into a brahman family. He spread the Dharma in central India.

27    Born into a brahman family in central India. He spread the Dharma in the northern of Kaśmīra. See Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV), state of Kaśmīra (present-day Kashmir). It is said that he was executed by the kingSanji-no-gō.

28    A native of western India.

29    A native of southern India.

241

30    (Born into a brahman family in eastern India. See for example Chapter Twenty-oneVol. II), Kankin; and Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III), Kūge.

31    III), The third son of a southern Indian king. Having succeeded Master Prajñā tara, he sailed to China during the reign of Emperor Bu (r. 502–549) of the Liang dynasty and became the First Buddhist Patriarch in China. He went to the Songshan Mountains in central northern China to practice zazen, and transmitted the Dharma to MasterTaiso Eka. See for example Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Kattō;Zanmai-ō-zanmai. Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III), Butsudō; and Gyōji; Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. Chapter Forty-six (Vol.

IV),

32    Master Taiso Eka (Ch. Dazu Huike). See for example Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Kattō; and Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), Sesshin-sesshō.Gyōji;

33    Master Kanchi Sōsan (Ch. Jianzhi Sengcan). It is said that he was already in his fortiesShinjinmei (Inscription when he became a disciple of Master Taiso Eka. He wrote the

Zhou dynasty, he secluded himself in the mountains for ten years. on Believing Mind). To escape persecution by Emperor Bu (r. 561–578) of the Northern

34    at the age of fourteen, and succeeded him after nine years. Died in 651.Master Daii Dōshin (Ch. Dayi Daoxin). Became a disciple of Master Kanchi Sōsan

35    Master Daiman Kōnin (Ch. Daman Hongren) (688–761). See for example ChapterTwenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō.

36    Master Daikan Enō (Ch. Dajian Huineng) (638–713). Spent eight months working as a temple servant at Master Daiman Kōnin’s temple, in which time he received the he lived on Sōkeizan and spread Buddhism from there for forty years. Master Dōgen master’s affirmation and the authentic transmission of the Buddhist robe. After that revered Master Daikan Enō very highly as “the Founding Patriarch” and “the eternal Twenty-two (Vol. II), buddha.” See for example Chapter One, Busshō; Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Bendōwa; Chapter Seven, Butsudō.Gyōji; Chapter Forty-four Senjō; Chapter

(Vol. III), Kobusshin; and Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III),

37    Forty-nine (Vol. III), Master Seigen Gyōshi (Ch. Qingyuan Xingsi). Died in 740. See for example ChapterButsudō.

38    Thatched HutMaster Sekitō Kisen (Ch. Shitou Xiqian) (700–790). Had his head shaved by the agedafter succeeding Master Seigen, he built a hut on a rock, earning himself the nicknameMaster Daikan Enō, who advised him to follow Master Seigen Gyōshi. It is said that Sekitōsōan-no-uta). See for example Chapter(Songs from Seki tō’s

Sekitō (On Top of the Rock). He wrote the

Forty-nine (Vol. III), ) and the Butsudō.Sandōkai (Experiencing the State

39    the age of seventeen, he learned the sutras and commentaries, kept the precepts, andMaster Yakusan Igen (Ch. Yueshan Weiyan) (745–828). Having become a monk at seven (Vol. II), met Master Sekitō Kisen, at whose suggestion he also visited Master Baso Dōitsu.Eventually he became Master Sekitō’s successor. See for example Chapter Twenty-Zazenshin.

Chapter Fifteen

40    Sixty-three (Vol. III), under Master Hyakujō Ekai, after whose death he became the disciple of Master Ungan Donjō (Ch. Yunyan Tansheng) (782–841). Practiced for twenty yearsMujō-seppō; and Chapter

Yakusan. See for example Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III), Ganzei.

41 age of twenty-one and traveled around visiting Buddhist masters including MasterMaster Tōzan Ryōkai (Ch. Dongshan Liangjie) (807–869). Became a monk at the

Ganzei;sesshō; State of a Jewel-Mirror and later the successor of Master Ungan. He wrote the Nansen Fugan and Master Isan Reiyū. At the latter’s suggestion he became the disciple Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III), and Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), ). See for example Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), Mujō-seppō;Shunjū. Hōkyōzanmai (Samādhi, theSesshin-

Chapter Sixty-three (Vol. III),

42 Master Ungo Dōyō (Ch. Yunju Daoying) (835?–902). Having succeeded Master Tozan, he spread the Dharma from Ungozan for thirty years. It is said that his disciples always numbered at least fifteen hundred. 43 Master Dōan Dōhi (Ch. Tongan Daopi). He lived on Hōseizan in the Kōshū district, but his life history is not known.

44    Master Dōan Kanshi (Ch. Tongan Guanzhi). His life history is unclear.

45    Master Ryōzan Enkan (Ch. Liangshan Yuanguan). His life history is also unclear.

46    Master Taiyō was about to die, he entrusted his robe, Hōen to give to Master Fuzan’s disciple Tōsu Gisei, thus making Master Tōsu his certain Master Chitsu, then traveled around learning Buddhism under various mastersbefore becoming the disciple and eventually the successor of Master Ryōzan. When successor. See Master Taiyō Kyōgen (Ch. Dayang Jingxuan) (942–1027). Became a monk under aShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 43.       pātra, etc. to Master Fuzan

47    Master Tōsu Gisei (Ch. Touzi Yiqing) (1032–1083). Became a monk at the age of two volumes. See for example Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III), entrusted by Master Taiyō to Master Fuzan, Master Tōsu succeeded Master Taiyō as the tenth-generation descendant in the lineage of Master Seigen Gyōshi. Master Rinzai’s lineage). Receiving the portrait, shoes and other personal effectsseven. Later spent about six years in the order of Master Fuzan Hōen (a member ofMujō-seppō; and ChapterGoroku in

Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajō.

48    Master Fuyō Dōkai (Ch. Furong Daokai) (1043–1118). Having realized the Dharma under Master Tōsu, he preached on Taiyōzan and at other temples. The Song emperorbut Master Fuyō refused to accept them and was consequently banished. Later heKisō (r. 1101–1126) bestowed on him a purple robe and the title Zen Master Jōshō, ancient style. See for example Chapter Fourteen, (was pardoned and built himself a thatched hut on Fuyōzan, where he lived in theVol. III), Kajō. Sansuigyō; and Chapter Sixty-four

49    Fuyō, he lived on Tankazan, with such disciples as Master Wanshi Shōgaku andMaster Tanka Shijun (Ch. Danxia Zichun) (1064–1117). Having succeeded Master

243

Master Shinketsu Seiryō.

hall”) was probably one of Master Tanka’s names.Collection) is also a record of the words of Master Tanka Shijun. Kidō (lit., “emptyGoroku in two volumes. The six-volume Kidōshū (Kidō

50    umes. Master Shinketsu Seiryō (Ch. Zhenxie Qingliao) (1089–1151). Goroku in two vol-

51    Master Tendō Sōkaku (Ch. Tiantong Zongjue). Though he was the grandfather inBuddhism of Master Tendō Nyojō, his life history is not known clearly.

52    Master Setchō Chikan (Ch. Xuedou Zhijian) (1105–1192). See for example ChapterMitsugo. Fifty-one (Vol. III),

53    Master Tendō Nyojō (Ch. Tiantong Rujing) (1163–1228). After realizing the Dharma in Master Chikan’s order, he traveled around and taught at temples in many districts for forty years. While living at Jyōji ji, in 1224 he received an imperial edict to become Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), for example Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), the master of Keitokuzenji on Tendōzan, where he was to teach Master Dōgen. SeeZanmai-ō-zanmai.Gyōji; Chapter Fifty-nine (Vol. III), Baike; and

54    1225.

55    are real form.” (LS 1.684)quoted: “Buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all butsu.“Perfectly realize” is These words are from a sentence in the gujin. “Buddhas alone, together with buddhas” is Lotus Sutra which Master Dōgen oftenyui-butsu-yo-dharmas

56 the time, looking up to China, borrowed the Chinese name, probably for the district Yōshū was the Japanese pronunciation of the name of a district in China. People of

then called Yamashiro-no-kuni. The area corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture.

57 1241.

[Chapter Sixteen] Shisho

The Certificate of Succession

Translator’s Note: Shi means “succession” or “transmission.” Sho means “certificate.” So shisho means “the certificate of succession.” Buddhism is not only theory but also practice or experience. Therefore it is impossible for a Buddhist disciple to attain the Buddhist truth only by reading Buddhist sutras or listening to a master’s lectures. The disciple must live with a master and study the master’s behavior in everyday life. After a disciple has learned the master’s life and has realized the Buddhist truth in his or her own life, the master gives a certificate to the disciple, certifying the transmission of the truth from master to disciple. This certificate is called shisho. From a materialistic viewpoint, the certificate is only cloth and ink, and so it cannot hold religious meaning or be revered as something with religious value. But Buddhism is a realistic religion, and Buddhists find religious value in many concrete traditions. The certificate is one such traditional object that is revered by Buddhists. Therefore Master Dōgen found much value in this certificate. In this chapter he explains why the certificate is revered by Buddhists, and records his own experiences of seeing such certificates in China.

[3] Buddhas, without exception, receive the Dharma from buddhas, buddhato-buddha, and patriarchs, without exception, receive the Dharma from patriarchs, patriarch-to-patriarch; this is experience of the [Buddha’s] state,1 this is the one-to-one transmission, and for this reason it is “the supreme state of bodhi.” It is impossible to certify a buddha without being a buddha, and no one becomes a buddha without receiving the certification of a buddha. Who but a buddha can esteem this state as the most honored and approve it as the supreme? When we receive the certification of a buddha, we realize the state independently, without a master,2 and we realize the state independently, without our self.3 For this reason, we speak of buddhas really experiencing the succession, and of patriarchs really experiencing the same state. The

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import of this truth cannot be clarified by anyone other than buddhas. How could it be the thought of [bodhisattvas in] the ten states or the state of balanced awareness?4 How much less could it be supposed by teachers of sutras, teachers of commentaries, and the like? Even if we explain it to them, they will not be able to hear it, because it is transmitted between buddhas, buddha-to-buddha.

[5]    Remember, the Buddha’s state of truth is the perfect realization only of buddhas, and without buddhas it has no time. The state is like, for example, stones succeeding each other as stones, jewels succeeding each other as jewels, chrysanthemums succeeding each other, and pine trees certifying each other, at which time the former chrysanthemum and the latter chrysanthemum are each real as they are, and the former pine and the latter pine are each real as they are. People who do not clarify the state like this, even if they encounter the truth authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha, cannot even suspect what kind of truth is being expressed; they do not possess the understanding that buddhas succeed each other and that patriarchs experience the same state. It is pitiful that though they appear to be the Buddha’s progeny, they are not the Buddha’s children, and they are not child-buddhas.

[6]    Sōkei,5 on one occasion, preaches to the assembly, “From the Seven Buddhas to Enō there are forty buddhas, and from Enō to the Seven Buddhas there are forty patriarchs.”6 This truth is clearly the fundamental teaching to which the Buddhist patriarchs have authentically succeeded. Among these “Seven Buddhas,” some have appeared during the past kalpa of resplendence7 and some have appeared in the present kalpa of the wise.8 At the same time, to connect in a line the face-to-face transmissions of the forty patriarchs is the truth of Buddha, and is the succession of Buddha. This being so, going up from the Sixth Patriarch to the Seven Buddhas, there are forty patriarchs who are the buddha successors, and going down from the Seven Buddhas to

the  Sixth Patriarch, the forty buddhas must be the buddha successors. The truth of buddhas, and the truth of patriarchs, is like this. Without experience of the state, without being a Buddhist patriarch, we do not have the wisdom of a buddha and do not have the perfect realization of a patriarch. Without a buddha’s wisdom, we lack belief in the state of buddha. Without a patriarch’s perfect realization, we do not experience the same state as a patriarch. To speak of forty patriarchs, for the present, is just to cite those who are close.

Thus, the succession from buddha to buddha is profound and eternal; it is without regression or deviation and without interruption or cessation. The fundamental point is this: although Śākyamuni Buddha realizes the truth before the Seven Buddhas, it has taken him a long time to succeed to the Dharma of Kāśyapa Buddha.9 Although he realizes the truth on the eighth day of the twelfth month, thirty years after his descent and birth, [this] is realization of the truth before the Seven Buddhas; it is the same realization of the truth shoulder-to-shoulder with, and in time with, the many buddhas; it is realization of the truth before the many buddhas; and it is realization of the truth after all the many buddhas. There is also the principle to be mastered in practice that Kāśyapa Buddha succeeds to the Dharma of Śākyamuni Buddha. Those who do not know this principle do not clarify the Buddha’s state of truth. Without clarifying the Buddha’s state of truth, they are not the Buddha’s successors. The Buddha’s successors means the Buddha’s children. Śākyamuni Buddha, on one occasion, causes Ānanda to ask,10 “Whose disciples are the buddhas of the past?” Śākyamuni Buddha says, “The buddhas of the past are the disciples of Śākyamuni Buddha.” The Buddhist doctrine of all the buddhas is like this.

[9] To serve these buddhas and to accomplish the succession of Buddha is just the Buddha’s truth [practiced by] every buddha. This Buddha’s truth is always transmitted in the succession of the Dharma, at which time there is inevitably a certificate of succession. Without the succession of Dharma, we would be non-Buddhists of naturalism. If the Buddha’s truth did not dictate the succession of Dharma, how could it have reached the present day? Therefore, in [the transmission] that is [from] buddha [to] buddha, a certificate 68c of succession, of buddha succeeding buddha, is inevitably present, and a certificate of succession, of buddha succeeding buddha, is received. As regards the concrete situation of the certificate of succession, some succeed to the Dharma on clarifying the sun, the moon, and the stars, and some succeed to the Dharma on being made to get the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow;11 some receive a kaṣāya; some receive a staff; some receive a sprig of pine; some receive a whisk;12 some receive an uḍumbara flower; and some receive a robe of golden brocade.13 There have been successions with straw sandals14 and successions with a bamboo stick.15 When such successions of the Dharma are received, some write a certificate of succession with blood from a finger,

some write a certificate of succession with blood from a tongue, and some perform the succession of Dharma by writing [a certificate] with oil and milk; these are all certificates of succession. The one who has performed the succession and the one who has received it are both the Buddha’s successors. Truly, whenever [Buddhist patriarchs] are realized as Buddhist patriarchs, the succession of the Dharma is inevitably realized. When [the succession] is realized, many Buddhist patriarchs [find that] though they did not expect it, it has come, and though they did not seek it, they have succeeded to the Dharma. Those who have the succession of Dharma are, without exception, the buddhas and the patriarchs.

[12]  Since the twenty-eighth patriarch16 came from the west, the fundamental principle has been rightly heard in the Eastern Lands that there is in Buddhism the succession of the Dharma. Before that time, we never heard it at all. [Even] in the Western Heavens, it is neither attained nor known by teachers of commentaries, Dharma teachers, and the like. It is also beyond [bodhisattvas of] the ten sacred and the three clever states. Teachers of mantric techniques who intellectually study the Tripiṭaka17 are not able even to suspect that it exists. Deplorably, though they have received the human body which is a vessel for the state of truth, they have become uselessly entangled in the net of theory, and so they do not know the method of liberation and they do not hope for the opportunity to spring free. Therefore, we should learn the

69a     state of truth in detail, and we should concentrate our resolve to realize the state in practice.

[13]  Dōgen, when in Song [China], had the opportunity to bow before certificates of succession, and there were many kinds of certificate. One among them was that of the veteran master Iichi Seidō18 who had hung his traveling staff at Tendō [Temple]. He was a man from the Etsu district, and was the former abbot of Kōfukuji. He was a native of the same area as my late master. My late master always used to say, “For familiarity with the state, ask Iichi Seidō!” One day Seidō said, “Admirable old [calligraphic] traces are prized possessions of the human world. How many of them have you seen?” Dōgen said, “I have seen few.” Then Seidō said, “I have a scroll of old calligraphy in my room. It is a roster. I will let you see it, venerable brother.” So saying, he fetched it, and I saw that it was a certificate of succession. It was a certificate of the succession of Hōgen’s19 lineage, and had been obtained from among the robes and pātra20 of an old veteran monk: it was not that of the venerable Iichi himself. The way it was written is as follows: “The first patriarch Mahākāśyapa realized the truth under Śākyamuni Buddha; Śākyamuni Buddha realized the truth under Kāśyapa Buddha. . . .” It was written like this. Seeing it, Dōgen decisively believed in the succession of the Dharma from rightful successor to rightful successor. [The certificate] was Dharma that I had never before seen. It was a moment in which the Buddhist patriarchs mystically respond to and protect their descendants. The feeling of gratitude was beyond endurance.

[15] The veteran monk Shūgetsu, while he was assigned to the post of head monk21 on Tendō, showed Dōgen a certificate of succession of Unmon’s lineage. The master directly above the person now receiving the certificate, and the Buddhist patriarchs of the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, were arranged in columns, and under those was the name of the person receiving the certificate. All the Buddhist patriarchs were directly aligned with the name of this new ancestral master. Thus, the more than forty generations from the Tathāgata all converged on the name of the new successor. For example, it was as if each of them had handed down [the Dharma] to the 69b new patriarch. Mahākāśyapa, Ānanda, and so on, were aligned as if [they belonged to] separate lineages.22 At that time, Dōgen asked Head Monk Shūgetsu, “Master, nowadays there are slight differences among the five sects23 in their alignment [of names]. What is the reason? If the succession from the Western Heavens has passed from rightful successor to rightful successor, how could there be differences?” Shūgetsu said, “Even if the difference were great, we should just study that the buddhas of Unmonzan are like this. Why is Old Master Śākyamuni honored by others? He is an honored one because he realized the truth. Why is Great Master Unmon honored by others? He is an honored one because he realized the truth.” Dōgen, hearing these words, had a little [clearer] understanding. Nowadays many leaders of the great temples24 in Kōsoshō and Setsukōshō25 are successors to the Dharma of Rinzai, Unmon, Tōzan, and so on. However, among fellows claiming to be distant descendants of Rinzai a certain wrongness is sometimes contrived; namely, they attend the order of a good counselor, and cordially request a hanging portrait and a scroll of Dharma words,26 which they stash away as standards of their succession to the Dharma. At the same time, there is a

group of dogs who, [prowling] in the vicinity of a venerable patriarch, cordially request Dharma words, portraits, and so on, which they hoard away to excess; then, when they become senior in years, they pay money to government officials and they seek to get a temple, [but] when they are assigned as abbots they do not receive the Dharma from the master [who gave them] the Dharma words and the portrait. They receive the Dharma from fellows of fame and repute of the present generation, or from old veterans who are intimate with kings and ministers, and when they do so they have no interest in getting the Dharma but are only greedy for fame and reputation. It is deplorable that there are wrong customs like this in the corrupt age of the latter Dharma.

Among people like these, not one person has ever seen or heard the truth of

the Buddhist patriarchs, even in a dream. In general, with respect to the granting of Dharma words, portraits, and so forth, they may be given to lecturers of doctrine and laymen and laywomen, and they may be granted to temple servants, tradesmen, and the like. This principle is clear from the records of many masters. Sometimes, when some undeserving person, out of a rash desire for evidence of succession to the Dharma, wants to get a certificate, [a master] will reluctantly take up the writing brush, though those who possess the truth hate to do so. In such a case the certificate does not follow the traditional form; [the master] just writes some brief note saying “succeeded me.” The method of recent times is simply to succeed to the Dharma as soon as one attains proficiency in the order of a particular master, with that master as one’s master. [That is to say, there are] people who, although they have not received certification from their former master, are occupying the long platform [of another temple] that they have visited only for entry into [the master’s] room and formal preaching in the Dharma hall; [but] when they break open the great matter while staying at [this other] temple, they do not have the time to uphold the transmission of their [original] master; instead they very often take this [new] master as their master. Another matter: there was a certain Library Chief27 Den, a distant descendant of Zen Master Butsugen, that is, Master Seion of Ryūmon.28 This Library Chief Den also had a certificate of succession in his possession. In the early years of the Kajō era,29 when this Library Chief Den had fallen ill, Venerable Elder30 Ryūzen, though a Japanese, had nursed Library Chief Den with care; so [Library Chief

Den] had taken out the certificate of succession and let [Ryūzen] bow before it to thank him for his nursing work, because his labors had been unremitting. [At that time Library Chief Den] had said, “This is something hardly seen. I will let you bow before it.” Eight years later, in the autumn of the sixteenth year of Kajō,31 when Dōgen first stopped on Tendōzan, Venerable Elder Ryūzen kindly asked Library Chief Den to let Dōgen see the certificate of succession. The form of the certificate was as follows: the forty-five patriarchs 70a from the Seven Buddhas to Rinzai were written in columns, while the masters following Rinzai formed a circle in which were transcribed the masters’ original Dharma names32 and their written seals.33 The [name of the] new successor was written at the end, under the date. We should know that the venerable patriarchs of Rinzai’s lineage have this kind of difference.

[21] My late master, the abbot of Tendō, profoundly cautioned people against bragging about succeeding to the Dharma. Truly, the order of my late master was the order of an eternal buddha, it was the revival of the monastery.34 He himself did not wear a patterned kaṣāya. He had a patched Dharma robe transmitted from Zen Master Dōkai of Fuyōzan,35 but he did not wear it [even] to ascend the seat of formal preaching in the Dharma hall. In short, he never wore a patterned Dharma robe throughout his life as an abbot. Those who had the mind and those who did not know things all praised him and honored him as a true good counselor. My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall would constantly admonish monks in all directions, saying, “Recently many people who have borrowed the name of the Patriarch’s truth randomly wear the Dharma robe and like [to have] long hair, and they sign their name with the title of master as a vessel of promotion. They are pitiful. Who will save them? It is lamentable that the old veterans of all directions have no will to the truth and so they do not learn the state of truth. There are few who have even seen and heard of the causes and conditions of the certificate of succession and the succession of the Dharma. Among a hundred thousand people there is not even one! This is [due to] the decline of the Patriarch’s truth.” He was always admonishing the old veterans of the whole country like this, but they did not resent him. In conclusion, wherever [people] are sincerely pursuing the truth they are able to see and to hear that the certificate of succession exists. “To have seen and 70b heard” may be “learning the state of truth” itself. On the Rinzai certificate of succession, first the [master] writes the name [of the successor], then writes “Disciple So-and-So served under me,” or writes “has attended my order,” or writes “entered my inner sanctum,” or writes “succeeded me,” and then lists the former patriarchs in order. [So] it also shows a trace of traditional36 instruction about the Dharma, the point being for the successor simply to meet a true good counselor, regardless of whether the meeting is in the end or in the beginning: this is the unassailable fundamental principle.37 Among [certificates of] the Rinzai [lineage], there are some written as described above—I saw them with my own eyes, and so I have written about them. [24] “Library Chief Ryōha38 is a person of the Ibu39 district, and now he is my disciple. [I,] Tokkō,40 served Kō41 of Kinzan. Kinzan succeeded Gon42 of Kassan. Gon succeeded En43 of Yōgi. En succeeded Tan44 of Kaie. Tan succeeded E45 of Yōgi. E succeeded En46 of Jimyō. En succeeded Shō47 of Fun’yō. Shō succeeded Nen48 of Shuzan. Nen succeeded Shō49 of Fuketsu. Shō succeeded Gyō of Nan’in.50 Gyō succeeded Shō51 of Kōke. Shō was the excellent rightful successor of the founding patriarch Rinzai.”52

[27] Zen Master Busshō Tokkō of Aikuōzan53 wrote this and presented it to Musai [Ryō]ha. When [Musai Ryōha] was the abbot of Tendō, my brother monk54 Chiyu secretly brought it to the Dormitory of Quiescence55 to show to Dōgen. That was the first time I saw it, the twenty-first day of the first lunar month of the seventeenth year of the great Song era of Kajō [1224]. How overjoyed I felt! This was just the mystical response of the Buddhist patriarchs. I burned incense and did prostrations, then opened and read it. My asking for this certificate of succession to be brought out [happened as follows]: Around the seventh lunar month of the previous year [1223], in the Hall of Serene Light, Chief Officer56 Shikō had told Dōgen about it in secret. Dōgen had asked the chief in passing, “Nowadays, what person would have one in their possession?” The chief said, “It seems that the venerable abbot has one in his room. In future, if you cordially request him to bring it out,

70c   he will surely show it [to you].” Dōgen, after hearing these words, never stopped hoping, day or night. So in that year (1224), I cordially put my humble request to brother monk Chiyu. I did so with all my heart, and the request was granted. The base on which [the certificate] was written was a

lining of white silk, and the cover was red brocade. The rod was precious stone, about nine inches57 long. [The scroll’s] extent was more than seven feet.58 It was never shown to an idle person. Dōgen thanked Chiyu at once, and then went straightway to visit the abbot, to burn incense and to bow in thanks to Master Musai. At that time Musai said, “This sort of thing is rarely able to be seen or known. Now, venerable brother, you have been able to know of it. This is just the real refuge in learning the truth.” At this Dōgen’s joy was uncontainable. Later, in the Hōgyō era,59 while traveling as a cloud between Tendaizan,60 Ganzan, and so on, Dōgen arrived at Mannenji61 in the Heiden district. The master of the temple at that time was Master Genshi from Fukushū province. Master [Gen]shi had been assigned following the retirement of the veteran patriarch Sokan and he had completely revitalized the temple. While I was making personal salutations, we had a conversation about the traditional customs of the Buddhist patriarchs, and while quoting the story of the succession from Daii62 to Kyōzan,63 the veteran master said, “Have you ever seen the certificate of succession [that I have] in my room?” Dōgen said, “How might I have the chance to see it?” The veteran master himself immediately rose and, holding aloft the certificate of succession,64 he said, “I have not shown this even to intimates, or even to those who have spent years serving as attendant monks. That is the Buddhist patriarchs’ Dharma instruction. However, while staying in the city on my usual visit to the city in order to meet the governor of the district, Genshi had the following dream: An eminent monk, whom I supposed to be Zen Master Hōjō of Daibai zan,65 appeared holding up a branch of plum blossoms and said, ‘If there is a real person who has crossed the side of a ship, do not begrudge [these] blossoms.’ Thus saying, he gave the plum blossoms to me. Unconsciously, 71a Genshi dreamed of chanting, ‘Even before he has stepped over the side of the ship, I would like to give him thirty strokes!’ In any event, five days have not passed and I meet you, venerable brother. What is more, you have crossed over the side of a ship. And this certificate of succession is written on cloth patterned with plum blossoms. You must be what Daibai was telling me about. You match the image in the dream exactly and so I have brought out [the certificate]. Venerable brother, would you like to receive the Dharma from me? If you desire it, I will not begrudge it.” Dōgen could not contain

his belief and excitement. Though he had said that I might request the certificate of succession, I only venerated and served him, burning incense and performing prostrations. Present at that time was a [monk] called Hōnei, an assistant for the burning of incense; he said that it was the first time he had seen the certificate of succession. Dōgen thought inwardly, “It would be very difficult indeed to see and to hear this sort of thing without the mystical help of the Buddhist patriarchs. Why should a stupid fellow from a remote land be so fortunate as to see it several times?” My sleeves became damp with the tears of gratitude. At that time the Vimalakīrti Room, the Great Hall,66 and the other rooms were quiet and empty; there was no one about. This certificate of succession was written on white silk patterned with plum blossoms fallen on the ground. It was more than nine inches across, and it extended to a length of more than a fathom. The rod was of a yellow precious stone and the cover was brocade. On the way back from Tendaizan to Tendō, Dōgen lodged at the overnight quarters of Goshōji on Daibaizan. [Here] I dreamed a mystical dream in which the ancestral master Daibai came and gave me a branch of plum flowers in bloom. A patriarch’s mirror is the most reliable thing there is. The blossoms on that branch were more than a foot in diameter. How could the plum blossoms not have been the flowers of the uḍumbara?67 It may be that the state in a dream and the state in waking consciousness are equally real. Dōgen, while in Song [China] and since returning to this country, 71b has not before related [the above] to any person.

[33]        Today in our lineage from Tōzan [the way] the certificate of succession is written is different from [the way] it is written in the Rinzai and other [lineages]. The founding patriarch Seigen,68 in front of Sōkei’s desk, personally drew pure blood from his finger to copy [the certificate] that the Buddhist patriarch had kept inside his robe, and [thus] he received the authentic transmission. Legend says that [the certificate] was written and transmitted using a mixture of this finger blood and blood from the finger of Sōkei. Legend says that in the case of the First Patriarch and the Second Patriarch also, a rite of mixing blood was performed.69 We do not write such words as “My disciple” or “Served me.” This is the form of the certificate of succession written and transmitted by the many buddhas and by the Seven Buddhas. So remember that Sōkei graciously mixed his own blood with the pure blood of Seigen, and Seigen mixed his own pure blood with Sōkei’s own blood, and that the founding patriarch, Master Seigen, was thus the only one to receive the direct certification—it was beyond other patriarchs. People who know this fact assert that the Buddha-Dharma was authentically transmitted only to Seigen.

[34]        My late master, the eternal buddha, the great master and abbot of Tendō, preached the following: “The buddhas, without exception, have experienced the succession of the Dharma. That is to say, Śākyamuni Buddha received the Dharma from Kāśyapa Buddha, Kāśyapa Buddha received the Dharma from Kanakamuni Buddha, and Kanakamuni Buddha received the Dharma from Krakucchanda Buddha.70 We should believe that the succession has passed like this from buddha to buddha until the present. This is the way of learning Buddhism.” Then Dōgen said, “It was after Kāśyapa Buddha had entered nirvana that Śākyamuni Buddha first appeared in the world and realized the truth. Furthermore, how could the buddhas of the kalpa of wisdom receive the Dharma from the buddhas of the kalpa of resplendence?71 What 71c [do you think] of this principle?” My late master said, “What you have just expressed is understanding [based on] listening to theories. It is the way of [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred stages or the three clever stages. It is not the way [transmitted by] the Buddhist patriarchs from rightful successor to rightful successor. Our way, transmitted from buddha to buddha, is not like that. We have learned that Śākyamuni Buddha definitely received the Dharma from Kāśyapa Buddha. We learn in practice that Kāśyapa Buddha entered nirvana after Śākyamuni Buddha succeeded to the Dharma. If Śākyamuni Buddha did not receive the Dharma from Kāśyapa Buddha, he might be the same as a naturalistic non-Buddhist. Who then could believe in Śākyamuni Buddha? Because the succession has passed like this from buddha to buddha, and has arrived at the present, the individual buddhas are all authentic successors, and they are neither arranged in a line nor gathered in a group. We just learn that the succession passes from buddha to buddha like this. It need not be related to the measurements of kalpas and the measurements of lifetimes mentioned in the teaching of the Āgamas. If we say that [the succession] was established solely by Śākyamuni Buddha, it has existed for little over two thousand years, [so] it is not old; and the successions [number] little more than forty, [so] they might be called recent. This Buddhist succession is not to be studied like that. We learn that Śākyamuni Buddha succeeded to the Dharma

of Kāśyapa Buddha, and we learn that Kāśyapa Buddha succeeded to the Dharma of Śākyamuni Buddha. When we learn it like this, it is truly the succession of the Dharma of the buddhas and the patriarchs.” Then Dōgen not only accepted, for the first time, the existence of Buddhist patriarchs’ succession of the Dharma, but also got rid of an old nest.72

                                        Shōbōgenzō Shisho

                                        Written at Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji on the                                         seventh day of the third lunar month in the                                         second year of Japan’s Ninji era,73 by [a                                         monk] who entered Song [China] and                                         received the transmission of the Dharma, 72a                                            śramaṇa Dōgen.

                                        The twenty-fourth day of the ninth lunar                                         month in [the first year of] Kangen.74 Hung                                         our traveling staffs at old Kippōji, a                                         thatched cottage in Yoshida district of

                                        Echizen.75 (written seal)76

Notes

1     Shōkai. Shōment and, by extension, the state which is exactly the same as the state of Gautama means experience. Kai means pledge, promise, accord, or binding agree-

Buddha.

2     Mushi-dokugo. This expression appears repeatedly in the Shōbōgenzō. Muji-dokugo. This is Master Dōgen’s variation.

4     or “subtle awareness. ”fifty-first stage is Buddhahood. The forty-first to the fiftieth stages are Jūchi-tōgaku. It is said that bodhisattvas pass through fifty-two stages on the way totōkaku, or “balanced awareness,” and the ultimate stage is jūchi, the ten sacred stages. Themyōkaku,

5     Master Daikan Enō (638–713), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin.

6     buddhas.dharma as the First Patriarch in China. He was the thirty-third patriarch, countingfrom the Buddha’s successor, Master Mahākāśyapa as the first patriarch. And he wasthe fortieth patriarch counting from Vipaśyin Buddha, the first of the seven ancient Master Daikan Enō was the Sixth Patriarch in China, counting from Master Bodhi -

7     third of the Seven Buddhas), in which one thousand buddhas appeared. Shōgonkō. The past age extending from the eternal past to Viśvabhū Buddha (the

8     Kengō, from the Sanskrit bhadra-kalpa, the age in which we are living now.

9     Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the Seven Buddhas.

10    Master Ānanda is the second patriarch in India. See Chapter Fifteen, Busso.

11    Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Refers to the transmission between Master Bodhidharma and Master Taiso Eka. See Kattō. 12 by a Buddhist master during a lecture or ceremony, originally used in India to clear Hossu (Skt. vyajana), a whisk usually with a long plume of white animal hair, held insects from one’s path.

13    Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Refers to the transmission between the Buddha and Master Mahākāśyapa. See Chapter Udonge.

14    For example, the succession between Master Taiyō Kyōgen and Master Tōsu Giseisee notes to Chapter Fifteen, Busso). (

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15    It is used, for example, in the ceremony to inaugurate a head monk. Shippei .A stick about three feet long, made of split bamboo, with a ceremonial handle.

16    Master Bodhidharma, the First Patriarch in China.

17    Sanzō, Vinaya (precepts), and Abhidharma (commentaries).lit., “three storehouses,” from the Sanskrit Tripiṭaka (three baskets): Sutra,

18    his own temple and is now living as a guest in the west hall of another temple. Seidō, lit., “west hall,” is a title of respect for a veteran master who has retired from

19    Master Hōgen Bun’eki (885–958), the successor of Master Rakan Keichin, who was a successor of Master Gensha Shibi.

20    A pātra is a Buddhist food bowl. Robes and pātra symbolize the possessions of a monk.

21    above them were the six Suboctuple. He was the highest ranking of the six lit., “head seat.” The chiji,shusoor main officers. Was the leader of the main body of monks in achōshu, or assistant officers. Ranking

22    line but side by side at the top of their respective columns of historical patriarchs. That is, the names of the first and second patriarchs were arranged not in a vertical

23    The Rinzai, Igyō, Sōtō, Unmon, and Hōgen sects. See Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III),Bu tsu dō.

24    interpreted that a flagpole symbolized a place of Buddhist preaching, and hence atemple. flagpole. In ancient India a flag announced Buddhist preaching and so Chinese scholars Chinese scholars to interpret that Daisetsu. Setsu Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). At the same time, the character appears in Buddhists from the Sanskrit sekkan, or “setsukṣetra,kṣetramight be a transliteration of which means a sacred spot or district (see pole,” that is, a temple flagpole. This ledyaṣṭi, which means sutras in the compound

25    respectively. Provinces in eastern China bordering on the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea, 26 Hōgo, calligraphy containing a word or a phrase of Buddhist preaching.

27    Zōsu, the monk in charge of storing sutras. The zōsu was one of the six chōshu, or assistant officers.

28    the title Zen Master Butsugen, together with a purple robe, from the emperor. TheMaster Ryūmon Butsugen (d. 1120), a successor of Master Goso Hōen. He receivedGoroku, a record of his words, is in eight volumes.

29    1208–1224.

30    Jōza, School of the Elders. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.from the Sanskrit honorific sthavira, or in Pāli, thera, as in Thera vāda, the

31    1223.

Chapter Sixteen

32    used in a monk’s lifetime or it may be a posthumous name. Chinese characters. One name is the hōmyō, “Original Dharma name” is name to be avoided.” After a monk had died, it was customary to avoid using the name he had used in his lifetime, and to use a posthumous title instead. While living, monks in China and Japan usually have at least two personal names, each written with two “Dharma name.” A hōmyōhōki. Hōis always a hōgō,means Dharma or Buddhist and “Dharma title,” and another name is thehōki, whereas a hōgō may be a name ki means “the

33    Kaji. This seal was not stamped but written with a brush.

34    Sōrin, of monks, or a monastery. lit., “clump of forest,” from the Sanskrit piṇḍavana, meaning a large assembly

35    of Master Tōsu Gisei. See for example Chapter Fourteen, nine (Vol. II), Master Fuyō Dōkai (1043–1118), the Eighteenth Patriarch in China and a successor Gyōji; and Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajō.Sansuigyō; Chapter Twenty-

36    “Traditional” is ii kitare ru, lit., “having been spoken.”

37    In other words, the most important matter in the transmission is the relation between master and student. This is reflected in the form of the certificate in the Rinzai sect.

38    the master of the temple.  Musai Ryōha. He was the master of Keitokuji on Tendōzan when MasterDōgen arrived in China. When Master Ryōha’s death was approaching, he sent a letter to Master Dōgen’s future master, Master Tendō Nyojō, asking him to become

39    Present-day Fukien, a province of southeast China bordering on the Formosa Strait. 40 an EmperorMaster Busshō Tokkō (1121–1203). Author of the ), one volume. Sōtairoku (Record of Answers to

41    Chapter Seventy-five (Vol. IV), Master Daie Sōkō (b. 1089, d. 1163, thirty-seven years before Master Dōgen’s birth).He is thought to be the founder of the so-called kōan Zen of the Rinzai sect, and asShōbōgenzō. See for example such was criticized by Master Dōgen several times in the Jishō-zanmai.

42    four (Vol. IV), Master Engo is quoted in Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III),Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135). Edited the HekiganrokuShunjū, and Chapter Seventy-(Blue Cliff Record).

Tembōrin.

43    Master Goso Hōen (1024–1104). The Goroku, a record of his words, is in four volumes.

Master Hōen is quoted in Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), He was the third patriarch of the temple on Yōgizan founded by Master Yōgi Hōe.Tembōrin. 44 Master Kaie Shutan (1025–1072). Also called Master Hakkun Shutan. (Kaie andHakkun are both hōgō (Dharma titles)—see note 32).

45    Master Yōgi Hōe (992–1049). Lived on and spread the Dharma from Yōgizan. Theand Kōroku, records of his words, are in one volume each.

Goroku

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46    Master Jimyō Soen (986–1039). Became a monk at the age of twenty-two. 47 Master Fun’yō Zenshō (947–1024). The volumes. Goroku, a record of his words, is in three

48    Master Shuzan Shōnen (926–993). The Goroku, a record of his words, is in one volume.

49    Master Fuketsu Enshō (896?–973).

50    Master Nan’in Egyō (d. 930?).

51    Master Kōke Sonshō (830–888).

52    Hōe, Nyojō of Tendōzan is Master Tendō Nyojō, Dōgen of Eiheiji is Master EiheiDōgen, etc. See note 32.temple or mountain often precedes the nine (Vol. III), a record of his words, is in one volume. His disciples included Master Kōke Sonshō,Master Rinzai Gigen (815?–867). A successor of Master Ōbaku Kiun. The Master Sanshō Enen, and Master Kankei Shikan. See, for example, Chapter Forty-Rinzai is a hōmyō     In this certificate, the names Ryōha and Tokkō are is written. When a master’s name is written in full, the name of the master’shōgōButsudō.(Dharma title). For the other names only the first character of thehōmyō. Thus E of Yōgizan is Master Yōgihōmyō (Dharma names) while Goroku,

53    this mountain, and guessed that it might be one of eighty-four thousand stupas saidAikuō means King Aśoka. In 282 a priest called Ryūsaku discovered an old stupa on King Aśoka. It later became one of the five mountains: Mount Kin, Mount Hoku,to have been built by King Aśoka of ancient India. So the mountain was named after five mountains as the most important in China. promoting Buddhism as part of its political strategy, designated the temples on these Mount Taihaku, Mount Nan, and Mount Aikuō. The government of the Song dynasty,

54    since receiving the precepts. Shō-shi-sō. The term was used for a monk who had not passed ten summer retreats

55    were proper names of these particular buildings on Mount Tendō. The Dormitory of Quiescence (ryōnen-ryō) and the Hall of Serene Light (jakkō-dō)

56    4)6)officer, head of the temple office, comptroller; 2) Tsūsu,  dōsuthe highest of the six temple officers. The six main officers are 1) or inō, supervisor of monks in the zazen hall, rector; 5) kansu, prior; 3) tenzo,fūsu,head cook; andassistant prior;tsūsu, chief shisui, caretaker.

57    Literally, “About nine sun.” One sun is 1.193 inches.

58    Literally, “more than seven shaku.” One shaku is ten sun. 59 1225–27.

60 Abbreviated in the original text to Daizan. The Tendai sect takes its name fromthis mountain in Chekiang province in eastern China, where Master Tendai Chigi Chapter Sixteen

(538–597)still a teenager. lived. Master Dōgen became a monk in the Tendai sect in Japan while 61 Master Fugan was a successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. A temple established on Mount Tendai, at the site where Master Tendai Fugan died.

62    Master Isan Reiyū (771–853), a successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. He had many excellent disciples such as Master Kyōzan Ejaku, Master Kyōgen Chikan, and MasterReiun Shigon. The Goroku, a record of his words, is in one volume.

63    Master Kyōzan Ejaku (807–883). The Goroku, a record of his words, is in one volume. Gotōegen, chapter 8. The story of Master Kyōzan’s succession is contained in the

64    It is usual to place venerated things on the palms of the hands and to hold them uphigh.

65    Master Daibai Hōjō (752–839), a successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. He lived in seclu-Gyōji. sion on Daibaizan; see Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), 66 Proper names of these particular rooms.

67    transmission of Dharma. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), do not appear to be any The uḍumbara is a species of fig tree whose flowers form a kind of peel, so that there uḍumbara flowers. The uḍumbara flower is a symbol of theUdonge.

68    lineage of Master Seigen Gyōshi. Master Rinzai belongs to the lineage of another ofMaster Daikan Enō’s successors, Master Nangaku Ejō. Master Seigen Gyōshi (660–740) was one of several successors of Master DaikanEnō of Sōkei Mountain, the Sixth Patriarch in China. Master Tōzan belongs to the

69    Master Bodhidharma and Master Taiso Eka.

70    Krakucchanda Buddha, Kanakamuni Buddha, Kāśyapa Buddha, and ŚākyamuniBuddha were the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh of the seven ancient buddhas.

71    eternal past. See note 7.The kalpa of wisdom means the present age. The kalpa of resplendence means the

72    topical present to describe his own experiences, and in the description of his late The tense of the original Japanese sentence is the historical present. When Master Dōgen uses the historical present for a story, we generally try to use the present in translation. But in the many places in this chapter where Master Dōgen uses the his master, the past tense has been used in translation.

73    1241.

74    sign (the rabbit). The year at the end of the chapter is usually expressed in two ways,Ki1243is the tenth calendar sign (the younger brother of water) and . The year is identified, using the Chinese dating system, by the characters is the fourth horarykibō. using the Japanese dating system and the Chinese dating system (ignored in translation)

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viated.as a double check. However, in this sentence the word gannen, “first year,” was able-

75    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture.

76    after which Master Koun Ejō, when copying Master Dōgen’s original text, wrote the It is likely that Master Dōgen actually wrote his own seal having arrived at Kippōji,kaji, “written seal” (see note 33). words

[Chapter Seventeen] Hokke-ten-hokke Turns the Flower of Dharma The Flower of Dharma

Translator’s Note: means “Dharma,” “the law of the universe,” or the universe itself. Ke means “flowers.” So hokke means “the universe that is like flowers.” The full title of the Lotus Sutra, Myōhō rengekyō (Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma), is usually abbreviated to Hokkekyō. So hokke also suggests the wonderful universe as manifested in the Lotus Sutra. Ten means “to turn,” or “to move.” So hokke-ten-hokke means “the wonderful universe that is like flowers is moving the wonderful universe that is like flowers itself.” This is the Buddhist view of the universe, and Master Dōgen’s view. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains this view of the universe, quoting many words from the Lotus Sutra. The message of the Lotus Sutra is “How wonderful is the universe in which we are now living!” So here Master Dōgen unfolds his view of the universe, following the theory of the Lotus Sutra.

[39] “The content of the buddha lands of the ten directions”1 is the “sole existence”2 of the “Flower of Dharma.”3 Herein, “all the buddhas of the ten directions and the three times,”4 and beings of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi,5 have [times of] turning the Flower of Dharma,6 and have [times of] the Flower of Dharma turning.7 This is just the state in which “original practice of the bodhisattva way”8 neither regresses nor deviates. It is the “wisdom of the buddhas, profound and unfathomable.”9 It is the “calm and clear state of samādhi,”10 which is “difficult to understand and difficult to enter.”11 As Buddha Mañjuśrī,12 it has the “form as it is”13 of “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,”14 which is “the great ocean” or “the buddha land.” Or as Buddha Śākyamuni,15 it is “appearance in the world”16 in the state of “Only I know concrete form, and the buddhas of the ten directions are also like that.”17 It is the “one time”18 in which he “desires to cause living beings”19 to “disclose, to display, to

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realize, and to enter,”20 [saying] “I and buddhas of the ten directions are directly able to know these things.”21 Or it is Universal Virtue,22 “accomplishing” the Dharma Flower’s turning whose “virtue is unthinkable,”23 and “spreading throughout Jambud vīpa”24 the “profound and eternal”25 [truth of] anuttara samyak saṃbodhi, at which time the earth is able to produce the three kinds of plants, the two kinds of shrubs, and “large and small trees,”26 and the rain is able to moisten them. In the state in which “an object cannot be recognized,”27 he is solely “accomplishing the total practice”28 of the Flower of Dharma turning. While Universal Virtue’s spreading [of the truth] is still unfinished, the “great order on Vulture Peak”29 comes together. Śākyamuni experiences, as the “manifestation of light from his [circle of] white hair,”30 the coming and going of Universal Virtue.31 The Flower of Dharma turns when, before Śākyamuni’s “Buddhist assembly is halfway through,” the “consideration”32 of Mañjuśrī “swiftly” gives “affirmation”33 to Maitreya. Universal Virtue, the many buddhas, Mañ juśrī, and the great assembly, may all be the “pāramitā of knowing”34 the Dharma Flower’s turning, which is

72b “good in the beginning, middle, and end.”35 This is why [the Buddha] has “manifested himself in reality,” calling “sole reliance”36 on the “One Vehicle”37 “the one great matter.”38 Because this manifestation in reality is itself “the one great matter,” there are [the words] “buddhas alone, together with buddhas, just can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real form.”39 The method40 for that is inevitably “the One Buddha Vehicle,” and “buddhas alone” necessarily teach its “perfect realization” to “buddhas alone.” “The many buddhas” and “the Seven Buddhas”41 teach its “perfect realization” to each individual buddha, buddha-to-buddha, and they cause Śākyamuni Buddha to “accomplish” it.42 [Every place from] India in the west to China in the east is “in the buddha lands of the ten directions.” [For every patriarch] until the thirty-third patriarch, Zen Master Daikan,43 [this method] is the method which is “the One Vehicle of buddhas alone,” and which is just “perfect realization” itself. It is “the One Buddha Vehicle” in which “sole reliance” is decisively “the one great matter.” Now it is “manifesting itself in the world.”44 It is manifesting itself at this place.45 That the Buddhist customs of Seigen46 have been transmitted to the present, and that Nangaku’s47 Dharma gate has been opened and preached through the world, are totally [due to] the “Tathāgata’s real wisdom.”48 Truly, this [real wisdom] is the “perfect realization of buddhas alone, together with buddhas.” The Dharma Flower’s turning may be preaching it49 as the “disclosure, display, realization, and entering” of buddhas who are rightful successors, and of rightful successors of buddhas. This [real wisdom] is also called the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma,50 and it is “the method of teaching bodhisattvas.”51 Because this [real wisdom] has been called “all dharmas,” “Vulture Peak” exists, “space”52 exists, the “great ocean”53 exists, and the “great earth”54 exists, with the Flower of Dharma as their “national land.”55 This is just “real form”; it is “reality as it is”;56 “it is the wisdom of the Buddha”; it is “the constancy of the manifestation of the world”;57 it is “the real”;58 it is “the Tathāgata’s lifetime”;59 it is “the profound and unfathomable”;60 it is “the inconstancy of all actions”;61 it is “samādhi as [the state of] the Flower of Dharma”;62 it is “Śākyamuni Buddha”; it is “to turn the Flower of Dharma”;63 it is “the Flower of Dharma turning”;64 it is “the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana”;65 and it is “manifestation of the body to save living beings.”66 As “affirmation and becoming buddha,”67 it is maintained and relied upon, and dwelled in and retained.

[47] To the order of Zen Master Daikan68 at Hōrinji on Sōkeizan, in the Shōshū district of Guangdong,69 in the great kingdom of Tang, there came a monk called Hōtatsu.70 He boasts, “I have recited the Lotus Sutra three thou-        72c sand times already.”

The patriarch says, “Even if [you recite it] ten thousand times, if you do not understand the sutra, you will not be able even to recognize [your] errors.”

Hōtatsu says, “The student is foolish. Until now, I have only been reading [the sutra] aloud following the characters. How could I have hoped to clarify the meaning?”

The patriarch says, “Try reciting a round [of the sutra] and I will interpret

it for you.”

Hōtatsu recites the sutra at once. When he reaches the “Expedient Means”71 chapter the patriarch says, “Stop! The fundamental point of this sutra is the purpose of [the buddhas’] appearance in the world.72 Although it expounds many metaphors, [the sutra] does not go beyond this. What is that purpose? Only the one great matter. The one great matter is just the Buddha’s wisdom itself; it is to disclose, to display, to realize, and to enter [the Buddha’s wisdom]. [The one great matter] is naturally the wisdom of the Buddha and someone who is equipped with the wisdom is already a buddha. You must now believe that the Buddha’s wisdom is simply your own natural state of mind.” He preaches again in the following verse:

When the mind is in delusion, the Flower of Dharma turns.

When the mind is in realization, we turn the Flower of Dharma.

Unless we are clear about ourselves, however long we recite [the     sutra],

It will become an enemy because of its meanings.

Without intention the mind is right.

With intention the mind becomes wrong.

When we transcend both with and without, We ride eternally in the white ox cart.73

Hōtatsu, on hearing this poem, addresses the patriarch again: “The sutra says that even if all in the great [order], from śrāvakas to bodhisattvas, exhausted their intellect to suppose it,74 they could not fathom the Buddha’s wisdom. If you are now saying that the effort to make the common person realize his own mind is just the Buddha’s wisdom, unless we are of excellent makings we can hardly help doubting and denying it. Furthermore, the sutra explains the three kinds of carts, but what kind of distinction is there between the great ox cart and the white ox cart? Please, master, bestow your preaching

73a     again.”

The patriarch says, “The intention of the sutra is clear. You are straying off on your own and going against it. When people of the three vehicles cannot fathom the Buddha’s wisdom, the trouble is in their supposition itself. Even if together they exhaust their intellects to consider it,75 they will only get further and further away.76 The Buddha originally preaches only for the benefit of the common person; he does not preach for the benefit of buddhas. Some are not fit to believe this principle and withdraw from their seats;77 they do not know that they are sitting in the white ox cart yet still searching outside the gate78 for the three kinds of carts. The words of the sutra are clearly telling you: ‘There is neither a second nor a third.’79 Why do you not realize it? The three carts are fictitious, for they belong to the past. The One Vehicle is real, for it exists in the present. I only [wish to] make you get rid of the fiction and get back to the reality. When we get back to reality, reality is not a concept. Remember, your possessions are all treasures,80 and they totally belong to you. How you receive and use them is up to you. [The reality of the sutra] is neither the ideas of the father nor the ideas of the children,81 indeed it does not rely upon ideas at all; rather, it is called the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma. From kalpa to kalpa, from noon to night, [our] hands do not put down the sutra, and there is no time when we are not reading it.” Hōtatsu, enlightened already and jumping for joy,82 presents the following verse of praise:

Three thousand recitations of the sutra With one phrase from Sōkei, forgotten.

Before clarifying the import of [the buddhas’] appearance in the     world,

How can we stop recurring lives of madness?

[The sutra] explains goat, deer, and ox as an expedient,

[But] proclaims that beginning, middle, and end are good. Who knows that [even] within the burning house, Originally we are kings in the Dharma.

When he presents this verse, the patriarch says, “From now on, you may

be called the Sutra-reading Monk.”83

[54] The story84 of how Zen Master Hōtatsu visited Sōkei is like this. 73b Hereafter the Flower of Dharma began to be expounded as the Flower of Dharma turning and turning of the Dharma Flower. [Those terms] were not heard previously. Truly, the clarification of the Buddha’s wisdom should always take place under a Buddhist patriarch who may be the right Dharmaeye treasury itself. [The Buddha’s wisdom] cannot be known by literary scholars who vainly count sand and pebbles, as we can see again here in Hōtatsu’s experience. To clarify the true meaning of the Flower of Dharma, “perfectly realize,” as “only the one great purpose,” that which the ancestral master “disclosed and displayed.” Do not intend to study other vehicles. The present is the reality85 as it is of the real form, the real nature, the real body, the real energy, the real causes, and the real effects of the Flower of Dharma turning.86 This was never heard in China, and it was never present [in China], before the time of the ancestral master. “The Flower of Dharma is turning”

means “the mind is in delusion”; the mind being deluded is just the Flower of Dharma turning. Therefore, when the mind is in delusion, we are being turned by the Flower of Dharma. This means that even when mental delusion is in myriad phenomena, “form as it is”87 is still being turned by the Flower of Dharma. This being turned is not to be rejoiced at, and it is not to be hoped for; it is not gained, and it does not come. Even so, when the Flower of Dharma is turning “there is neither a second nor a third.” Because [the Flower of Dharma turning] is the “sole existence of the One Buddha Vehicle,” and because it is the Flower of Dharma with “form as it is,” whether it is the turner or the turned, it is “the One Buddha Vehicle,” and “the one great matter.”

88It is just moment by moment of red mind,89 upon which we rely solely. So do not worry about the mind being deluded. Your actions are the bodhisattva way itself;90 they are to serve the buddhas,91 which is original practice of the bodhisattva way.92 What you disclose, display, realize, and enter is, in every case, an instance of the Flower of Dharma turning.

93There is mental delusion in the burning house, there is mental delusion just at the gate itself, there is mental delusion outside the gate, there is mental delusion just in front of the gate, and there is mental delusion within the

73c gate.94 Mental delusion has created “within the gate” and “outside the gate” and even “the gate itself,” “the burning house,” and so on; therefore, disclosure, display, realization, and entering may take place even on the white oxcarriage.95 When we think of entry as “adornment”96 on this carriage, should we hope for “open ground”97 as the place to enter, or should we recognize “the burning house” as the place to leave?98 Should we reach the conclusion99 that the gate itself is merely a place of momentary passing?100 Remember, inside the carriage, there is turning [of the Flower of Dharma] which causes us to disclose, to display, to realize, and to enter the burning house; and on the open ground there is turning which causes us to disclose, to display, to realize, and to enter the burning house.101 There are cases in which the turning activates disclosure, display, realization, and entering through the whole gate as the gate here and now;102 and there are cases in which the turning activates disclosure, display, realization, and entering through a single gate which is [an instance of] the universal gate.103 There is turning which discloses, displays, realizes, and enters the universal gate in each instance of disclosure, display, realization, and entering.104 There are cases in which the turning activates disclosure, display, realization, and entering within the gate,105 and there are cases in which the turning activates disclosure, display, realization, and entering outside the gate.106 There are cases of disclosing, displaying, realizing, and entering open ground in the burning house.107

108Therefore the burning house is “beyond understanding”109 and the open ground is “beyond knowing.”110 Who could make the turning of the wheel of the triple world111 into a carriage and ride it as “the One Vehicle”? Who could leave and enter disclosure, display, realization, and entering as if they were a gate? If we seek the carriage from the burning house, how many times the wheel must turn! When we look upon the burning house from the open ground, how “deep in the distance”112 it is! Should we reach the conclusion that Vulture Peak existed “in tranquility”113 on open ground? Or should we study in action that the open ground is “balanced and even”114 on Vulture Peak? “The place where living beings enjoy themselves”115 has been made into “eternal presence”116 as “my Pure Land which is immortal,”117 and this also we must meticulously perform as “original practice.”118

Do we realize in practice that “wholeheartedly wanting to meet Buddha”119 is about ourselves, or do we realize in practice that it is about others? There are times when the truth is realized as an “individual body,”120 and there are times when the truth is realized as the “whole body.”121

“Appearance together on Vulture Peak”122 comes from “not begrudging one’s own body and life.”123 There is disclosure, display, realization, and entering in “constantly abiding here preaching the Dharma,”124 and there is 74a disclosure, display, realization, and entering in, “as an expedient method, manifesting nirvana.”125 In the state of “being close yet still failing to see,”126 who could not believe in understanding of non-understanding by “wholeheartedness”?127

The place that is “always filled with gods and human beings”128 is just the land of Śākyamuni Buddha and of Vairocana,129 “the eternally peaceful and bright land”130 itself. We who naturally belong in the “four lands”131 are just living in “the Buddha’s land” which is “real oneness.”132 When we look at “atoms”133 that does not mean we fail to see “the world of Dharma.” When we are experiencing the world of Dharma,134 that does not mean we fail to experience atoms. When the buddhas experience the world of Dharma, they do not exclude us from the experience, which is “good at the beginning, middle, and end.”

This being so, the present is the “form as it is” of the state of experience, and even “alarm, doubt, and fear”135 are nothing other than reality as it is. With the Buddha’s wisdom, this [fear] is only the difference between looking at atoms and sitting in atoms. When we are seated in the world of Dharma it is not wide, and when we are sitting in atoms, they are not confining; therefore, without maintaining and relying upon [reality as it is], we cannot sit, but when we are maintaining and relying upon [reality as it is], there is no alarm or doubt about width and confinement. This is because we have “perfectly realized” the “body” and the “energy” of the Flower of Dharma. So should we think that our own “form” and “nature” now are “originally practicing” in this world of Dharma, or should we think that they are “originally practicing” in atoms? They are without alarm and doubt, and without fear; they are simply the profound and eternal state which is original practice as the Flower of Dharma turning. This seeing atoms and seeing the world of Dharma is beyond conscious action and conscious consideration. Conscious consideration, and conscious action too, should learn Flower of Dharma consideration, and should learn Flower of Dharma action. When we hear of “disclosure, display, realization, and entering,” we should understand them in terms of [the Buddha’s] “desire to cause living beings.”136 In other words, that which, as the Flower of Dharma turning, discloses the Buddha’s wisdom, we should learn by displaying the Buddha’s wisdom. That which, as the Flower of Dharma turning, realizes the Buddha’s wisdom, we should learn by entering the Buddha’s wisdom. That which, as the Flower of Dharma turning, displays the Buddha’s wisdom, we should learn by real-

74b izing the Buddha’s wisdom. For each such instance of the Flower of Dharma turning, as disclosure, display, realizing, and entering, we can have ways of perfect realization. In sum, this wisdom-pāramitā137 of the buddha-tathāgatas is the Dharma Flower’s turning, which is wide, great, profound, and eternal. “Affirmation”138 is just our own disclosure of the Buddha’s wisdom; it is the Flower of Dharma’s turning which is never imparted by others. This, then, is [the reality of] “When the mind is in the state of delusion, the Flower of Dharma turns.”

[62] “When the mind is in the state of realization, we turn the Flower of Dharma” describes turning the Flower of Dharma. That is to say, when the Flower of Dharma has “perfectly exhausted”139 the energy with which it turns us, the “energy as it is”140 with which we turn ourselves will, in turn, be realized. This realization is to turn the Flower of Dharma. Though the former turning is, even now, without cease, we, reversely, are naturally turning the Flower of Dharma. Though we have not finished donkey business, horse business will still come in.141 [Here] there exists “sole reliance on the one great purpose” as “real appearance at this place.”142 The multitudes of the thousandfold world that “spring out of the earth”143 have long been great honored saints of the Flower of Dharma144 but they spring out of the earth being turned by themselves and they spring out of the earth being turned by circumstances.145 In turning the Flower of Dharma we should not only realize springing out of the earth; in turning the Flower of Dharma we should also realize springing out of space.146 We should know with the Buddha’s wisdom not only earth and space but also springing out of the Flower of Dharma itself. In general, in the time of the Flower of Dharma, inevitably, “the father is young and the son old.”147 It is neither that the son is not the son, nor that the father is not the father; we should just learn that the son is old and the father young. Do not imitate “the disbelief of the world”148 and be surprised. [Even] the disbelief of the world is the time of the Flower of Dharma. This being so, in turning the Flower of Dharma we should realize the “one time” in which “the Buddha is living.”149 Turned by disclosure, display, realization, and entering, we spring out of the earth; and turned by the Buddha’s wisdom, we spring out of the earth. At the time of this turning the Flower of Dharma, “mental realization”150 exists as the Flower of Dharma, and the Flower of

Dharma exists as mental realization.151 For another example, the meaning of 74c “the downward direction” is just “the inside of space.”152 This “downward,” and this “space,” are just the turning of the Flower of Dharma, and are just the lifetime of the Buddha. We should realize, in turning the Flower of Dharma, that the Buddha’s lifetime, the Flower of Dharma, the world of Dharma, and the wholehearted state, are realized as “downward,” and realized also as “space.” Thus, “downward space” describes just the realization of turning the Flower of Dharma. In sum, at this moment, by turning the Flower

of Dharma we can cause the three kinds of grass to exist, and by turning the Flower of Dharma we can cause the two kinds of trees to exist. We should not expect [this] to be a state of awareness, and we should not wonder whether it is a state without awareness. When we turn ourselves and “initiate bodhi,”153 that is just “the southern quarter.”154 This realization of the truth is originally present on Vulture Peak, which convenes as an order in the southern quarter. Vulture Peak is always present in our turning the Flower of Dharma. There are buddha lands of the ten directions that convene as an order in space, and this is an individual body155 turning the Flower of Dharma. When we realize it, in turning the Flower of Dharma, as already the buddha lands of the ten directions, there is no place into which an atom could enter. There is turning the Flower of Dharma as “matter just being the immaterial,”156 which is beyond “either disappearance or appearance.”157 There is turning the Flower of Dharma as “the immaterial just being matter,”158 which may be “absence of life and death.”159 We cannot call it “being in the world”;160 and how could it only be in a process of “extinction”?161 When [a person] is a “close friend”162 to us, we are also a “close friend” to that person. We must not forget to bow to and to work for a “close friend”; therefore, we must take care to perfectly realize moments of giving “the pearl in the topknot”163 and of giving “the pearl in the clothes.”164 There is turning the Flower of Dharma in the presence “before the Buddha” of a “treasure stupa,”165 whose “height is five hundred yojanas.”166 There is turning the Flower of Dharma in the “Buddha sitting inside the stupa,”167 whose extent is “two hundred and fifty yojanas.” There is turning the Flower of Dharma in springing out from the earth and abiding in the earth, [in which state] mind is without restriction and matter is without restriction. There is turning the Flower of Dharma in springing out from the sky and abiding in the earth, which is restricted by the eyes and restricted by the body.168 Vulture Peak exists inside the stupa, and the treasure stupa

75a   exists on Vulture Peak. The treasure stupa is a treasure stupa in space, and space makes space for the treasure stupa.169 The eternal buddha inside the stupa takes his seat alongside the buddha of Vulture Peak, and the buddha of Vulture Peak experiences the state of experience as the buddha inside the stupa.170 When the buddha of Vulture Peak enters the state of experience inside the stupa, while object and subject on Vulture Peak [remain] just as they are, he enters into the turning of the Flower of Dharma. When the buddha

inside the stupa springs out on Vulture Peak, while still of the land of eternal buddhas, while still “long extinct,”171 he springs out. “Springing out,” and “entering into the turning,” are not to be learned under common people and the two vehicles, [but] should follow turning of the Flower of Dharma. “Eternal extinction” is an ornament of real experience that adorns the state of buddha. “Inside the stupa,” “before the Buddha,” “the treasure stupa,” and “space” are not of Vulture Peak; they are not of the world of Dharma; they are not a halfway stage; and they are not of the whole world. Nor are they concerned with only a “concrete place in the Dharma.”172 They are simply “different from thinking.”173 There is turning the Flower of Dharma either in “manifesting the body of Buddha and preaching the Dharma for others”174 or in manifesting this body and preaching the Dharma for others. Or turning the Flower of Dharma is the manifestation of Devadatta.175 Or there is turning the Flower of Dharma in the manifestation of “to retreat also is fine.”176 Do not always measure “the waiting, with palms held together and [faces] looking up,”177 as “sixty minor kalpas.”178 Even if the length of “wholehearted waiting”179 is condensed into just a few countless kalpas, still it will be impossible to fathom the “buddha-wisdom.”180 As how much buddha-wisdom should we see a wholehearted mind that is waiting? Do not see this turning the Flower of Dharma only as “the bodhisattva way practiced in the past.”181 Wherever the Flower of Dharma is a total order the virtue is that of turning the Flower of Dharma, [and it is expressed] as, “The Tathāgata preaches the Great Vehicle today.”182 [When] the Flower of Dharma just now is the Flower of Dharma, it is “neither sensed nor recognized,”183 and at the same time it is “beyond knowing” and “beyond understanding.”184 This being so, “five hundred [ink]drop [kalpas]”185 are a brief thousandth [of an instant] of turning the Flower of Dharma; they are the Buddha’s lifetime being proclaimed by each moment of red mind.

           [70] In conclusion, in the hundreds of years since this sutra was trans- 75b

mitted into China, to be turned as the Flower of Dharma, very many people, here and there, have produced their commentaries and interpretations. Some, moreover, have attained the Dharma state of an eminent person by relying on this sutra. But no one has grasped the point of “the Flower of Dharma turning,” or mastered the point of “turning the Flower of Dharma,” in the manner of our Founding Patriarch, the eternal buddha of Sōkei. Now that we have heard these [points] and now that we have met it, we have experienced the meeting of eternal buddha with eternal buddha; how could [this] not be the land of eternal buddhas? How joyful it is! From kalpa to kalpa is the Flower of Dharma, and from noon to night is the Flower of Dharma. Because the Flower of Dharma is from kalpa to kalpa, and because the Flower of Dharma is from noon to night, even though our own body and mind grows strong and grows weak, it is just the Flower of Dharma itself. The reality that exists “as it is” is “a treasure,”186 is “brightness,”187 is “a seat of truth,”188 is “wide, great, profound, and eternal,”189 is “profound, great, and everlasting,”190 is “mind in delusion, the Flower of Dharma turning,” and is “mind in realization, turning the Flower of Dharma,” which is really just the Flower of Dharma turning the Flower of Dharma.

[72] When the mind is in the state of delusion, the Flower of Dharma     turns.

When the mind is in the state of realization, we turn the Flower of     Dharma.

If perfect realization can be like this,

The Flower of Dharma turns the Flower of Dharma.

When we “serve offerings to it, venerate, honor, and praise it”191 like

this, the Flower of Dharma is the Flower of Dharma.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Hokke-ten-hokke

On a day of the summer retreat in the second year of Ninji192 I have written this and presented it to Zen person Etatsu. I am profoundly glad that he is going to leave home to practice the truth. Just to shave the head is a lovely fact in itself. To shave the head and to shave the head again: this is to be a true child of transcending family life.193 Leaving home today is the “effects and results as they are” of the “energy as it is,” which has turned the Flower of Dharma hitherto. The Flower of Dharma today will inevitably bear the

Flower of Dharma’s Flower of Dharma fruits. It is not Śākyamuni’s Flower

75c of Dharma and it is not the buddhas’ Flower of Dharma; it is the Flower of Dharma of the Flower of Dharma. Though “form” is “as it is,” our habitual turning of the Flower of Dharma has been suspended in the state of “neither sensing nor recognizing.” But the Flower of Dharma now is manifesting itself afresh in the state “beyond knowing and beyond understanding.” The past was exhalation and inhalation, and the present is exhalation and inhalation. This we should maintain and rely upon, as the Flower of Dharma that is “too fine to think about.”194

                                        Written by the founder of Kannondōrikō shō-                                         hōrinji, a śramaṇa who entered Song [China]                                         and received the transmission of Dharma,                                         Dōgen (his written seal).

                                        The copying was completed at Hōgyōji at                                         the beginning of spring195 in the third year                                         of Kagen.196

 

Notes

1     Juppō-butsudo-chū. See LS 1.106.

2     Yui-i. See LS 1.106.

3     See LS 2.156.Hokke, or (more freely translated) “Lotus Universe,” from the title of the Lotus Sutra.

4     present, and future, i.e.,  eternity) is Lotus Sutra.“All buddhas” is See LS 1.90, 1.128.issai-shobutsu. “Ten directions” is sanze. These expressions all derive from thejuppō. “The three times” (past,

5     Anokutara-sanmyaku-sanbodai.Sanskrit anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, These characters, representing the sound of the appear frequently throughout the Lotus Sutra.

See LS 2.156.

6     Tenhokke. Tenten suggests 1) to turn a scroll on which the is literally “to turn,” “to move,” or “to change.” Used here as a transitive Lotus SutraLotus Sutra.is written, and 2) to The content of the same. this chapter suggests that to read the act in, or upon, the universe which is identified with the verb, Lotus Sutra and to realize the real universe are

7     unrolling naturally, and 2) the activity of the universe independent of the subjective Hokketen. Used here as an intransitive verb, ten suggests 1) a scroll of the Lotus Sutra self.

8     HongyōHongyō-bosatsudō. Honappears in several places in the means “original,” and at the same time it suggests the past. Lotus Sutra referring to the practices of bodhisattvas in the eternal past. See LS 2.172, 3.20.

9     Shobutsu-chie-shinjin-muryō. See LS 1.66.

10    Anshō-zanmai. See LS 1.66.

11    Nange-nannyū. See LS 1.66.

12    Monjushiri. A symbol of Buddhist wisdom. In Japan the statue in the zazen hall is the great ocean. See LS 2.212–214, 2.218.usually an image of Mañjuśrī. The Lotus Sutra describes him as springing out from

13    Nyozesō. See LS 1.68.

14    Yuibutsu-yobutsu. See LS 1.68.

277

15    Śākyamuni means “Sage of the Śākyas.” See LS 2.186–88.Shakamuni. The historical Buddha, who was born into the Śākya clan. The Sanskrit

16    Shutsugen-o-se. See LS 1.88–90.

17    Yui-ga-chi-ze-shō, juppō-butsu-yaku-nen. See LS 1.74.

18    Ichiji. See LS 1.8, and note 146.

19    Yoku-rei-shūjō. See LS 1.88–90.

20    Kai-ji-go-nyu. See LS 1.88–90.

21    Ga-gyū-juppō-butsu, nai-nō-chi-ze-ji. See LS 1.70.

22    Virtue”). The translation into English of Chinese characters representing the names Lotus Sutra Fugen, the bodhisattva called Samantabhadra in Sanskrit. The last chapter of theis Fugen-bosatsu-kanpotsu (“Encouragement of Bodhisattva Universal Lotus Sutra. of bodhisattvas has generally followed the translation in the 23 Fukashigi no kudoku. See LS 3.210, 3.328–30.

24    Sanskrit Jambudvīpa, the southern continent upon which, according to ancient IndianEnbudai ni rufu se shimuru.cosmology, human beings live.See LS 3.328–30. Enbudai represents the sound of the

25    Shindai-ku-on. See LS 3.18, 3.328–30.

26    Daishō-shoju. See LS 1.274. 27 Sho-fu-nō-chi. See LS 1.66.

28    Lotus Sutra;LS 1.66, 3.328–30). Jingyō-jōju. The characters Jingyōsuggests Universal Virtue’s work of realizing the reality of the means “total practice” or “all-out action” (see LS 1.66).jōju, “accomplish,” appear often in the Lotus Sutra (see

In this context see LS 3.326.jingyō

29    Chatha, overlooking the Rājagṛha valley. It was so called because the silhouette ofRyōzen no dai-e.the mountain resembles a vulture. The historical Buddha often preached there. See Vulture Peak is a natural platform on the southern slope of Mount

LS 2.216, 3.30.

30    Byakugō-kōsō.guishing marks attributed to the Buddha. The when the Buddha sent forth a ray of light from between his eyebrows. See LS 1.18,The circle of hair, ūrṇā in Sanskrit, is one of the thirty-two distin-Lotus Sutra describes many occasions

2.176.

31    The final chapter of the Universal Virtue coming from the east to Vulture Peak to hear Śākyamuni’s preaching of the Lotus SutraLotus Sutra,in order to serve and to protect them. and promising to go to any place where people read and recite the Lotus Sutra, Fugen-bosatsu-kanpotsu, describes Bodhisattva 32 Yuijun. See LS 1.38, 1.52.

33    Thirty-two (Vol. II) of the Juki, from the Sanskrit vyākaraṇa. ShōbōgenzōThe sixth chapter of the have the title Juki. Here Lotus Sutrajuki refers to Mañjuśrī’s and Chapter affirmation of Maitreya, that is, Mañjuśrī’s prediction that Maitreya will become Buddha in the future. See LS 1.62.

34    Chiken-haramitsu.see LS 1.68), where they are used as a noun, and he used them as a transitive verb. means to know and Master Dōgen picked up these characters from the ken means to see. chikenChikento represent the intellectual and sensory means knowledge or knowing. Lotus Sutra

ChiMaster Dōgen sometimes uses the word (faculties (e.g., in the other than criteria that precede knowing and seeing?”), but in this chapter and in the, chiken Fukanzazengi: “How could [dignified behavior] be anything

Maka-hannya-haramitsuthe body and mind when the nervous system is set right in zazen (see Chapter Two, is from the Sanskrit Lotus Sutra Chicken   haramitsupāramitā,suggests the intuitive wisdom of the mind in action. ).      which means “gone to the opposite shore” or “Accom-means prajñā, or real wisdom experienced through out Haramitsu plishment.”

35    Sho-chū-kō-zen. See LS 1.40.

36    Yui-i.of. . .].” See LS 1.88–90.In the Lotus Sutra, these characters have the meaning of “solely by [reason

37    Ichijō, short for ichi-butsujō. See LS 1.90. 38 Ichidaiji. See LS 1.88–90.

39    sunawachi yoku hoho-jisso o gujin su.Yuibutsu-yobutsu-nainō-gujin-shohō-jissō;See LS 1.68.or read in Japanese, yuibutsu-yo-butsu,

40    The natural method of zazen.

41    Shichibutsu. See LS 2.96. See also Chapter Fifteen, Busso.

42    Jōju su. See note 28.

43 Master Daikan Enō (638–713), a successor of Master Daiman Kōnin. He was the

He had several excellent disciples including Master Seigen Gyōshi, Master NangakuEjō, and Master Nan’yō Echū.thirty-third patriarch from Master Mahākāśyapa, and the Sixth Patriarch in China.

44    as the subject (see LS 1.88–90). Here Master Dōgen uses it with the Buddhist method, Shutsugen-o-se. This expression appears many times in the Lotus Sutra with buddhas zazen, as the subject.

45    Sutra.Shutsugen-o-shi. This is Master Dōgen’s variation on the expression in the Lotus

46    sects sprang from Master Seigen’s  descendants. Master Seigen Gyōshi (660?–740). The lineages of the Sōtō, Unmon, and Hōgen 47 of Master Nangaku and his successor Master Baso Dōitsu.III), Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744). His history is described in Chapter Sixty-two (Vol.Hensan. The lineages of the Rinzai and Igyō sects sprang from the descendants

48    Nyorai [no] nyojitsu-chiken. See LS 3.18.

49    Hokketen su beshi. Here hokketen su is used as a verb phrase—“the Dharma Flower’s turning preaches.”

50    Myōhōrengekyō,puṇḍarīka-sūtra. See LS 1.52.the full title of the Lotus Sutra, from the Sanskrit Saddhar ma-

51    Kyō-bosatsu-hō. See LS 1.52.

52    Kokū. See LS 2.286. See also Chapter Seventy-seven (Vol. IV), Kokū.

53    Daikai. See LS 2.212–214. 54 Daichi. See LS 2.196–98.

55    Buddha’s real wisdom is identified with all things and phenomena in this world, Kokudo. See LS 2.286. In this case, kokudo suggests a unified realm. Because the things like Vulture Peak, space, oceans, and the earth form a meaningful whole.

56    Nyoze, used here as a noun. See LS 1.68.

57    Sesō-jōjū. See LS 1.120.

58    Nyojitsu, as in nyojitsu-chiken; see LS 1.68.

59    Nyorai-juryō, the title of the sixteenth chapter of the Lotus Sutra. 60 Shinjin-muryō. See LS 1.66.

61    arising and passing have ceased,/The peace and quiet is pleasure itself.”sūtra, Shogyō-mujō.which a hungry demon tells the child bodhisattva Himālaya: “Actions areThis is the first line of the four-line poem in the Mahāparinirvāṇa-dharmas./After without constancy./Concrete existence is the arising and passing of

62    Hokke-zanmai. See LS 3.214.

63    Tenhokke. See note 6.

64    Hokketen. See note 7.

65    and the fine mind of nirvana; I transmit them to Mahā kāśyapa.” See for exampleShōbōgenzō-nehan-myōshin. The Buddha said, “I have the right Dharma-eye treasuryUdonge.

Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III),

66    Genshin-doshō. See LS 3.252.

67    Juki-sabutsu. See for example LS 1.134, 1.322.

68    Master Daikan Enō (638–713).

69    dong province) created in southeast China during the reign of the Song emperor KineiKōnantōro. This was the name of an administrative area (close to present-day Guang-

(1068–1077).

70    Hōtatsu became a monk at the age of seven, and devoted himself to reciting the Sutra until meeting with Master Daikan Enō and receiving the master’s affirmation. Lotus

71    Hōben, the second chapter of the Lotus Sutra.

72    Innen-shusse.rect or external causes, connections, or conditions. At the same time, the Sanskrit hetu-pratyaya, See LS 1.88–90. which sometimes means “causes” or “purpose.” In means direct or intrinsic causes, and innenen means indi-represents

73    children out of a burning house by telling them that there are three kinds of carts—Byakugosha.Lotus Sutra Symbol of the state of Buddhist wisdom. See LS 1.166. The third chapter, Hiyu (“A Parable”), is the parable of a rich father who lures his of the

oxen, which is more than they had hoped for. In the same way, buddhas use expedient children escape the burning house, the father gives them a great cart yoked by white goat carts, deer carts, and ox carts—for them to play with outside the gate. When the should transcend the triple world, buddhas know that in reality there is only the One and explain the three vehicles by which Buddha Vehicle, which is the real wisdom of zazen. means to make living beings realize the Buddha’s wisdom—even as they discriminate śrāvakas, pratyekabuddhas, and bodhisattvas

74    Jinji-doryō. See LS 1.72.

75    Jinshi-gusui. See LS 1.72.

76    Ken-on. See LS 1.128.

77    See LS 1.86.

78    Monge. See LS 1.164.

79    Muni-yaku-musan. See LS 1.106. 80 Chinpō. See LS 1.224.

81    of the burning house and in several other chapters of the metaphor of father (the Buddha) and children (his followers) occurs in the parable Lotus Sutra.

82    Yūyaku-kanki. This expression occurs repeatedly in the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.134,

1.166.

83    This is Master Daikan Enō’s affirmation.

84    nidāna, Terms and note 72.“Story” is which means a primary cause or a historical account. See Glossary of Sanskritinnen, lit., “causes and conditions,” in this case representing the Sanskrit

85    Nyoze, used as a noun. See LS 1.68.

86    hokketen,Hokketen. the Flower of Dharma turning. In the following paragraph (62) he explains our turning of the Flower of Dharma. From here to the end of this long paragraph, Master Dōgen explains tenhokke,

87    Nyozesō. See LS 1.68.

88    So far in this paragraph, Master Dōgen has outlined in general terms the meaning ofhokketen). This short section introduces the concrete there are no divisions in the source text.or objective phase. The division into sub-paragraphs has been done for ease of reading; “the Flower of Dharma turns” (

89    Sekishin means “naked mind,” “sincere mind,” or “mind as it is.” 90 Nanjira-shogyō, ze-bosatsudō. See LS 1.286.

91 Shobutsu [ni] bugon [suru], or to pay homage to the buddhas. See LS 1.300. 92 Hongyō-bosatsudō. See LS 2.172, 3.20.

93    objective reality, as opposed to idealism. In general, the burning house symbolizesbolizes the process leading from delusion to realization; the three carts symbolizedelusion; open ground symbolizes the state of realization; the gate of the house sym-From here Master Dōgen considers the analogy of the burning house on the basis ofof Buddhist wisdom, zazen.methods of Buddhist practice; and the white ox cart symbolizes practice in the state

94    Denial of the idealistic idea that delusion exists only in the burning house.

95    recognizing their thoughts as thoughts.Even people who are in the state of Buddhist wisdom can experience realization by

96    Shōkyō. See LS 1.166. 97 Roji. See LS 1.166.

98    already, and so there is no area to be entered and no area to be left.Denial of idealistic interpretations of entering and leaving—reality is where we are

99    Gujin, elsewhere translated as “perfectly realize.” See LS 1.68.

100  Denial of the idealistic view that the Buddhist process is only a means to an end.

101  who have real wisdom and are living in the peaceful state.Buddhist teaching always affirms the reality of the not-ideal situation, even for those

102  process.Tōmon no zenmon suggests the whole Buddhist process as this moment of the Buddhist

103  the 1.162 Fumon no ichimon. The characters suggests the Buddhist process of one individual, at one time andfumonichimonare contained in the title of the twenty-fifth chapter ofappear in the parable of the burning house. See LS“The Universal Gate of Bodhisattva Regarder

Lotus Sutra, Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon,

“universal” or “every kind of.” The chapter describes how Bodhisattva Avalo kiteśvarabeings. See LS 3.252, and the Glossary of Sanskrit Terms under of the Sounds of the World.” manifests himself or herself in many different guises (Mon means both “gate” and “aspect,” and fumon), in order to save livingsamantamukha.fu means

104  We usually think that various processes lead us to realization. This suggests, conversely, that realization leads us to realize the Buddhist process.

105  Buddhist wisdom can occur instantaneously, even before the Buddhist process iscompleted. 106 Buddhist wisdom can still be realized even after the process is complete.

107  We can sometimes realize the peaceful state in painful or emotional circumstances.

108  life.This part considers the analogy of the burning house on the practical basis of everyday 109 buppōFue. Master Daikan Enō said, “I do not understand the Buddha-Dharma” (). See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 59. gabue 110 Gyōji,Fushiki. paragraph 188; and Chapter Twenty, Alludes to the words of Master Bodhidharma. See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II),Kokyō, paragraph 162.

111    divided in the minds of ordinary people; the ordinary world. The us to see the triple world as it really is, as the triple world. See LS 3.18.Rinden-sangai. Rindenor “circuit of mundane existence.” represents the Sanskrit word samsara, lit., “wandering through,”Sangai, triple world, means the world as it isLotus Sutra teaches

112    Shin-on. See LS 1.68.

113    Anon. Suggests an ideal situation. See LS 1.146.

114    Heitan.have not been traced in the expression, Suggests the concrete balanced state realized in practice. These charactersheisho, appears many times, often together with Lotus Sutra.An equivalent, though slightly more abstractanon. See LS 1.146.

115    Shujō-sho-yuraku. See LS 3.32.

116    Jōzai. See LS 3.32.

117    Waga-jōdo-fuki. See LS 3.32.

118    Hongyō, used here as a verb. See note 8, and LS 2.172, 3.20.

119    Isshin-yoku-kenbutsu. See LS 3.30. See also Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Kenbutsu. 120 Bunshinof the Buddha. See LS 2.176.means “offshoot,” suggesting the bodies of individual buddhas as offshoots 121 Chapter Seventy-one [Vol. III], Zenshin sometimes suggests the universe as the whole body of the Buddha (as inNyorai-zenshin). See LS 2.154. 122 Gushutsu-ryōjusen. See LS 3.30.

123  Shinmyō o jishaku se zaru. See LS 3.30.

124  Jōjū-shi-seppō. See LS 3.30. See also Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Kenbutsu.

125  Hōben-gen-nehan. See LS 3.30.

126  Shi-fuken no sui-gon. See LS 3.30.

127  LS 3.30.Ishin, lit., “one mind”; used in the Lotus Sutra as an adverb (“wholeheartedly”). See 128 Tennin-jō-jūman. See LS 3.32.

129  Threefold Lotus Sutramentioned in the Birushana. Vairocana is the Sun Buddha, not mentioned in the Kanfugenbosatsugyōhōkyō ), which is included as the third part of the(Sutra of Reflection on the Practice of Lotus Sutra itself but

Dharma by Bodhisattva Universal Virtue(LSW).

130  Sutra, four lands (see following note). The Tendai sect is based on the study of the Jō-jaku-kō-do.and Master Dōgen spent his teenage years as a monk of the Tendai sect at a This sentence is related to the teaching of the Tendai sect about the Lotus temple on Mount Hiei in Japan.

131  hōben-uyo-do,bonshō-dōgo-do,Shido are four lands symbolizing the four processes of Buddhist life. They are 1)the land of expedient methods where something still remains, that is, the land where sacred beings and ordinary people live together; 2) and no hindrances, that is, the land of bodhisattvas who have realized the teaching plentily realized the teaching for themselves; 3) the land of those who are led by the Buddha’s teachings but who have not yet com-jō-jaku-kō-do, the eternally peaceful and bright land, which is thejippō-muge-do, the land of real results abode of those who have realized the truth. perfectly; and 4)

132  Nyoitsu no butsudo. See LS 3.158.

133  Mijin,atom. See LS 3.130.derived from the Sanskrit paramāṇu, which means an infinitesimal portion or

134  Hokkai means inclusive reality.

135  Kyōgi-fu-i. See LS 2.156–58.

136  Yoku-rei-shujō. See LS 1.88–90.

137  Chiken-haramitsu. See note 34.

138  Juki. See note 33.

139  realized.” See LS 1.68.“Perfectly exhausted” is another translation of gujin, usually translated as “perfectly

140  Nyozeriki. See LS 1.68.

141  Buddha-Dharma?” Master Reiun says, “Donkey business being unfinished, but horse Master Chōkei Eryō asks Master Reiun Shigon, “Just what is the Great Intent of the business coming in.” See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 56.

142  Shutsugen-o-shi. See note 45.

143  ing Out from the Earth.” See LS 2.286.Chi-yū. The title of the fifteenth chapter of the Lotus Sutra is Ju-chi-yūshutsu, “Spring144 the bodhisattvas who have pursued the truth for a long time in the past have now In the “Springing Out from the Earth” chapter, the Buddha is asked to explain why sprung from the earth and become followers of the Buddha who has only recently realized the truth. See LS 2.318.

145  self), or as “others,” or as “him” (the Buddha in the “Circumstances” is ta. This can be interpreted as “circumstances” (as opposed to Lotus Sutra; see LS 2.286).

146  meanings, that is, 1) concrete space or the sky, and 2) for in this part of the Kokū.śūnyatāSee LS 2.286. The Lotus Sutra Three fold Lotus SutraShōbōgenzōis ākāśa (space, ether), which is often used as a synonymthe Chinese character says that the original Sanskrit wordśūnyatā,kūi.e., the state in which includes both these

(void). In the

there is nothing on our mind, emptiness. But (note 49.is used as a transitive verb: “to realize . . . in turning the Flower of Dharma.” Compare space)—see Chapter Seventy-seven (Vol. IV), kokū usually has a more concrete emphasis Kokū. In this sentence, tenhokke su

147  Fushō-ji-shirō. See LS 2.318.

148  Yo no fushin. See LS 2.318.

149  Ichiji-butsu-jū, taken from the opening words of the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.8. 150 Shingo, as in Master Daikan Enō’s poem.

151  factors: real and mental, objective and subjective, concrete and abstract, the substantial In general in this paragraph Master Dōgen repeatedly suggests the synthesis of two factual Vulture Peak and the fabulous stupa, the historical Buddha and the legendary earth and the empty sky, the individual downward direction and all-inclusive space, Tathagata, and so on.

152  Master Dōgen read the characters The that reality includes both the specific (the downward direction) and the inclusive downward direction,” and “the inside of space.” He emphasized that we should realizespaceLotus Sutra).    says kahō-kūchū-jū,kahō “Down below, they live in space.” See LS 2.310.and kūchū literally, as noun phrases: “the

(

153  Hotsu-bodai, short for hotsu-bodaishin, “to establish the bodhi-mind.” See LS 2.218.

154  Nanpō, a world free of impurity. See LS 2.224.

155  Bunshin. See note 120.

156  Shiki-soku-ze-kū.haramitsu.     Quoted from the Heart Sutra. See Chapter Two, Maka-hannya-

157  Nyaku-tai-nyaku-shutsu. See LS 3.18.

158  Kū-soku-ze-shiki. Also quoted from the Heart Sutra.

159  Mu-u-shōji. See LS 3.18.

160  Zaise. See LS 3.18.

161  Metsudo. See LS 3.18.

162  Shin-yū. See LS 2.118.

163  Keiju. See LS 2.276. 164 Eju. See LS 2.118.

165  Lotus Sutra, Ken-hōtōButsuzen ni hōtō aru. Taken from the opening words of the eleventh chapter of the(“Seeing the Treasure Stupa”). See LS 2.168.

166  an ox can pull a cart in one day—about nine miles (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms).Master Dōgen emphasized that even a fabulous stupa has its concrete height.Kō-gohyaku-yujun. See LS 2.168. It is said that one yojana is equivalent to the distance

167  Tōchū ni butsuza. See LS 2.186–88.

168  The Lotus Sutra says the stupa sprang out from the earth and abides in the sky (see on mental phenomena (and which is therefore realization restricted by the eyes andconsidered two further cases: concrete realization which is based on the concrete (andwhich is therefore unrestricted realization), and concrete realization which is basedLS 2.168), suggesting phenomenal realization based on the concrete. Master Dōgen by the body).

169  Suggests the oneness of an entity and the space that it occupies.

170  2.186–88.The legendary eternal buddha called Buddha Abundant Treasures (Skt. Prabhūt and Śākyamuni Buddha who existed as a historical person on Vulture Peak, are onthe same level; when we venerate them, we are venerating the same state. See LSaratna),

171  Kumetsudo. See LS 2.190. 172 Ze-hō-i. See LS 1.120.

173  II),HishiryōZazenshin; describes the state in zazen. See for example Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol.Chapter Fifty-eight (Vol. III), Hōben (“Expedient Means”) chapter of the Zazengi; and the Fukanzazengi.Lotus Sutra.The

See LS 1.88–90.characters also appear in the

174  Gen-busshin-ji-i-seppō. See LS 3.252.

175  later turned against the Buddha and caused a schism within the sangha. Hence Deva-Devadatta was a cousin of the Buddha and at one time the Buddha’s disciple, but hedatta is a symbol of bad behavior. See LS 3.282–84. Nevertheless, in the chapter“Devadatta,” the twelfth chapter of the that Devadatta will become a buddha in the future. See LS 2.208.Lotus Sutra, the Buddha gives affirmation

176  Tai-yaku-ke-i. See LS 1.86–88.

177  Gasshō-sengō-tai, from Śāriputra’s words in the Lotus Sutra, Hōben chapter, describing

1.80the attitude of the Buddha’s disciples waiting for him to preach the Dharma. See LS. In these sentences Master Dōgen praises the attitude of patient waiting.

178  Rokujū-shōkō. See LS 1.46.

179  Isshin-tai. See LS 1.64.

180  Fu-nō-soku-bucchi. See LS 1.72.

181  Hongyō-bosatsudō. See note 8, and LS 2.172, 3.20.

182  Konnichi-nyorai-setsu-daijō. See LS 1.52.

183  Fukaku-fuchi. See LS 1.160.

184  Fushiki, fue. See notes 109 and 110.

185  Jinten, short for jintenkō. See LS 2.12–214.

186  Chinpō. See LS 1.224.

187  Kōmyō. See LS 2.286. See also Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), Kōmyō.

188  Dōjō. See LS 1.120.

189  Kōdai-shinnon. See LS 1.68.

190  Shindai-ku-on. See LS 3.18–20, 3.328–30.

191  LS 1.300.Kuyō, kugyō, sonjū, sandan. This phrase appears many times in the Lotus Sutra. See

192  1241.

193  Shin [no] shukke-ji, a true monk.

194  Myōnashi. See LS 1.82.

195  The first month of the lunar calendar.

196  1305.

 

[Chapter Eighteen] Shin-fukatoku Mind Cannot Be Grasped(The Former)

Translator’s Note: Shin means “mind,” fu expresses negation, ka expresses possibility, and toku means “to grasp.” Shin-fukatoku, or “mind cannot be grasped,” is a quotation from the Diamond Sutra. On the basis of our common sense, we usually think that our mind can be grasped by our intellect, and we are prone to think that our mind must exist somewhere substantially. This belief also extends into the sphere of philosophy; René Descartes, for example, started his philosophical thinking with the premise “Cogito ergo sum” or “I think therefore I am.” The German idealists, for example, Kant, Fichte, von Schelling, and Hegel, also based their philosophies on the existence of mind. But in Buddhism we do not have confidence in the existence of mind. Buddhism is a philosophy of action, or a philosophy of the here and now; in that philosophy, mind cannot exist independently of the external world. In other words, Buddhism says that all existence is the instantaneous contact between mind and the external world. Therefore it is difficult for us to grasp our mind independently of the external world. In short, Buddhist theory cannot support belief in the independent existence of mind. In this chapter, Master Dōgen preached that mind cannot be grasped, explaining a famous Buddhist story about a conversation between Master Tokusan Senkan and an old woman selling rice cakes.

[75]       Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Past mind cannot be grasped, present mindcannot be grasped, and future mind cannot be grasped.”1

This is what the Buddhist Patriarch has mastered in practice. Inside cannot be grasped, it has scooped out and brought here the caves2 of the past, present, and future. At the same time it has utilized the cave of [the Buddhist Patriarch] himself, and the meaning of “self” here is “mind cannot be grasped.” The present thinking and discrimination is “mind cannot be grasped.” The whole body utilizing the twelve hours is just “mind cannot be grasped.”

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[76]       After entering the room of a Buddhist patriarch, we understand “mind cannot be grasped.” Before entering the room of a Buddhist patriarch, we are without questions about, we are without assertions about, and we do not see and hear “mind cannot be grasped.” Teachers of sutras and teachers of commentaries, śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas, have never seen it even in a dream. Evidence of this is close at hand: Zen Master Tokusan Senkan,3 in former days, boasts that he has elucidated the Diamond Prajñā Sutra.4

76a Sometimes he calls himself “Shū, King of the Diamond Sutra.”5 He is reputed to be especially well versed in the Seiryū Commentaries,6 besides which he [himself] has edited texts weighing twelve tan.7 It appears that there is no other lecturer to match him. [In fact,] however, he is the last in a line of literary Dharma teachers. Once, he hears that there is a supreme Buddha Dharma, received by rightful successor from rightful successor, and angered beyond endurance he crosses mountains and rivers, carrying his sutras and commentaries with him, until he comes upon the order of Zen Master Shin of Ryūtan.8 On the way to that order, which he intends to join, he stops for a rest. Then an old woman comes along, and she [also] stops for a rest by the side of the road.

Then Lecturer [Sen]kan asks, “What kind of person are you?”

The old woman says, “I am an old woman who sells rice cakes.” Tokusan says, “Will you sell some rice cakes to me?”

The old woman says, “Why does the master wish to buy rice cakes?”

Tokusan says, “I would like to buy rice cakes to refresh my mind.”9 The old woman says, “What is that great load the master is carrying?”

Tokusan says, “Have you not heard? I am Shū, King of the Diamond Sutra. I have mastered the Diamond Sutra. There is no part of it that I do not understand. This [load] I am now carrying is commentaries on the Diamond Sutra.

Hearing this insistence, the old woman says, “The old woman has a

question. Will the master permit me [to ask] it, or not?”

Tokusan says, “I give you permission at once. You may ask whatever

you like.”

The old woman says, “I have heard it said in the Diamond Sutra that past mind cannot be grasped, present mind cannot be grasped, and future mind cannot be grasped. Which mind do you now intend somehow to refresh

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with rice cakes? If the master is able to say something, I will sell the rice 76b cakes. If the master is unable to say anything, I will not sell the rice cakes.”

Tokusan is dumbfounded at this: he does not know how he might politely reply. The old woman just swings her sleeves10 and leaves. In the end, she does not sell her rice cakes to Tokusan. How regrettable it is for a commentator on hundreds of scrolls [of text], a lecturer for tens of years, on merely receiving one question from a humble old woman, to be defeated at once and not even to manage a polite reply. Such things are due to the great difference between [someone] who has met a true teacher and succeeded a true teacher and heard the right Dharma, and [someone] who has never heard the right Dharma or met a true teacher. This is when Tokusan first says, “A rice cake painted in a picture cannot kill hunger.” Now, so they say, he has received the Dharma from Ryūtan.

[81]    When we carefully consider this story of the meeting between the old woman and Tokusan, Tokusan’s lack of clarity in the past is audible [even] now. Even after meeting Ryūtan he might still be frightened of the old woman. He is just a late learner, not an eternal buddha who has transcended enlightenment. The old woman on this occasion shuts Tokusan’s mouth, but it is still difficult to decide that she is really a true person.11 The reason is that when she hears the words “mind cannot be grasped,” she thinks only that mind cannot be got, or that mind cannot exist, and so she asks as she does. If Tokusan were a stout fellow, he might have the power to examine and defeat the old woman. If he had examined and defeated her already, it would also be apparent whether the old woman is in fact a true person. Tokusan has not yet become Tokusan, and so whether the old woman is a true person also is not yet apparent.

[82]    That the mountain monks of the great kingdom of Song today, with        76c

their patched robes and wide sleeves,12 idly laugh at Tokusan’s inability to answer, and praise the old woman’s inspired wit, might be very unreliable and stupid. For there is no absence of reasons to doubt the old woman: At the point when Tokusan is unable to say anything, why does the old woman not say to Tokusan, “Now the master is unable to say something, [so] go ahead and ask [this] old woman. The old woman will say something for the master instead.” If she spoke like this, and if what she said to Tokusan after receiving his question were right in expression, it would be apparent that the old woman

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really was a true person. She has questions, but she is without any assertion. No one since ancient times has ever been called a true person without asserting even a single word. We can see from Tokusan’s past [experience] that idle boasting is useless, from beginning to end. We can know from the example of the old woman that someone who has never expressed anything cannot be approved. Let us see if we can say something in Tokusan’s place. Just as the old woman is about to question him as she does, Tokusan should tell her at once, “If you are like this, then do not sell me your rice cakes!” If Tokusan speaks like this, he might be an inspired practitioner. Tokusan might ask the old woman, “Present mind cannot be grasped, past mind cannot be grasped, and future mind cannot be grasped. Which mind do you now intend to refresh with rice cakes?” If he questions her like this, the old woman should say at once to Tokusan, “The master knows only that rice cakes cannot refresh the mind. You do not know that mind refreshes rice cakes, and you do not know

77a that mind refreshes mind.” If she says this, Tokusan will surely hesitate. Just at that time, she should take three rice cakes and hand them over to Tokusan. Just as Tokusan goes to take them, the old woman should say, “Past mind cannot be grasped! Present mind cannot be grasped! Future mind cannot be grasped!” Or if Tokusan does not extend his hands to take them, she should take one of the rice cakes and strike Tokusan with it, saying, “You spiritless corpse! Do not be so dumb!” When she speaks like this if Tokusan has something to say [for himself], fine. If he has nothing to say, the old woman should speak again for Tokusan. [But] she only swings her sleeves and leaves. We cannot suppose that there is a bee in her sleeve, either. Tokusan himself does not say, “I cannot say anything. Please, old woman, speak for me.” So not only does he fail to say what he should say, he also fails to ask what he should ask. It is pitiful that the old woman and Tokusan, past mind and future mind, questions and assertions, are solely in the state of “future mind cannot be grasped.” Generally, even after this, Tokusan does not appear to have experienced any great enlightenment, but only the odd moment of violent behavior.13 If he had studied under Ryūtan for a long time, the horns on his head might have touched something and broken,14 and he might have met the moment in which the pearl [under the black dragon’s] chin15 is authentically transmitted. We see merely that his paper candle was blown out,16 which is not enough for the transmission of the torch.17 This being so, monks who are

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learning in practice must always be diligent in practice. Those who have taken it easy are not right. Those who were diligent in practice are Buddhist patriarchs. In conclusion, “mind cannot be grasped” means cheerfully buying a painted rice cake18 and munching it up in one mouthful.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Shin-fukatoku      77b

                                        Preached to the assembly at Kannondōrikō-                                         shōhōrinji, in the Uji district of Yōshū,19                                         during the summer retreat in the second year                                         of Ninji.20

 

Notes

1     The Sanskrit KongōhannyaharamitsukyōVajracchedikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra.Kongōkyō or the Diamond Sutra.Diamond Prajñāpāramitā Sutra, In Japanese the name of the sutra is from the usually abbreviated to

2     Kutsurō,daily life. (This usage is also found in Chapter Seventy-nine [Vol. IV], quotation from the past, present, and future. Lit., “cave-cage,” suggests the regulated and concrete conditions of a buddha’s Diamond Sutra has exactly described the life of the buddhas of Ango.) The

3     said that Master Tokusan received the Dharma from Master Ryūtan, and later also Master Tokusan Senkan (780–865). After traveling to the south of China he met Master Ryūtan Sōshin, a third-generation descendant of Master Seigen Gyōshi. It is

Dokufuzan to escape persecution by the Tang emperor Bu (r. 841–846), who tried to met Master Isan Reiyū. He lived for thirty years in the Reiyō district, then fled to

Master Tokusan to become the master of Kotokuzenin Temple. Master Tokusan’s successors included Master Seppō Gison.abolish Buddhism. Finally, in the Daichū era (847–860), the governor of Buryō invited

4     The most popular Chinese translation of the revered after the time of Master Daikan Enō.by Kumārajīva. The sutra preaches that all Diamond Sutra in their preaching. It was especially highlydharmaDiamond Sutras are bare and without self. Manyis a single-volume version

Chinese masters quoted the

5     a complete cycle, and therefore suggests Master Tokusan’s complete understanding Shū was Master Tokusan’s family name. At the same time, the character Diamond Sutra.    shū means of the

6     The Seiryū Commentaries were written by a monk called Dōin at Seiryōji, under the orders of the Tang emperor Gensō (r. 713–755).

7     One tan is a hundred kin. One kin is equal to about 0.6 kilos.

8     living, but his life history is not known clearly. He spent his life as a teacher in theMaster Ryūtan Sōshin. A successor of Master Tennō Dōgo, who was the successorof Master Sekitō Kisen. It is said that Master Ryūtan’s family sold rice cakes for a

Reiyō district.

9     “To refresh my mind” is would like to buy a rice cake and use it as a refreshment). tenjin, originally used not as a verb but as a noun (lit., ITen means to light, as in

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a cup of noodles.to light a candle. Shin, jin means mind. Tenjin means refreshments—cakes, fruit, or 10 A sign of contempt.

11    Sono hito, lit., “that person,” or “the very person,” or “a person of the fact.”

12    Un-nō-ka-bei, lit., “clouds-patches-mist-sleeves.” The words suggest the natural life and the usual clothes of a Buddhist monk, and therefore monks themselves.

13    See, for example, ‘If you ask a question, there is something wrong. If you do not ask your question,Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 45. “Tokusan preaches to an audience, that is also a violation.’ Then a monk edges forward and prostrates himself. The masterstrikes him at once. . . .” 14 of himself.Horns on the head can be interpreted as symbols of Master Tokusan’s high opinion

15    The black dragon’s pearl symbolizes the truth.Ganju, lit., “chin pearl,” means the pearl that a black dragon retains under its chin.

16    candle and gives it to Master Tokusan. As soon as Tokusan touches the candle, MasterOne evening Tokusan enters Master Ryūtan’s room, and stands waiting there untillate at night. Master Ryūtan asks him, “Why don’t you retire?” Tokusan takes hisleave but then comes back saying, “It is dark outside.” Master Ryūtan lights a paper

Ryūtan blows it out. Then Master Tokusan has a sudden great realization and prostrateshimself. The story (which suggests that a person cannot find his or her way by relyingupon another person’s enlightenment) is recorded in the 4, and (in a simpler version) in the Keitokudentō roku, chapter 15. Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no.

17    Dentō,), symbolizes the transmission of the Dharma from Buddhist patriarch to Buddhist“transmission of the torch,” as in Dentōroku (Records of Transmission of the patriarch.Torch

18    Gabyō; see Chapter Forty (Vol. II), Gabyō.

19    Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture. 20 1241.

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[Chapter Nineteen] Shin-fukatoku Mind Cannot Be Grasped(The Latter)

Translator’s Note: The ninety-five–chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō has two chapters with the same title, Shin-fukatoku or Mind Cannot Be Grasped. We usually discriminate between the two chapters with the words “the former,” and “the latter.” The contents of the two chapters are different, but the meaning of the two chapters is almost the same. Furthermore, the end of each chapter records the same date—the summer retreat in 1241. However, while the former chapter says “preached to the assembly,” this chapter says “written.” So it may be that the former chapter was a shorthand record of Master Dōgen’s preaching, and the latter was Master Dōgen’s draft of his lecture. This is only a supposition, and scholars in future may be able to find a more exact conclusion.

[89]  “Mind cannot be grasped” is the buddhas; they have maintained it andrelied upon it as their own state of anuttara samyak saṃbodhi.

[90]  The Diamond Sutra says, “Past mind cannot be grasped, present

mind cannot be grasped, and future mind cannot be grasped.”

This is just the realized state of maintaining and relying upon “mind cannot be grasped,” which is the buddhas themselves. They have maintained it and relied upon it as “triple-world mind cannot be grasped” and as “alldharmas mind cannot be grasped.” The state of maintenance and reliance which makes this clear is not experienced unless learned from buddhas and is not authentically transmitted unless learned from patriarchs. To learn from buddhas means to learn from the sixteen-foot body,1 and to learn from a single stalk of grass.2 To learn from the patriarchs means to learn from skin, flesh, bones, and marrow,3 and to learn from a face breaking into a smile.4 The import of this is that when we seek [the truth] under [a teacher who] has evidently received the authentic transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury, who

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has received the legitimate one-to-one transmission of the state in which the mind-seal of the buddhas and the patriarchs is directly accessible, then without fail that [teacher’s] bones and marrow, face and eyes, are transmitted, and we receive body, hair, and skin. Those who do not learn the Buddha’s truth and who do not enter the room of a patriarch neither see nor hear nor understand this. The method of asking about it is beyond them. They have never realized the means to express it, even in a dream.

[92] Tokusan, in former days, when not a stout fellow, was an authority on the Diamond Sutra. People of the time called him Shū, King of the Dia-

77c mond Sutra. Of more than eight hundred scholars, he is the king. Not only is he especially well versed in the Seiryū Commentaries, he has also edited texts weighing twelve tan. There is no lecturer who stands shoulder-to-shoulder with him. In the story he hears that in the south a supreme truth has been received by rightful successor from rightful successor, and so, carrying his texts, he travels across the mountains and rivers. He takes a rest by the left of the road leading to Ryūtan, and an old woman comes by.

Tokusan asks, “What kind of person are you?”

The old woman says, “I am an old woman who sells rice cakes.” Tokusan says, “Will you sell some rice cakes to me?”

The old woman says, “What does the master want to buy them for?” Tokusan says, “I would like to buy some rice cakes to refresh my mind.” The old woman says, “What is all that the master is carrying?”

Tokusan says, “Have you not heard? I am Shū, King of the Diamond Sutra. I have mastered the Diamond Sutra. There is no part of it that I do not understand. This [load] I am carrying is commentaries on the Diamond Sutra.

Hearing this, the old woman says, “The old woman has a question. Will

the master permit me [to ask] it, or not?”

Tokusan says, “I permit it. You may ask whatever you like.”

She says, “I have heard it said in the Diamond Sutra that past mind cannot be grasped, present mind cannot be grasped, and future mind cannot be grasped. Which mind do you now intend to refresh with my rice cakes? If the master is able to say something, I will sell the rice cakes. If the master is unable to say anything, I will not sell the rice cakes.”

At this, Tokusan was dumbfounded; he could not find any appropriate 78a reply. The old woman just swung her sleeves and left. In the end, she did not sell any rice cakes to Tokusan. How regrettable it was that a commentator on hundreds of scrolls [of text], a lecturer for tens of years, on receiving one mere question from a humble old woman, promptly fell into defeat. Such things are due to the great difference between those who have received a master’s transmission and those who have not received a master’s transmission, between those who visit the room of a true teacher and those who do not enter the room of a true teacher. Hearing the words “cannot be grasped,” [some] have simply understood that to grasp is equally impossible both for the former group and for the latter group. They totally lack the vigorous path.5 Again, there are people who think that we say we cannot grasp it because we are endowed with it originally. Such [thinking] has by no means hit the target. This was when Tokusan first knew that rice cakes painted in a picture cannot kill hunger, and understood that for Buddhist training it is always necessary to meet a true person. He also understood that a person who has been uselessly caught up in only sutras and texts is not able to acquire real power. Eventually he visited Ryūtan and realized the way of master and disciple, after which he did indeed become a true person. Today he is not only a founding patriarch of the Unmon and Hōgen [sects],6 [but also] a guiding teacher in the human world and in the heavens above.

[95] When we consider this story, it is evident now that Tokusan in the past was not enlightened. Even though the old woman has now shut Tokusan’s mouth, it is also hard to decide that she is really a true person. In brief, it seems that hearing the words “mind cannot be grasped,” she considers only that mind cannot exist, and so she asks as she does. If Tokusan were a stout fellow, he might have the power of interpretation. If he were able to interpret 78b [the situation], it would also have become apparent whether the old woman was a true person, but because this is a time when Tokusan was not Tokusan, whether the old woman is a true person also is not known and not evident. What is more, we are not without reasons to doubt the old woman now. When Tokusan is unable to say anything, why does she not say to Tokusan, “Now the master is unable to say something, so please go ahead and ask [this] old woman. The old woman will say something for the master instead.” Then, after receiving Tokusan’s question, if she had something to say to Tokusan, the old woman might show some real ability. Someone who has the state of effort common to the bones and marrow and the faces and eyes of the ancients,

and [common] to the brightness and the conspicuous form of eternal buddhas, in such a situation has no trouble not only taking hold but also letting go of Tokusan, the old woman, the ungraspable, the graspable, rice cakes, and mind. The “buddha-mind” is just the three times.7 Mind and the three times are not separated by a thousandth or a hundredth, but when they move apart and we discuss their separation, then the profound distance [between them] has [already] gone beyond eighty-four thousand.8 If [someone] says “What is past mind?” we should say to that person “It cannot be grasped.” If [someone] says “What is present mind?” we should say to that person “It cannot be grasped.” If [someone] says “What is future mind?” we should say to that person “It cannot be grasped.” The point here is not to say that there is mind,

78c which we provisionally call ungraspable; we are just saying for the present “It cannot be grasped.” We do not say that it is impossible to grasp mind; we only say “It cannot be grasped.” We do not say that it is possible to grasp mind; we only say “It cannot be grasped.” Further, if [someone] says “What is the state of ‘past mind cannot be grasped’?” we should say “Living and dying, coming and going.” If [someone] says “What is the state of ‘present mind cannot be grasped’?” we should say “Living and dying, coming and going.” If [someone] says “What is the state of ‘future mind cannot be grasped’?” we should say “Living and dying, coming and going.” In sum, there is buddha-mind as fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles, and all the buddhas of the three times experience this as “it cannot be grasped.” There are only fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles, which are the buddha-mind itself, and the buddhas experience this in the three times as “it cannot be grasped.” Furthermore there is the state of “it cannot be grasped” itself, existing as mountains, rivers, and the earth. There are [times when] the state of “it cannot be grasped” as grass, trees, wind, and water, is just mind. There are also [times when] “the mind to which we should give rise while having no abode”9 is the state of “it cannot be grasped.” Still further, mind in the state of “it cannot be grasped” which is preaching eighty thousand Dharma gates through all the ages of all the buddhas of the ten directions, is like this.

[99] A further example: At the time of the National Master Daishō,10 Daini Sanzō11 arrived at the capital12 from the faraway Western Heavens,13 claiming to have attained the power to know others’ minds.14 In the story the Tang emperor Shukusō15 orders the National Master to examine [Sanzō]. As soon as Sanzō meets the National Master, he promptly prostrates himself and stands to the [master’s] right.

At length, the National Master asks, “Have you got the power to know

others’ minds, or not?”

Sanzō says, “I would not be so bold [as to say].”16

The National Master says, “Tell me where [this] old monk is now.”

Sanzō says, “Master, you are the teacher of the whole country. Why are

you by the West River watching a boat race?”

          The National Master, after a while, asks a second time, “Tell me where      

the old monk is now.”

Sanzō says, “Master, you are the teacher of the whole country. Why are

you on Tianjin Bridge17 watching [someone] play with a monkey?”

The National Master asks again, “Tell me where the old monk is now.”

Sanzō takes a while, but knows nothing and sees nothing. Then the National Master scolds him, saying, “You ghost of a wild fox,18 where is your power to know others’ minds?” Sanzō has no further answer.19

[101] If we did not know of such an episode, that would be bad, and if we were not informed about it, we might have doubts. Buddhist patriarchs and scholars of the Tripiṭaka20 can never be equal; they are as far apart as heaven and earth. Buddhist patriarchs have clarified the Buddha-Dharma, scholars of the Tripiṭaka have never clarified it at all. With regard to [the title] “scholar of the Tripiṭaka,” indeed, there are cases of even secular people being “a scholar of the Tripiṭaka.” It represents, for example, the acquisition of a place in literary culture. This being so, even if [Sanzō] has not only understood all the languages of India and China but has also accomplished the power to know others’ minds as well, he has never seen the body and mind of the Buddhist truth, even in a dream. For this reason, in his audience with the National Master, who has experienced the state of the Buddhist patriarchs, [Sanzō] is seen through at once. When we learn mind in Buddhism, the myriad dharmas are mind itself,21 and the triple world is mind alone.22 It may be that mind alone is just mind alone,23 and that concrete buddha is mind here and now.24 Whether it is self, or whether it is the external world, we must not be mistaken about the mind of the Buddha’s truth. It could never idly flow down to the West River or wander over to Tianjin Bridge. If we want to maintain and to rely upon the body and mind of the Buddha’s truth,

79b we must learn the power which is the wisdom of the Buddha’s truth. That is to say, in the Buddha’s truth the whole earth is mind, which does not change through arising and vanishing, and the whole Dharma is mind. We should also learn the whole of mind as the power of wisdom. Sanzō, not having seen this already, is nothing but the ghost of a wild fox. So, even the first two times, [Sanzō] never sees the mind of the National Master, and never penetrates25 the mind of the National Master at all. He is a wild fox cub idly playing with no more than the West River, Tianjin Bridge, a boat race, and a monkey— how could he hope to see the National Master? Again, the fact is evident that [Sanzō] cannot see the place where the National Master is. He is asked three times, “Tell me where the old monk is now,” but he does not listen to these words. If he could listen, he might be able to investigate [further], [but] because he does not listen, he blunders heedlessly onward. If Sanzō had learned the Buddha-Dharma, he would listen to the words of the National Master, and he might be able to see the body and mind of the National Master. Because he does not learn the Buddha-Dharma in his everyday life, even though he was born to meet a guiding teacher of the human world and the heavens above, he has passed [the opportunity] in vain. It is pitiful and it is deplorable. In general, how could a scholar of the Tripiṭaka attain to the conduct of a Buddhist patriarch and know the limits of the National Master? Needless to say, teachers of commentaries from the Western Heavens, and Indian scholars of the Tripiṭaka, could never know the conduct of the National Master at all. Kings of gods can know, and teachers of commentaries can know, what scholars of the Tripiṭaka know. How could what commentary-teachers and gods know be beyond the wisdom of [bodhisattvas at] the place of assignment; or beyond [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred stages and the three clever stages? Gods cannot know, and [bodhisattvas at] the place of assignment26 have never clarified, the body and mind of the National Master. Discussion of body and mind among Buddhists is like this. We should know it and believe it.

[105] The Dharma of our great teacher Śākyamuni is never akin to the ghosts of wild foxes—the two vehicles, non-Buddhists, and the like. Still,

79c venerable patriarchs through the ages have each studied this story, and their discussions have survived:

27A monk asks Jōshū,28 “Why does Sanzō not see where the National

Master is the third time?” Jōshū says, “He does not see because the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils.”

Another monk asks Gensha,29 “If [the National Master] is already on [Sanzō’s] nostrils, why does [Sanzō] not see him?” Gensha says, “Simply because of being enormously close.”

Kaie Tan30 says, “If the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils, what difficulty could [Sanzō] have in seeing him? Above all, it has not been recognized that the National Master is inside Sanzō’s eyeballs.”

On another occasion, Gensha challenges31 Sanzō with these words: “You! Say! Have you seen at all, even the first two times?” Setchō Ken32 says, “I am defeated, I am defeated.”

On still another occasion, a monk asks Kyōzan,33 “Why is it that the third time, though Sanzō takes a while, he does not see where the National Master is?” Kyōzan says, “The first two times [the master’s] mind is wandering in external circumstances; then he enters the samādhi of receiving and using the self,34 and so [Sanzō] does not see him.”

These five venerable patriarchs are all precise, but they have passed over the National Master’s conduct: by only discussing [Sanzō’s] failure to know the third time, they seem to permit that he knew the first two times. This is the ancestors’ oversight, and students of later ages should know it.

[108]  Kōshō’s (Dōgen)35 present doubts about the five venerable patriarchs are twofold. First, they do not know the National Master’s intention in examining Sanzō. Second, they do not know the National Master’s body and mind.

[109]  Now the reason I say that they do not know the National Master’sintention in examining Sanzō is as follows: First the National Master says, “Tell me where the old monk is just now.” The intention expressed [here] is to test whether or not Sanzō has ever known the Buddha-Dharma. At this 80a time, if Sanzō has heard the Buddha-Dharma, he would study according to the Buddha-Dharma the question “Where is the old monk just now?” Studied according to the Buddha-Dharma, the National Master’s “Where is the old monk now” asks “Am I at this place?” “Am I at that place?” “Am I in the supreme state of bodhi?” “Am I in the prajñāpāramitā?” “Am I suspended in space?” “Am I standing on the earth?” “Am I in a thatched hut?” and “Am I in the place of treasure?” Sanzō does not recognize this intention, and so

he vainly offers views and opinions of the common person, the two vehicles, and the like. The National Master asks again, “Tell me where this old monk is just now.” Here again Sanzō offers useless words. The National Master asks yet again, “Tell me where this old monk is just now,” whereupon Sanzō takes a while but says nothing, his mind baffled. Then the National Master scolds Sanzō, saying, “You ghost of a wild fox, where is your power to know others’ minds?” Thus chided, Sanzō still has nothing to say [for himself]. Having considered this episode carefully, the ancestors all think that the National Master is now scolding Sanzō because, even if [Sanzō] knows where the National Master was the first two times, he does not know the third time. That is not so. The National Master is scolding Sanzō outright for being nothing but the ghost of a wild fox and never having seen the Buddha-Dharma even in a dream. [The National Master] has never said that [Sanzō] knew the first two times but not the third time. His criticism is outright criticism of Sanzō. The National Master’s idea is, first, to consider whether or not it is possible to call the Buddha-Dharma “the power to know others’ minds.”

Further, he thinks “If we speak of ‘the power to know others’ minds’ we must

take ‘others’ in accordance with the Buddha’s truth, we must take ‘mind’ in accordance with the Buddha’s truth, and we must take ‘the power to know’ in accordance with the Buddha’s truth, but what this Sanzō is saying now does not accord with the Buddha’s truth at all. How could it be called the Buddha-Dharma?” These are the thoughts of the National Master. The meaning of his testing is as follows: Even if [Sanzō] says something the third time, if it is like the first two times—contrary to the principles of the Buddha Dharma and contrary to the fundamental intention of the National Master— it must be criticized. When [the National Master] asks three times, he is asking again and again whether Sanzō has been able to understand the National Master’s words.

[112] The second [doubt]—that [the five venerable patriarchs] do not know the body and mind of the National Master—is namely that the body and mind of the National Master cannot be known, and cannot be penetrated,36 by scholars of the Tripiṭaka. It is beyond the attainment of [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred stages and the three clever stages, and it is beyond clarification by [bodhisattvas at] the place of assignment or [in] the state of balanced awareness,37 so how could the common person Sanzō know it? We must clearly determine [the truth of] this principle. If [people] purport that even Sanzō might know, or might attain to, the body and mind of the National Master, it is because they themselves do not know the body and mind of the National Master. If we say that people who have got the power to know others’ minds can know the National Master, then can the two vehicles also know the National Master? That is impossible: people of the two vehicles can never arrive at the periphery of the National Master. Nowadays many people of the two vehicles have read the sutras of the Great Vehicle, [but] even they cannot know the body and mind of the National Master. Further, they cannot see the body and mind of the Buddha-Dharma, even in a dream. Even if they seem to read and recite the sutras of the Great Vehicle, we should clearly know that they are totally people of the Small Vehicles. In sum, the body and mind of the National Master cannot be known by people who are acquiring mystical powers or getting practice and experience. It might be difficult even for the 80c National Master to fathom the body and mind of the National Master. Why? [Because] his conduct has long been free of the aim of becoming buddha; and so even the Buddha’s eye could not glimpse it. His leaving-and-coming has far transcended the nest and cannot be restrained by nets and cages.

[114] Now I would like to examine and defeat each of the five venerable patriarchs. Jōshū says that because the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils, [Sanzō] does not see. What does this comment mean? Such mistakes happen when we discuss details without clarifying the substance. How could the National Master be right on Sanzō’s nostrils? Sanzō has no nostrils. Moreover, although it does appear that the means are present for the National Master and Sanzō to look at each other, there is no way for them to get close to each other. Clear eyes will surely affirm [that this is so].

38Gensha says, “Simply because of being enormously close.” Certainly, his “enormously close” can be left as it is, [but] he misses the point. What state does he describe as “enormously close”? What object does he take to be “enormously close”? Gensha has not recognized “enormous closeness,” and has not experienced “enormous closeness.” In regard to the Buddha Dharma he is the farthest of the far.

Kyōzan says, “The first two times [the master’s] mind is wandering in external circumstances; then he enters the samādhi of receiving and using the self, and so [Sanzō] does not see him.” Though [Kyōzan’s] acclaim as a little Śākyamuni echoes on high [even] in the Western Heavens, he is not without such wrongness. If he is saying that when [people] see each other [they] are inevitably wandering in external circumstances, then there would seem to be no instance of Buddhist patriarchs seeing each other, and he would appear not to have studied the virtues of affirmation and becoming buddha. If he is saying that Sanzō, the first two times, was really able to know the place where the National Master was, I must say that [Kyōzan] does not know the virtue of a single bristle of the National Master’s hair.

81a Gensha demands, “Have you seen at all, even the first two times?” This one utterance “Have you seen at all?” seems to say what needs to be said, but it is not right because it suggests that [Sanzō’s] seeing is like not seeing.39 Hearing the above, Zen Master Setchō Myōkaku40 says, “I am defeated. I am defeated.” When we see Gensha’s words as the truth, we should speak like that; when we do not see them as the truth, we should not speak like that.

Kaie Tan says, “If the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils, what difficulty could [Sanzō] have in seeing him? Above all, it has not been recognized that the National Master is inside Sanzō’s eyeballs.” This again discusses [only] the third time. It does not criticize [Sanzō] as he should be criticized, for not seeing the first two times as well. How could [Kaie] know that the National Master is on [Sanzō’s] nostrils or inside [Sanzō’s] eyeballs?

[117]      Every one of the five venerable patriarchs is blind to the virtue ofthe National Master; it is as if they have no power to discern the truth of the Buddha-Dharma. Remember, the National Master is just a buddha through all the ages. He has definitely received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury. Scholars of the Tripiṭaka, teachers of commentaries, and others of the Small Vehicles, do not know the limits of the National Master at all; and the proof of that is here. “The power to know others’ minds,” as it is discussed in the Small Vehicles, should be called “the power to know others’ ideas.” To have thought that a Small Vehicle scholar of the Tripiṭaka, with the power to know others’ minds, might be able to know a single bristle or half a bristle of the National Master’s hair, is a mistake. We must solely learn that a Small Vehicle scholar of the Tripiṭaka is totally unable to see the situation of the virtue of the National Master. If [Sanzō] knew where the National Master was the first two times but did not know a third time, he would possess ability which is two-thirds of the whole and he would not deserve to be criticized. If he were criticized, it would not be for a total lack [of ability]. If [the National Master] denounced such a person, who could believe in the National Master? [The National Master’s] intention is to criticize Sanzō for completely lacking the body and mind of the Buddha-Dharma. The five venerable patriarchs have such incorrectness 81b because they completely fail to recognize the conduct of the National Master. For this reason, I have now let the Buddha’s teaching of “mind cannot be grasped” be heard. It is hard to believe that people who are not able to penetrate this one dharma could have penetrated other dharmas. Nevertheless, we should know that even the ancestors have [made] such mistakes that are to be seen as mistakes.

[118]      On one occasion a monk asks the National Master, “What is themind of eternal buddhas?” The National Master says, “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.”41 This also is “mind cannot be grasped.” On another occasion a monk asks the National Master, “What is the constant and abiding mind of the buddhas?” The National Master says, “Fortunately you have met an old monk’s palace visit.”42 This also is mastery of the state of mind which “cannot be grasped.” The god Indra, on another occasion, asks the National Master, “How can we be free from becoming?”43 The National Master says, “Celestial One! You can be free from becoming by practicing the truth.” The god Indra asks further, “What is the truth?” The National Master says, “Mind in the moment is the truth.” The god Indra says, “What is mind in the moment?” Pointing with his finger, the National Master says, “This place is the stage of prajñā. That place is the net of pearls.” The god Indra does prostrations.

[120] In conclusion, in the orders of the buddhas and the patriarchs, there is often discussion of the body and of the mind in the Buddha’s truth. When we learn them both together in practice, the state is beyond the thinking and the perception of the common person and sages and saints. [So] we must

master in practice “mind cannot be grasped.”

                                        Shōbōgenzō Shin-fukatoku

                                        Written at Kōshōhōrinji on a day of the                                         sum mer retreat in the second year of Ninji.44

 

Notes

1            The sixteen-foot golden body of the Buddha, an image of the perfect state. 2              A concrete thing.

3     and marrow. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Master Bodhidharma told his four disciples that they had got his skin, flesh, bones, Kattō.

4     Master Mahamaya’s face broke into a smile when the Buddha showed his audience queenly used the words skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, and a face breaking into an uḍumbara flower. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge. Master Dōgen freemale as symbols of the transmission from Buddhist patriarch to Buddhist patriarch.

5     Katsuro. path of getting the body out.” The Fukanzazengi contains the words shusshin no katsuro, “the vigorous

6     The Unmon sect traces its lineage back to Master Unmon Bun’en (864–949), a successorof Master Seppō Gison, who was a successor of Master Tokusan. The Hōgen sectRakan Keichin, who was a successor of Master Gensha Shibi, who was a successor traces its lineage back to Master Hōgen Bun’eki (885–958), a successor of Master of Master Seppō Gison.

7     Past, present, and future; eternal existence.

8     Reality includes all things and phenomena without separation, but if we try to under-stand it intellectually we lose the state of reality completely.

9     Ō-mu-shojū-ji-shō-go-shin,lit., “While having no abode still we should cause the mindor in Japanese pronunciation, Diamond Sutra.When Master Daikan Enō happenedmasani jusho naku shi te a monk. See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), sono kokoro o shozu beshi,to arise.” These words are from the to hear them recited in a market place, he decided at once to leave home and becomeGyōji.

10    Master Nan’yō Echū (675?–775). A successor of Master Daikan Enō. Posthumously titled by the emperor as “National Master Daishō.”

11    given to a person who was accomplished in studying the Tripiṭaka.(Sanzōscriptures), Vinaya (precepts), and Abhidharma (commentaries). The title Sanzō wasrepresents the meaning of the Sanskrit Tripiṭaka, the three baskets of Sutra

12    The ancient capital of modern-day Luoyang province.

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13    Saiten (Western Heavens): India.

14    Tashintsū. See Chapter Eighty (Vol. IV), Tashintsū.

15    tioned in Chapter One, The third son of Emperor Gensō; reigned from 756 until his death in 762; also men-Bendōwa, and Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV), Shukke-kudoku. 16 so.Sanzō suggested that he had the ability, but modesty forbade him from daring to say 17 Tianjin is a large city and port in Hopeh province, southeast of Beijing.

18    natural and mystical quality of a person who has got the Dharma. In this case, it refersto Sanzō’s mystical pretensions.Yakozei. In Chapter Eight, Raihai-tokuzui, “the ghost of a wild fox” symbolizes the

19    This story, together with the comments of the five venerable patriarchs, is also quotedin Chapter Eighty (Vol. IV), story is originally recorded in the the story in Japanese; in TashintsūTashintsū.Keitokudentōroku, the story is quoted in Chinese characters only. TheIn the present chapter Master Dōgen wrotechapter 5.

20    “Scholars of the Tripiṭaka” is sanzō. See note 11. 21 Banpō-sokushin.

22    Sangai-yuishin.in this sentence are traditional expressions. See Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), Sangai-yuishin. The two expressions

23    Yuishin kore yuishin.

24    on traditional expressions. In Chapter Six, the four characters the combination used here, Zebutsu-soku-shin. The two expressions in this sentence are Master Dōgen’s variationssoku-shin-ze-butsuzebutsu-soku-shin,Soku-shin-ze-butsu, Master Dōgen uses in several different combinations. However, does not appear in Chapter Six.

25    Tsūzu.one of which is The same character, as a noun, appears in the phrase tashintsū, “the power to know others’ minds.”jintsū, “mystical powers,” 26 Hosho,in one life,” that is, a bodhisattva who is about to become a buddha. In the imageryshort for isshō-hosho no bosatsu, lit., “a bodhisattva at the place of assignment to the world to become buddhas. Of ancient India, bodhisattvas live their last lives in Tuṣita Heaven before descending

27    The five following stories are contained in one paragraph in the source text.

28    Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. See for example Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. II), Hakujushi.

29    Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison. See for exampleIkka-no-myōju. Chapter Four,

30    Master Kaie Shutan (1025–1072), successor of Master Yōgi Hōe.

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31    changeably with another character pronounced Chō su means to solicit [an opinion]. At the same time, chō, chōwhich means to chastise.is sometimes used inter-

32    Master Setchō Jūken (980–1052), a successor of Master Chimon Kōso. His comment is in praise of Master Gensha’s comment. Master Setchō is known for promoting the Sōkō (1089–1163), thought to be the originator of so-called teachings of the Unmon sect (founded by Master Unmon Bun’en [864–949]). MasterSetchō quoted a hundred stories, or compiled his works in the them with poems. Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135) later based his popular com-of Master Engo Kokugon. After Master Setchō’s death, Master Setchō’s disciplesHekiganroku (IrokuBlue Cliff Record(Bequeathed Recordskōans, from the ) on Master Setchō’s book. Master DaieKeitokudentōroku), in seven volumes.kōan Zen, was a student and praised monetary the

33    record of his words, is in one volume.Master Kyōzan Ejaku (803–887). A successor of Master Isan Reiyū. The Goroku, a 34 Jijuyō-zanmai, that is, the state of natural balance. See Chapter One, Bendōwa.

35 Kōshō. At the time, Master Dōgen was the master of Kōshōhōrinji. 36 Tsūzu. See note 25.

37    stages of belief; then thirty states classed as the three clever stages; then ten sacred A bodhisattva is said to pass through fifty-two stages before becoming a buddha: ten

The ultimate state is also called is stages; then the penultimate state; and finally the ultimate state. The penultimate statetōkaku, “balanced awareness.” The ultimate state is hosho; see note 26.                                myōkaku, “subtle awareness.”

38    These five short paragraphs criticizing the five masters are contained in one paragraph in the source text.

39    Master Dōgen is concerned with the area beyond seeing and not seeing—that is, realization of the practical state.

40    Another name of Master Setchō Jūken. While still living, he was awarded the title Zen Master Myōkaku.

41    See Chapter Forty-four (Vol. III), Kobusshin. Kobutsukobutsuliterally means “past/ancient means buddhas who buddhas,” but in that chapter Master Dōgen says that transcend the past and present and belong directly to eternity.

42    permission to become the master of a temple. In other words, “Fortunately, you have met the old monk who became master of this Sandai, “palace visit,” means going to the palace to receive the emperor’s

43    U-i, from the Sanskrit saṃskṛta. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 44 1241.

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[Chapter Twenty] The Eternal Mirror

                                                         Kokyō                                             

Translator’s Note: Ko means “ancient” or “eternal” and kyō means “mirror,” so kokyō means “the eternal mirror.” And what “the eternal mirror” means is the question. In this chapter Master Dōgen quoted Master Seppō Gison’s words “When a foreigner comes in front of the mirror, the mirror reflects the foreigner.” From these words we can understand the eternal mirror as a symbol of some human mental faculty. The eternal mirror suggests the importance of reflection, so we can suppose that the eternal mirror is a symbol of the intuitional faculty. In Buddhist philosophy, the intuitional faculty is called prajñā, or real wisdom. Real wisdom in Buddhism means our human intuitional faculty on which all our decisions are based. Buddhism esteems this real wisdom more than reason or sense perception. Our real wisdom is the basis for our decisions, and our decisions decide our life, so we can say that our real wisdom decides the course of our life. For this reason, it is very natural for Master Dōgen to explain the eternal mirror. At the same time, we must find another meaning of the eternal mirror, because Master Dōgen also quoted other words of Master Seppō Gison, “Every monkey has the eternal mirror on its back.” Therefore we can think that the eternal mirror means not only human real wisdom but also some intuitional faculty of animals. So we must widen the meaning of the eternal mirror, and understand it as a symbol of the intuitional faculty that both human beings and animals have. Furthermore Master Seppō Gison said, “When the world is ten feet wide, the eternal mirror is ten feet wide. When the world is one foot wide, the eternal mirror is one foot wide.” These words suggest the eternal mirror is the world itself. So we can say that the eternal mirror is not only a symbol of an individual faculty but is also something universal. From ancient times Buddhists have discussed the eternal mirror. In this chapter Master Dōgen explains the meaning of the eternal mirror in Buddhism, quoting the words of ancient Buddhist masters.

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[123] What all the buddhas and all the patriarchs have received and retained, and transmitted one-to-one, is the eternal mirror. They1 have the same view and the same face, the same image2 and the same cast;3 they share the same state and realize the same experience. A foreigner appears, a foreigner is reflected—one hundred and eight thousand of them. A Chinese person appears, a Chinese person is reflected—for a moment and for ten thousand years. The past appears, the past is reflected; the present appears, the present is reflected; a buddha appears, a buddha is reflected; a patriarch appears, a patriarch is reflected.

[125] The eighteenth patriarch, Venerable Geyāśata, is a man from the kingdom of Magadha in the western regions. His family name is Uzuran, his father’s name is Tengai, and his mother’s name is Hosho.4 His mother once has a dream in which she sees a great god approaching her and holding a big mirror. Then she becomes pregnant. Seven days later she gives birth to the master. Even when he is newborn, the skin of the master’s body is like polished lapis lazuli, and even before he is bathed, he is naturally fragrant and clean. From his childhood, he loves quietness. His words are different from those of ordinary children; since his birth, a clear and bright round mirror has naturally been living with him. “A round mirror” means a round mirror.5 It is a matter rare through the ages. That it has lived with him does not mean that the round mirror was also born from his mother’s womb.6 The master was born from the womb, and as the master appeared from the womb the round mirror came and naturally manifested itself before the master, and became like an everyday tool. The form of this round mirror is not ordinary: when the child approaches, he seems to be holding up the round mirror before him with both hands, yet the child’s face is not hidden. When the child goes away, he seems to be going with the round mirror on his back, yet the child’s body

82a is not hidden. When the child sleeps, the round mirror covers him like a flowery canopy. Whenever the child sits up straight, the round mirror is there in front of him. In sum, it follows [all his] movements and demeanors, active and passive. What is more, he is able to see all Buddhist facts of the past, future, and present by looking into the round mirror. At the same time, all problems and issues of the heavens above and the human world come cloudlessly to the surface of the round mirror. For example, to see by looking in this round mirror is even more clear than to attain illumination of the past

and illumination of the present by reading sutras and texts. Nevertheless, once the child has left home and received the precepts, the round mirror never appears before him again.7 Therefore [people of] neighboring villages and distant regions unanimously praise this as rare and wonderful. In truth, though there are few similar examples in this sahā world, we should not be suspicious but should be broadminded with regard to the fact that, in other worlds, families may produce such progeny. Remember, there are sutras which have changed into trees and rocks,8 and there are [good] counselors who are spreading [the Lotus Sutra] in fields and in villages;9 they too may be a round mirror. Yellow paper on a red rod10 here and now is a round mirror. Who could think that only the master was prodigious?

[129] On an outing one day, encountering Venerable Saṃgha nandi,11 [Master Geyāśata] directly proceeds before Venerable [Saṃgha]nandi. The Venerable One asks, “[That which] you have in your hands is expressing what?”12 We should hear “is expressing What?” not as a question,13 and we should learn it as such in practice. The master says:

The great round mirror of the buddhas Has no flaws or blurs, within or without.

[We] two people are able to see the same.

[Our] minds, and [our] eyes, are completely alike.

So how could the great round mirror of the buddhas have been born together with the master? The birth of the master was the brightness of the great round mirror. Buddhas [experience] the same state and the same view in this round mirror. Buddhas are the cast image of the great round mirror. 82b The great round mirror is neither wisdom nor reason, neither essence nor form. Though the concept of a great round mirror appears in the teachings of [bodhisattvas at] the ten sacred stages, the three clever stages, and so on, it is not the present “great round mirror of the buddhas.” Because “the buddhas” may be beyond wisdom, buddhas have real wisdom, [but] we do not see real wisdom as buddhas. Practitioners should remember that to preach about wisdom is never the ultimate preaching of the Buddha’s truth. Even if we feel that the great round mirror of the buddhas is already living with us, it is still a fact that we can neither touch the great round mirror in this

life nor touch it in another life; it is neither a jewel mirror nor a copper mirror, neither a mirror of flesh nor a mirror of marrow. Is [the verse] a verse spoken by the round mirror itself or a verse recited by the child? Even if it is the child who preaches this four-line verse, he has not learned it from [other] people, either by “following the sutras” or by “following [good] counselors.” He holds up the round mirror and preaches like this, simply [because] to face the mirror has been the master’s usual behavior since his earliest childhood. He seems to possess inherent eloquence and wisdom. Was the great round mirror born with the child, or was the child born with the great round mirror? It may also be possible that the births took place before or after [each other]. “The great round mirror” is just a virtue of “the buddhas.” Saying that this mirror “has no blurs on the inside or the outside” neither describes an inside that depends on an outside, nor an outside blurred by an inside. There being no face or back, “two individuals14 are able to see the same.” Minds, and eyes, are alike. “Likeness” describes “a human being” meeting “a human being.” In regard to images within, they have mind and eyes, and they are able to see the same. In regard to images without, they have mind and eyes,

and they are able to see the same. Object and subject which are manifest before us now are like each other within and like each other without—they are neither I nor anyone else. Such is the meeting of “two human beings,” and the likeness of “two human beings.” That person is called “I,” and I am that person. “Minds, and eyes, are totally alike” means mind and mind are alike, eyes and eyes are alike. The likeness is of minds and of eyes; this means, for example, that the mind and the eyes of each are alike. What does it mean for mind and mind to be alike? The Third Patriarch and the Sixth Patriarch.15 What does it mean for eyes and eyes to be alike? The eye of the truth being restricted by the eye itself.16 The principle that the master is expressing now is like this. This is how [Master Geyāśata] first pays his respects to Venerable Saṃghanandi. Taking up his principle, we should experience in practice the faces of buddhas and the faces of patriarchs in the great round mirror, which is akin to the eternal mirror.

[134] The thirty-third patriarch, Zen Master Daikan, in former days when toiling in the Dharma order on Ōbaizan, presented the following verse to the ancestral master,17 by writing it on the wall:18

In the state of bodhi there is originally no tree, Neither does the clear mirror need a stand. Originally we do not have a single thing, Where could dust and dirt exist?

[134] So then, we must study these words. People in the world call the Founding Patriarch Daikan “the eternal buddha.” Zen Master Engo19 says, “I bow my head to the ground before Sōkei,20 the true eternal buddha.”21 So remember [the words] with which the Founding Patriarch Daikan displays the clear mirror: “Originally we do not have a single thing, At what place could dust and dirt exist?” “The clear mirror needs no stand”: this contains the lifeblood; we should strive [to understand it]. All [things in] the clearclear state22 are the clear mirror itself, and so we say, “When a clear head comes, a clear head will do.”23 Because [the clear mirror] is beyond “any place,” it does not have “any place.”24 Still more, throughout the universe in 83a the ten directions, does there remain one speck of dust that is not the mirror? On the mirror itself, does there remain one speck of dust that is not the mirror? Remember, the whole universe is not lands of dust;25 and so it is the face of the eternal mirror.

[136]        In the order of Zen Master Nangaku Daie26 a monk asks, “If a mir-

ror is cast into an image,27 to what place does its luster return?”

The master says, “Venerable monk, to what place have the features you

had before you became a monk departed?”

The monk says, “After the transformation, why does it not shine like a

mirror?”

The master says, “Even though it is not shining like a mirror, it cannot

delude others one bit.”28

[137]        We are not sure of what these myriad images29 of the present are made. But if we seek to know, the evidence that they are cast from a mirror is just [here] in the words of the master. A mirror is neither of gold nor of precious stone, neither of brightness nor of an image, but that it can be instantly cast into an image is truly the ultimate investigation of a mirror.30 “To what place does the luster return?” is the assertion that “the possibility31 of a mirror being cast into an image” is just “the possibility of a mirror being cast into an image”; [it says,] for example, [that] an image returns to the place of an image, and [that] casting can cast a mirror.32 The words “Venerable monk, to what place have the features you had before you became a monk departed?” hold up a mirror to reflect [the monk’s] face.33 At this time, which momentary face34 might be “my own face”? The master says, “Even though it is not shining like a mirror, it cannot delude others one bit.” This means that it cannot shine like a mirror; and it cannot mislead others. Learn in practice that the ocean’s drying can never disclose the seabed!35 Do not break out, and do not move! At the same time, learn further in practice: there is a principle of taking an image and casting a mirror. Just this moment is miscellaneous bits of utter delusion,36 in hundred thousand myriads of shining mirror reflections.37

[139] Great Master Seppō Shinkaku38 on one occasion preaches to the

83b assembly, “If you want to understand this matter,39 my concrete state is like one face of the eternal mirror. [When] a foreigner comes, a foreigner appears. [When] a Chinese person comes, a Chinese person appears.”

Then Gensha40 steps out and asks, “If suddenly a clear mirror comes

along, what then?”

The master says, “The foreigner and the Chinese person both become

invisible.”

Gensha says, “I am not like that.”

Seppō says, “How is it in your case?”

Gensha says, “Please, master, you ask.”

Seppō says, “If suddenly a clear mirror comes along, how will it be then?” Gensha says, “Smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces!”

[141]     Now the meaning of Seppō’s words “this matter” should be learnedin practice as “this is something ineffable.”41 Let us now try to learn Seppō’s eternal mirror. In the words “Like one face of the eternal mirror. . . ,” “one face” means [the mirror’s] borders have been eliminated forever and it is utterly beyond inside and outside; it is the self as a pearl spinning in a bowl.42 The present “[when] a foreigner comes, the foreigner appears” is about one individual redbeard.43 “[When] a Chinese person comes, a Chinese person appears”: although it has been said since the primordial chaos,44 since [the reign of] Banko (Ch. Panku),45 that this “Chinese person” was created from the three elements and five elements,46 in Seppō’s words now a Chinese person whose virtue is the eternal mirror has appeared. Because the present Chinese person is not “a Chinese person,” “the Chinese person appears.” To Seppō’s present words “The foreigner and the Chinese person both become invisible,” he might add, “and the mirror itself also becomes invisible.” Gensha’s words “Smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces” mean “the truth should be expressed like that, but why, when I have just asked you to give me back a concrete fragment, did you give me back a clear mirror?”

[142]     In the age of the Yellow Emperor there are twelve mirrors.47 According to the family legend, they are gifts from the heavens. Alternately, they are said to have been given by [the sage] Kōsei of Kōdōzan.48 The rule for using49 the twelve mirrors is to use one mirror every hour through the twelve hours, and to use each mirror for a month through the twelve months, [and again] to use the mirrors one by one, year by year through twelve years. They say that the mirrors are Kōsei’s sutras. When he transmits them to the Yellow Emperor, the twelve hours and so on are mirrors with which to illuminate the past and to illuminate the present. If the twelve hours were not mirrors, 83c how would it be possible to illuminate the past? If the twelve hours were not mirrors, how would it be possible to illuminate the present? The twelve hours, in other words, are twelve concrete sheets [of mirror], and the twelve concrete sheets [of time] are twelve mirrors. The past and present are what the twelve hours use.50 [The legend] suggests this principle. Even though it is a secular saying, it is in [the reality of] the twelve hours during which “the Chinese person” appears.

[144]  Kenen (Ch. Xuanyuan),51 the Yellow Emperor, crawls forward on Kōdō [Mountain] and asks Kōsei about the Way. Thereupon, Kōsei says, “Mirrors are the origin of yin and yang; they regulate the body eternally. There are naturally three mirrors: namely, the heavens, the earth, and human beings.52 These mirrors are without sight and without hearing.53 They will make your spirit quiet, so that your body will naturally become right. Assured of quietness and of purity, your body will not be taxed and your spirit will not be agitated. You will thus be able to live long.”54

[145]  In former times, these three mirrors are used to regulate the whole country, and to regulate the great order. One who is clear about this great order is called the ruler of the heavens and the earth. A secular [book]55 says, “The Emperor Taisō56 has treated human beings as a mirror, and thus he fully illuminates [all problems of] peace and danger, reason and disorder.” He uses one of the three mirrors. When we hear that he treats human beings as a mirror, we think that by asking people of wide knowledge about the past and present, he has been able to know when to employ and to discharge saints and sages—as, for example, when he got Gichō (Ch. Weizheng) and got Bōgenrei (Ch. Fang Xuanling).57 To understand it like this is not [truly to understand] the principle which asserts that Emperor Taisō sees human beings as a mirror. Seeing human beings as a mirror means seeing a mirror as a mirror, seeing oneself as a mirror, seeing the five elements58 as a mirror, or seeing the five constant virtues59 as a mirror. When we watch the coming and going of human beings, the coming has no traces and the going has no direction: we call this the principle of human beings as a mirror.60 The myriad diversity of sagacity and ineptitude is akin to astrological phenomena. Truly, it may be as latitude and longitude.61 It is the faces of people, the faces of

84a mirrors, the faces of the sun, and the faces of the moon. The vitality of the five peaks and the vitality of the four great rivers passes through the world on the way to purifying the four oceans, and this is the customary practice of the mirror itself.62 They say that Taisō’s way is to fathom the universal grid by understanding human beings. [But this] does not refer [only] to people of wide knowledge.

[147] “Japan, since the age of the gods, has had three mirrors; together with the sacred jewels and the sword they have been transmitted to the present.63 One mirror is in the Grand Shrines of Ise,64 one is in the Hinokuma

Shrine in Kii-no-kuni,65 and one is in the depository of the Imperial Court.”66 [148] Thus it is clear that every nation transmits and retains a mirror. To possess the mirror is to possess the nation. People relate the legend that these three mirrors were transmitted together with the divine throne and were transmitted by the gods. Even so, the perfectly refined copper [of these mirrors] is also the transformation of yin and yang.67 It may be that [when] the present comes, the present appears [in them], and [when] the past comes, the past appears [in them]. [Mirrors] that thus illuminate the past and present may be eternal mirrors. Seppō’s point might also be expressed, “[When] a Korean comes, a Korean appears; [when] a Japanese comes, a Japanese appears.” Or, “[When] a god comes, a god appears; [when] a human being comes, a human being appears.” We learn appearance-and-coming like this, in practice, but we have not now recognized the substance and details of this appearance: we only meet directly with appearance itself. We should not always learn that coming-and-appearance is [a matter of] recognition or [a matter of] understanding. Is the point here that a foreigner coming is a foreigner appearing? [No,] a foreigner coming should be an instance of a foreigner coming. A foreigner appearing should be an instance of a foreigner appearing. The coming is not for the sake of appearing. Although the eternal mirror is [just] the eternal mirror, there should be such learning in practice.

[149] Gensha steps out and asks, “What if suddenly it meets the coming of a clear mirror?”68 We should study and clarify these words. What might be the scale of the expression of this word “clear”? In these words, the “com- 84b ing” is not necessarily that of “a foreigner” or of “a Chinese person.” This is the clear mirror, which [Gensha] says can never be realized as “a foreigner” or as “a Chinese person.” Though “a clear mirror coming” is a “clear mirror coming,” it never makes a duality.69 Though there is no duality, the eternal mirror is still the eternal mirror, and the clear mirror is still the clear mirror. Testimony to the existence of [both] the eternal mirror and the clear mirror has been expressed directly in the words of Seppō and Gensha. We should see this as the Buddha’s truth of essence-and-form. We should recognize that Gensha’s present talk of the clear mirror coming is totally penetrating,70 and we should recognize that it is brilliant in all aspects.71 It may be that in his encounters with human beings, [Gensha] directly manifests [himself], and that in manifesting directness he can reach others. So should we see the clear of the clear mirror and the eternal of the eternal mirror, as the same, or should we see them as different? Is there eternity in the clear mirror, or not? Is there clarity in the eternal mirror, or not? Do not understand from the words “eternal mirror” that it must necessarily be clear. The important point is that “I am like that, and you are also like that.” We should practice without delay, polishing the fact that “all the patriarchs of India were also like that.”72 An ancestral master’s expression of the truth73 says that, for the eternal mirror, there is polishing. Might the same be true for the clear mirror? What [do you say]? There must be learning in practice that widely covers the teachings of all the buddhas and all the patriarchs.

[151] Seppō’s words, “The foreigner and the Chinese person both become invisible” mean that the foreigner and the Chinese person, when it is the clear mirror’s moment, are “both invisible.” What is the meaning of this principle of “both being invisible”? That the foreigner and the Chinese person have already come-and-appeared does not hinder the eternal mirror, so why should they now “both be invisible”? In the case of the eternal mirror, “[when] a foreigner comes a foreigner appears,” and “[when] a Chinese person comes a Chinese person appears,” but “the coming of the clear mirror” is naturally “the coming of the clear mirror” itself; therefore the foreigner and the

Chinese person reflected in the eternal mirror are “both invisible.”74 So even

84c in Seppō’s words there is one face of the eternal mirror and one face of the clear mirror.75 We should definitely confirm the principle that, just at the moment of “the clear mirror coming,” [the clear mirror] cannot hinder the foreigner and the Chinese person reflected in the eternal mirror.76 [Seppō’s] present assertion, about the eternal mirror, that “[When] a foreigner comes a foreigner appears,” and “[When] a Chinese person comes a Chinese person appears,” does not say that [the foreigner and the Chinese person] come-andappear “on the eternal mirror,” does not say that they come-and-appear “in the eternal mirror,” does not say that they come-and-appear “on the exterior of the eternal mirror,” and does not say that they come-and-appear “in the same state as the eternal mirror.” We should listen to his words. At the moment when the foreigner and the Chinese person come-and-appear, the eternal mirror is actually making the foreigner and the Chinese person come. To insist that even when “the foreigner and the Chinese person are both invisible,” the mirror will remain, is to be blind to appearance and to be remiss with regard to coming. To call it absurd would not be going far enough.

[153]          Then Gensha says, “I am not like that.” Seppō says, “How is it in your case?” Gensha says, “Please, master, you ask.” We should not idly pass over the words “Please, master, you ask” spoken now by Gensha. Without father and son having thrown themselves into the moment, how could the coming of the master’s question, and the requesting of the master’s question, be like this? When [someone] requests the master’s question, it may be that “someone ineffable”77 has already understood78 decisively the state in which the question is asked. While the state of the questioner is already thundering, there is no place of escape.

[154]          Seppō says, “If suddenly a clear mirror comes along, how will itbe then?” This question is one eternal mirror which father and son are mastering together.

[155]          Gensha says, “Smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces!” These words mean smashed into hundred thousand myriads of bits and pieces. What he calls “the moment,79 when suddenly a clear mirror comes along,” is “smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces!” That which is able to experience the state of “smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces” may be the clear mirror. When the clear mirror is made to express itself, [the expression] may be “smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces.” Therefore, the place where smashed 85a bits and pieces are dangling is the clear mirror. Do not take the narrow view that formerly there was a moment of not yet being smashed to bits and pieces and that latterly there may be a moment of no longer being smashed to bits and pieces. [The expression] is simply “smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces!” Confrontation with the hundreds of smashed bits and pieces is a solitary and steep unity.80 This being so, does this “smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces” describe the eternal mirror, or does it describe the clear mirror?— I would like to ask further for words of transformation.81 At the same time, it neither describes the eternal mirror nor describes the clear mirror: though [hitherto] we have been able to ask about the eternal mirror and the clear mirror, when we discuss Gensha’s words, might it be that what is manifesting itself before us as only sand, pebbles, fences, and walls has become the tip of a tongue, and thus “smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces”? What form does “smashing” take? Eternal blue depths; the moon in space.

[157] Great Master Shinkaku of Seppō Mountain and Zen Master Enen of Sanshōin Temple82 are walking along when they see a group of apes. Thereupon Seppō says, “These apes are each backed with one eternal mirror.”83

[157] We must diligently learn these words in practice. “Ape” means monkey.84 How are the apes that Seppō sees? We should ask questions like this, and make effort further, not noticing the passing of kalpas. “Each is backed with one eternal mirror”: though the eternal mirror is the face of Buddhist patriarchs, at the same time, the eternal mirror, even in the ascendant state, is the eternal mirror. That it backs each individual ape does not mean that there are big mirrors and small mirrors according to individual differences; it is “one eternal mirror.” As to the meaning of “backed,” for example we say that a painted image of a buddha is “backed” with what we stick behind it. When the backs of apes are backed, they are backed with the eternal mirror. “What kind of paste could have been used?”85 To speak tentatively, the backs 85b of monkeys might be backed with the eternal mirror. Is the back of the eternal mirror backed with monkeys? The back of the eternal mirror is backed with the eternal mirror, and the backs of monkeys are backed with monkeys. The words that “each back has one face”86 are never an empty teaching: they are the truth expressed as the truth should be expressed. So apes or eternal mirrors? Ultimately, what can we say? Are we ourselves originally apes? Or are we other than apes? Who can we ask? Whether we are apes is beyond our knowledge and beyond the knowledge of others. Whether we are ourselves is beyond [intellectual] groping.

[159] Sanshō says, “It has been nameless for successive kalpas. Why would you express it as the eternal mirror?” This is a mirror, a concrete instance, with which Sanshō has certified his realization of the eternal mirror. “For successive kalpas” means before a mind or a moment of consciousness has ever appeared; it means the inside of a kalpa not having shown its head. “Nameless” describes “the successive kalpas’”sun-faces, moon-faces, and eternal mirror-faces; and describes the face of the clear mirror. When “the nameless” is really “the nameless,” the “successive kalpas” are never “successive kalpas.” Given that “the successive kalpas” are not “successive kalpas,” Sanshō’s expression cannot be an expression of the truth. Instead, “before a moment of consciousness has ever appeared” means today. We should train and polish without letting today pass in vain. Frankly, though the fame of this “nameless for successive kalpas” is heard on high, it expresses the eternal mirror as what? A dragon’s head with a snake’s tail!87

[161]  Seppō might now say to Sanshō, “The eternal mirror! The eternalmirror!” Seppō does not say that; what he says further is, “A flaw has appeared,” or in other words, “a scratch has emerged.”88 We are prone to think “how could a flaw appear on the eternal mirror?” At the same time, [in saying that] the eternal mirror has borne a flaw [Seppō] may be calling the expression “It has been nameless for successive kalpas” a flaw. The eternal mirror described by “a flaw has appeared” is the total eternal mirror. Sanshō

85c has not got out of the cave of a flaw appearing on the eternal mirror, and so the understanding which he has expressed is utterly a flaw on the eternal mirror. This being so, we learn in practice that flaws appear even on the eternal mirror and that even [mirrors] on which flaws have appeared are the eternal mirror; this is learning the eternal mirror in practice.

[162]  Sanshō says, “What is so deadly urgent that you are not conscious of the story?”89 The import of these words is “why [are you in] such a deadly hurry?” We should consider in detail and learn in practice whether this “deadly emergency” is [a matter of] today or tomorrow, the self or the external world, the whole universe in ten directions or [a concrete place] inside the great kingdom of Tang?90 As to the meaning of “story” in the words “You are not conscious of the story,” there are stories that have continued to be told, there are stories that have never been told, and there are stories that have already been told completely. Now, the truths which are in “the story” are being realized. Has the story itself, for example, realized the truth together with the earth and all sentient beings?91 It is never restored brocade.92 Therefore it is “not conscious”; it is the “nonconsciousness” of “the man facing the royal personage”;93 it is being face-to-face without consciousness of each other. It is not that there are no stories; it is just that the concrete situation is “beyond consciousness.” “Nonconsciousness” is red mind in every situation94 and, further, not-seeing with total clarity.95

[163]  Seppō says, “It is the old monk’s mistake.” Sometimes people saythese words meaning “I expressed myself badly,” but [the words] need not be understood like that. “The old monk” means the old man who is master in his house;96 that is to say, [someone] who solely learns in practice the old monk himself, without learning anything else. Though he experiences a thousand changes and ten thousand transformations, heads of gods and faces of demons, what he learns in practice is just the old monk’s one move.97 Though 86a he appears as a buddha and appears as a patriarch, at every moment and for ten thousand years, what he learns in practice is just the old monk’s one move. “Mistakes” are his “abundant jobs as temple master.”98 Upon reflection, Seppō is an outstanding member99 of [the order of] Tokusan, and Sanshō is an excellent disciple100 of Rinzai. Neither of the two venerable patriarchs is of humble ancestry: [Seppō] is a distant descendant of Seigen and [Sanshō] is a distant descendant of Nangaku.101 That they have been dwelling in and retaining the eternal mirror is [evidenced] as described above. They may be a criterion102 for students of later ages.

[165]     Seppō preaches to the assembly, “[If] the world is ten feet103 wide, the eternal mirror is ten feet wide. [If] the world is one foot104 wide, the eternal mirror is one foot wide.”

At this, Gensha, pointing to the furnace, says, “Tell me then, how wide

is the furnace?”

Seppō says, “As wide as the eternal mirror.”

Gensha says, “The Old Master’s heels have not landed on the ground.”105

[166]     He calls ten feet the world; the world is ten feet. He sees one foot as the world; the world is one foot. He describes the ten feet of the present, and describes the one foot of the present, never any other unfamiliar foot or tens of feet. When [people] study this story, they usually think of the width of the world in terms of countless and boundless three-thousand-great-thousandfold worlds or the limitless world of Dharma, but that is only like being a small self and cursorily pointing to beyond the next village. In taking up this world [here and now], we see it as ten feet. This is why Seppō says, “The width of the eternal mirror is ten feet, and the width of the world is ten feet.” When we learn these ten feet [here and now], we are able to see one concrete part of “the width of the world.” In other cases, when [people] hear the words “eternal mirror” they envisage a sheet of thin ice. But it is not like that.106 The ten foot width [of the eternal mirror] is at one with the ten foot width of the world, but are the form and content [of the eternal mirror and the world] necessarily equal, and are they at one, when the world is limitless?107 We

should consider this diligently. The eternal mirror is never like a pearl. Never hold views and opinions about whether it is bright or dull, and never look at it as square or round. Even though “the whole universe in ten directions is one bright pearl,”108 this cannot match “the eternal mirror.” So the eternal mirror, regardless of the coming and the appearance of foreigners or Chinese, is every thing [that happens] through the length and breadth of [this state of] brilliance.109 [But] it is not numerous and not large. “Width” refers to this [real] quantity; it does not mean extent. “Width” means what is expressed as two or three ordinary inches and counted, for example, in sevens and eights. In calculation of the Buddha’s truth, when we calculate it in terms of great realization or nonrealization we clarify [a weight of] two pounds or three pounds; and when we calculate it in terms of buddhas and patriarchs we realize five things or ten things.110 One unit of ten feet is the width of the eternal mirror, and the width of the eternal mirror is one thing.111 Gensha’s words, “How wide is the furnace?” are an unconcealed expression of the truth, which we should learn in practice for a thousand ages and for ten thou-

sand ages. To look now into the furnace is to look into [the furnace] having become a person who is “Who?”112 When we are looking into the furnace, it is not seven feet and it is not eight feet. This [story] is not a tale of agitation and attachment; it is about the realization of a singular state in a fresh situation—[as expressed,] for example, “What is it that comes like this.”113 When the [meaning of] the words “what amount of width. . .” has come to us, the “what amount [of width]” may be different from “how [wide]” [as we have understood it] hitherto.114 We must not doubt the fact of liberation at this concrete place. We must hear in Gensha’s words the fundamental point that the furnace is beyond aspects and dimensions. Do not idly allow the one dumpling before you now to fall to the ground. Break it open! This is the effort.

[170]  Seppō says, “As wide as the eternal mirror.” We should quietly reflect on these words. Not wanting to say “the furnace is ten feet wide,” he speaks like this. It is not true that saying ten feet would be the fit expression 86c of the truth whereas “as wide as the eternal mirror” is an unfit expression. We should study actions that are “as wide as the eternal mirror.” Many people have thought that not saying “the furnace is ten feet wide” was unfitness of expression. They should diligently consider the independence of “width”; they should reflect that the eternal mirror is a concrete thing; and they should not let action which is “reality” pass them by.115 [Seppō] may be “manifesting behavior in the way of the ancients, never falling into despondency.”116

[171]  Gensha says, “The Old Man’s heels have not landed on theground.”117 The point here is, whether we call him “the Old Man” or whether we call him “the Old Master,” that is not always Seppō himself, because Seppō may be “a [real] Old Man.” As to the meaning of “heels,” we should ask just where they are.118 We should master in practice just what “heels” means. Does mastering [“heels”] in practice refer to the right Dharma-eye treasury, or to space, or to the whole ground, or to the lifeblood? How many [“heels”] are there? Is there one? Is there a half? Are there hundred thousand myriads? We should do diligent study like this. “They have not landed on the ground”: what kind of thing is “the ground”?119 We provisionally call the present earth “ground,” in conformance with the view of our own kind. There are other kinds that see it, for instance, as “the Dharma gate to unthinkable salvation,”120 and there is a kind that sees [the earth] as the buddhas’ many enactments of the truth. So in the case of the “ground” upon which heels should land, what does [Gensha] see as the “ground”? Is the “ground” the real state of being, or is it the real state of being without? Further, we should ask again and again, and we should tell ourselves and tell others, whether it is impossible for even an inch or so of what we generally call “the ground” to exist within the great order? Is heels touching the ground the right state, or is heels not landing on the ground the right state? What situation leads

87a [Gensha] to say “they have not landed on the ground?” When the earth is without an inch of soil,121 [the words] “touching the ground” may be immature122 and [the words] “not having landed on the ground” may be immature. This being so, “the Old Man’s heels not having landed on the ground” is the [very] exhalation and inhalation of the Old Man, the [very] moment of his heels.123

[174] Zen Master Kōtō124 of Kokutai-in Temple, on Kinkazan in the Bushu125 district, the story goes, is asked by a monk, “What is the eternal mirror like before being polished?”126

The master says, “The eternal mirror.”

The monk says, “What is it like after being polished?”

The master says, “The eternal mirror.”127

[174]          Remember, the eternal mirror under discussion now has a time ofbeing polished, a time before being polished, and [a time] after being polished, but it is wholly the eternal mirror. This being so, when we are polishing, we are polishing the eternal mirror in its entirety. We do not polish by mixing in mercury or anything else other than the eternal mirror. This is neither polishing the self nor the self polishing; it is polishing the eternal mirror. Before being polished the eternal mirror is not dull. Even if [people] call it black, it can never be dull: it is the eternal mirror in its vivid state. In general, we polish a mirror to make it into a mirror; we polish a tile to make it into a mirror; we polish a tile to make it into a tile; and we polish a mirror to make it into a tile.128 There are [times when] we polish without making anything; and there are [times when] it would be possible to make something, but we are unable to polish.129 All equally are the traditional work of Buddhist patriarchs.

[175]          When Baso130 of Kōzei,131 in former days, was learning in practice under Nangaku,132 Nangaku on one occasion intimately transmits to Baso the mind-seal. This is the beginning of the beginning of “polishing a tile.”133 Baso has been living at Denpōin Temple, sitting constantly in zazen for a matter of ten or so years. We can imagine what it is like in his thatched hut on a rainy night. There is no mention of him letting up on a cold floor sealed in by snow. Nangaku one day goes to Baso’s hut, where Baso stands waiting.

Nangaku asks, “What are you doing these days?”

Baso says, “These days Dōitsu just sits.”

           Nangaku says, “What is the aim of sitting in zazen?”                                       

Baso says, “The aim of sitting in zazen is to become buddha.”134

Nangaku promptly fetches a tile and polishes it on a rock near Baso’s

hut.

Baso, on seeing this, asks, “What is the master doing?” Nangaku says, “Polishing a tile.”

Baso says, “What is the use of polishing a tile?”

Nangaku says, “I am polishing it into a mirror.”135

Baso says, “How can polishing a tile make it into a mirror?”136

Nangaku says, “How can sitting in zazen make you into a buddha?”137

[178] For several hundred years, since ancient times, most people interpreting this story—great matter that it is—have thought that Nangaku was simply spurring Baso on. That is not necessarily so. The actions of great saints far transcend the states of common folk. Without the Dharma of polishing a tile, how could the great saints have any expedient method of teaching people? The power to teach people is the bones and marrow of a Buddhist patriarch. Although [Nangaku] has devised it, this [teaching method] is a common tool. [Teaching methods] other than common tools and everyday utensils are not transmitted in the house of Buddha. Further, the impression on Baso is immediate. Clearly, the virtue authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs is directness. Clearly, in truth, when polishing a tile becomes a mirror, Baso becomes buddha. When Baso becomes buddha, Baso immediately becomes Baso. When Baso becomes Baso, zazen immediately becomes zazen. This is why the making of mirrors through the polishing of tiles has been dwelled in and retained in the bones and marrow of eternal buddhas; and, this being so, the eternal mirror exists having been made from a tile. While we have been polishing this mirror—in the past also—it has never been tainted. Tiles are not dirty; we just polish a tile as a tile. In this state, the virtue of making a mirror is realized, and this is just the effort of 87c Buddhist patriarchs. If polishing a tile does not make a mirror, polishing a mirror cannot make a mirror either.138 Who can suppose that in this “making” there is [both] “becoming” buddha and “making” a mirror?139 Further, to express a doubt, is it possible, when polishing the eternal mirror, to mistakenly think that the polishing is making a tile? The real state at the time of polishing is, at other times, beyond comprehension. Nevertheless, because Nangaku’s words must exactly express the expression of the truth, it may be, in conclusion, simply that polishing a tile makes a mirror. People today also should try taking up the tiles of the present and polishing them, and they will certainly become mirrors. If tiles did not become mirrors, people could not become buddhas. If we despise tiles as lumps of mud, then we might also despise people as lumps of mud. If people have mind, tiles must also have mind. Who can recognize that there are mirrors in which, [when] tiles come, tiles appear? And who can recognize that there are mirrors in which, [when] mirrors come, mirrors appear?

                                        Shōbōgenzō Kokyō

                                        

Notes

1     Buddhist patriarchs and the eternal mirror.

2     Zō,and 2) a statue, that is, an image that has been cast from a mold.like the English word “image,” includes two meanings: 1) a phenomenal form,

3     In Master Dōgen’s time, mirrors were not made of glass; they were cast from copper and kept highly polished.

4     derivation of the Chinese characters and sacred,” is uncertain. Uzuran is the phonetic representation in Chinese characters of the original name. The tengai, “celestial canopy,” and hōshō, “exact

5     Enkan towa enkyō nari.the more familiar character Master Dōgen explained the less familiar character kyō. kan with 6 the meaning here is “lived with.”Dōshō literally means either “lived with” or “born with.” Master Dōgen clarified that 7 for behavior naturally. The implication is that after becoming a Buddhist monk he already had the criteria 8 “Trees and rocks” alludes to the story of the young “Child of the Himalayas.” Seenote 159 in Chapter Twelve, Kesa-kudoku.

9     or acquaintance, represents the Sanskrit Nyakuden-nyakuri ni rufu suru chishiki ari.kalyāṇamitra. See LS 3.72–74. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Chishiki, lit., knowledge

10    Yellow paper on a red rod means a Buddhist sutra.

11    The seventeenth patriarch in India. See Chapter Fifteen, Busso.

12    Literally, “[That which] you have in your hands has the expression of what?” Master Saṃghanandi invited Master Geyāśata to express his state. 13 “What?” suggests ineffable reality.

14    concrete things”; The poem says ryōnin,ko is a counter for inanimate objects. “two people.” This says ryōko, “two individuals,” or “two

15    The Third Patriarch in China was called Kanchi, “Mirror Wisdom,” and the Sixth Patriarch in China was called Daikan, “Great Mirror.” Both names contain the character kan, “mirror.”

331

16    In other words, the Buddhist viewpoint realized as it is.

17    China). See Chapter Fifteen, Master Daiman Kōnin (688–761), the thirty-second patriarch (the Fifth Patriarch in Busso.

18    up some words on the wall of the southern corridor. In the middle of one night, Ācārya It was the custom at the temple for a monk who wanted to express an idea to paste clear mirror./At every moment we work to wipe and polish it/To keep it free of dustup the following poem: “The body is the Jinshū, the most intelligent member of the order, secretly took a lantern and postedbodhi tree,/The mind is like the stand of a

and dirt.” A boy from the temple recited Jinshū’s poem as he passed by the temple monks. Hearing the poem, Master Daikan Enō thought that comparing Buddhist prac-tice to keeping a mirror clean was too intellectual or artificial, so he had someone paste up his own poem. All the monks were astonished at the excellence of the laborer’s servant’s cottage where Master Daikan Enō lived and worked, pounding rice for the Sixth Patriarch’s Dharma Treasure poem. The story is contained in the ).Rokusodaishihōbōdangyō (Platform Sutra of the

19    Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135). A successor of Master Goso Hōen and an Bukka from the Song emperor Kisō (r. 1101–1126), and the title Zen Master Engoeleventh-generation descendant of Master Rinzai. He received the title of Zen Master

Daie Sōkō. from the Southern Song emperor Kōsō (r. 1127–1163). His successors included Master

20    Master Daikan Enō. Sōkei was the name of the mountain where he lived. 21 Also quoted in Chapter Forty-four (Vol. III), Kobusshin.

22       Mei-mei,Hōtei or “Cloth Bag” because he wandered freely from temple to temple carrying all his belongings in a sack. In Japan the fat laughing monk depicted in “Happy Buddha”in the clear-clear state.” These are the words of Master Chinshū Fuke, quoted in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), concrete thing is conspicuously clear as it is. Master Chinshū Fuke was nicknamed statues is called Hōtei.lit., “clear-clear,” from Busshō,mei-meisuggesting the state in which each miscellaneous[taru] hyaku-so-to, lit., “hundreds of weeds

23       Also the words of Master Chinshū Fuke, or Hōtei, the Happy Buddha. See pt. 1 no. 22.    Shinjishōbōgenzō,

24       “where” or “at what place,” in the last line of the poem.“Any place” is izure no tokoro, Japanese words representing the characters doko,

25       Jinsetsu, or “lands as numerous as dust particles.”

26       Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744), a successor of Master Daikan Enō. Zen Master Daie is his posthumous title.

27       which was also used to make images or statues.Again, it should be remembered that in those days mirrors were cast from copper 28 Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 16.

29    graph, “image” means statue. See note 2.Banshō, “myriad phenomena.” Here “images” means phenomena; in the rest of this para-

30    Master Dōgen praises the monk’s viewpoint.

31    “Possibility” is nyo or [ga] goto [ki], translated in the story as “If. . . .”

32    The monk’s question is not only abstract speculation but includes recognition of pos-sibilities as they are, of concrete things as they are, and of the state of action that makes all things possible.

33    The monk’s question was philosophical, so Master Nangaku brought the discussion back down to the monk’s own experience.

34    Men-men, lit., “face-face.”

35    Because if the sea dries up, what was formerly the seabed is now land. That the ocean’s drying cannot reveal the seabed was an expression of reality in China.

36    appear in Master Nangaku’s words. Man-man ten-ten, lit., “delusion-delusion, point-point.” The characters man and ten

37    “Shining mirror reflections” is appear in the story (“shine like a mirror”). The last sentence suggests concrete realitywhich is different from abstract thinking.kanshō, lit., “mirror-shine.” These characters also

38    Master Seppō Gison (822–907), a successor of Master Tokusan Senkan. Great MasterSeppō Shinkaku is the title he received from Emperor Isō (r. 860–874).

39    Kono ji, or “the matter of this,” “the state of reality.”

40    Master Gensha Shibi (835–907). The Shinji-shōbōgenzō contains many conversations

Seppō preaching very sincerely and Master Gensha being somewhat cynical. Between Master Seppō and Master Gensha, of which this one is typical—with Master

41    See Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), [re “What is it that comes like this?” or “This is something [ineffable] coming like this.”] nan [no] ji alludes to Master Daikan Enō’s words, Inmo; and Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), ko[re] shimo-butsu [kaHensan.] inmo-

42    A pearl spinning in a bowl symbolizes constant movement (see for example Chapter Sixty-six [Vol. III], Shunjū, paragraph 135); or, in this context, busy daily life. 43 To Chinese people, red beards were foreigners and foreigners were red beards. See for example Chapter Seventy-six (Vol. IV), Dai-shugyō. 44 Konton, the state of chaos that existed before the forces of yin and yang had become distinct.

45 Banko appears in the Daoist book and Five [Elements]). He is the emperor who ruled at the beginning of creation. Sangoryakuki (History of the Three [Elements] 46 The heavens, the earth, human beings; wood, fire, earth, metal, water.

47    Emperor’s confidential account, when the emperor met his mother at the royal palace, The Yellow Emperor (approximate dates 2697–2597 in the legendary age of the five rulers (2852–2205 Jibutsugenki (Record of the Origins of Things B.C.E.), says, “According to the Yellow B.C.E.). Volume 8 of the Chinese) was the third emperor book

he cast twelve great mirrors, which he used one month at a time.”

48    on Kōdōzan, to ask for the secret of immortality. See Chapter Fourteen, Daoist legend says that the Yellow Emperor visited Kōsei at Kōsei’s hermit’s cave Sansuigyō.

49    In the Far East, the use of a mirror represents the function of decision-making.

50    ordinary time of concrete daily life, have real substance—in Chapter Eleven, Master Dōgen urges us to learn real time as the twelve hours of today.The idea of past and present is subordinate to the twelve hours of today which, as theUji,

51    Kenen is the Japanese pronunciation of the Yellow Emperor’s personal name. 52 Again it should be stressed that in the Far East a mirror means a standard. In this con-text, for example, the criteria of astrology, geography, and economics could be called mirrors.

53    They are intuitional.

54    Summarized quotation from vol. 4 of the Daoist text Sōshi.

55    The Jōkanseiyō (Jōkan Era [Treatise] on the Essence of Government).

56    The second Tang dynasty emperor (r. 627–650).

57    Gichō and Bōgenrei were two high officials in Emperor Taisō’s government.

58    Gogyō. Wood, fire, earth, metal, water.

59    Gojō. Paternal righteousness, maternal benevolence, friendship as an elder brother, respect as a younger brother, and filial piety.

60    Human beings, as they are, are a criterion; in other words, reality is the criterion. 61 Again, the point is that concrete facts are universal criteria.

62    The five peaks are five mountains in China. The four great rivers are the Yellow River, of the north, south, east, and west. This part suggests Master Dōgen’s optimism about the progress of human society. the Yangzi River, and the Waisui and Saisui Rivers. The four oceans are the oceans

63    Refers to Japan’s three sacred treasures: the mirrors, the sacred jewels, and the “grass mowing sword.”

64    The Inner Shrine at Ise, considered the abode of Amaterasu, the Sun Goddess, still houses one of the sacred mirrors. 65 houses the second of the three mirrors’-no-kuni, present-day Wakayama prefecture, where the Hinokuma Shrine still 66 Palace in Tokyo. The original text is in the style of a quotation, written in ChineseThe third of the three mirrors, called Yata-no-kagami, is still housed in the Imperial characters only.

67    It is just a physical substance.

68    Master Gensha’s words in Japanese. The original story is quoted in Chinese characters only. Here Master Dōgen represents

69    Nimai, that is, two mirrors—the eternal mirror, and the clear mirror.

70    tinations.” Shichitsū-hattatsu, lit., “penetrating the seven directions and arriving at the eight des-

71    something clear, bright, and serene. Hachimen-reirō. The original meaning of reirō is the sound of golden bells, and hence

72    no. 1, and Chapter Seven, Master Daikan Enō’s words to Master Nangaku Ejō. See Senjō.    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2,

73    See the two stories quoted at the end of this chapter.

74    The images of the foreigner and the Chinese person are no longer relevant.

75    sides. Master Seppō did not only affirm the eternal mirror—both masters affirmed both

76    person appearing in the eternal mirror. Both similes can coexist independently.The simile of the clear mirror does not deny the simile of the foreigner and Chinese

77    Inmonin. See Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Inmo.

78    two (Vol. II), this usage reflects Master Dōgen’s identification of what is possible and what is “Has already understood” is already there. Master Dōgen explains that Busshō, no. 14.nyaku-e su. Nyakunyaku means “already” in Chapter Twenty-originally expresses possibility, but

79    Ji, toki, means time or moment. In Master Gensha’s original question it is translated as “then.”

80    Gensha’s expression which suggests reality as miscellaneous things and phenomena in Koshun no itsu. Itsu, “one” or “unity,” suggests reality as the one, in contrast to Master Koshun expresses the mental aspect (solitude) and concrete their own concrete forms. aspect (steepness) of the real state.

81    Master Dōgen expected the answer “Both the eternal mirror and the clear mirror.” Ichitengo, lit., “one-turn words,” i.e., words that can change a situation completely.

82    Master Sanshō Enen (dates unknown), a successor of Master Rinzai.

83    graphs, the rest of the story is quoted line by line.See Shinji-shōbōgenzō pt. 3, no. 95. Also Hekiganroku, no. 68. In the following para-

84    Master Dōgen explained the relatively uncommon Chinese characters that appear inthe story, mikō, with the familiar Japanese word saru. 85 Dōgen has not been traced. The question is written in Chinese characters only, but a source earlier than Master

86       Master Seppō’s words are of eternal mirror,” with suggests that all individual things have one reality in common. men,ichimen no kokyō o hai se ri,“face,” used as a counter. Master Dōgen’s comment lit., “backed with one face

87       eternal mirror is never a concept. But in conclusion he was not impressed by Master Dōgen first of all affirmed Master Sanshō’s words, because they say that thekalpas.”

Sanshō calling the eternal mirror “nameless for successive

88       Master Dōgen explained the meaning of the Chinese character kana (kizu).     ka, kizu, with the Japanese

89       concrete. In the Rinzai sect, stories (or so-called “Story” is Master Dōgen in the watō. Wa means “story.” Shinji-shōbōgenzōTō, “head,” is added to make the expression more, are called kōanwatō.s) such as those recorded by

90       We should learn whether, in reality, there is anything to be hasty about.

91       The Buddha said that when he realized the truth the earth and all sentient beings realize the truth at the same time. See for example Chapter Sixty-nine (Vol. III), mujōshin. Master Dōgen emphasized that the story is not only abstract words, butHotsuthe representation of something real.

92       The story is not to be fussed and worried over.

93       Master Sanshō’s words sound like a complaint that Master Seppō is not listening to In the Emperor Wu story, “I do not know” or “I am not conscious [of myself]” or “I personage?” Master Bodhidharma replied, “I do not know.” See When Master Bodhidharma arrived in China from India, he was presented to EmperorWu of the Liang dynasty. The emperor said to him, “Who is the man facing the royalfushikifushiki,as ironic praise of Master Seppō’sas in Master Sanshō’s words.Hekiganroku, no. 1. do not understand [myself intellectually]” is him. But Master Dōgen interpreted the word state.

94       henpen, Jōjō no sekishin.or “naked mind at every moment. “This is a variation on Master Dōgen’s usual expression sekishin-

95       Meimei no fuken, lit., “clear-clear not-seeing.”

96       That is, his own master, the master of himself.

97       one time and place. Ichijaku means one placement of a stone in a game of go—suggesting one action at 98 it feed on?” Seppō says, “When you have got free of the net, I will tell you.” SanshōSanshō asks Seppō, “The golden-scaled fish that passes through the net: what does shōbōgenzō,Master Seppō says, “The old monk’s jobs as temple master are abundant.” See says, “The good counselor to fifteen hundred people is not conscious of the story!” pt. 1, no. 52.  Shinji-

99    Ikkaku, lit., one horn.

100  Jinsoku, lit., “mystical foot,” from the Sanskrit Raihai-tokuzui,ṛddhipāda.note 33. See the Glossary of Sanskrit

Terms. See also Chapter Eight,

101  Master Seigen Gyōshi (660–740) and Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744) were both dis-ciples of Master Daikan Enō. 102 positions of the cracks thus caused to divine a future course of action. Kikyō, lit., “turtle mirror.” Chinese soothsayers used to heat a turtle shell and use the

103  Ichijō. One is about ten feet.

104  Issahaku. One shaku is almost exactly one foot, and ten shaku equals one jō. 105 See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 9.

106 it as something material. Some people think about the eternal mirror too abstractly; others can only conceive 107 In Master Seppō’s example, the eternal mirror and the world are a unity within the area of ten feet. Master Dōgen asked if it would be true if the world were limitless.

108 Master Gensha’s expression of the truth. See Chapter Four, Ikka-no-myōju. 109 Reirō suggests the universe itself. See note 71.

110  layers of clothing, mirrors, etc., and sometimes as a counter for generations of Buddhist“Thing” is patriarchs.mai, which is used as a counter for thin flat objects such as sheets of paper,

111  of ten feet,” to This sentence can be contrasted with the opening sentence of the paragraph. In thisichijō, “one unit case Master Dōgen changed the final element in the sentence from ichimai, “one thing,” emphasizing that the eternal mirror is concrete.

112  Tare hito, a person who has lost self-consciousness, a person whose state is beyond words or understanding.

113  KoNangaku Ejō when Master Nangaku entered his order. See also note 41.[re] shimo-butsu [ka] inmo-rai. Master Daikan Enō spoke these words to Master

114  Master Gensha said hiroki koto tashō, or katsu-tashō. In Chinese tashō, lit., “largeis, etc. However, Master Dōgen understood Master Gensha’s words not only as anordinary question, but also as a statement that the furnace was a real quantity.small,” is the usual way of asking how big something is, how expensive something

115  emphasis: reality.“oneness” or “one reality.” Here Master Dōgen repeats the character, as a noun it means “real state,” or “reality”—for example, in the compound each of the three elements independently. As an adverb, Master Seppō said nyo-kokyō-katsu. Master Dōgen considered the real meaning ofnyo means “as” or “like,” butnyo nyo,ichinyo,for

116  The words of Master Kyōgen Chikan. See Chapter Nine, Keisei-sanshiki.

117  In the story “ground” is or “great earth.” chi, “ground” or “earth.” “The earth” is daichi, “big ground” 118 In general, heels are symbols of the concrete.

119  Chistate.”means “ground” or “earth”; at the same time, it means “the concrete” or “concrete

120  Fushigi-gedatsu-hōmon, the words of Vimalakīrti, a lay student of the Buddha.

121  When the earth is realized as it is.

122  original sentence.“Immature” is imadashi, lit., “not yet.” This is the negative used in Master Gensha’s

123  words really expresses. In conclusion, Master Gensha’s words describe Master Seppō’sIn this paragraph, Master Dōgen urges us to consider what each of Master Gensha’s real state, his concrete existence.

124  Master Kokutai Kōtō, a successor of Master Gensha Shibi; dates unknown. 125 A district in Chekiang province in east China.

126  as something that needs polishing. Because in those days mirrors were made of copper, it was natural to think of a mirror

127  See Shinji-shōbōgenzō pt. 2, no. 17.

128  Sometimes our idealism is like polishing a mirror in order to try and make an ideal action transcends idealism completely. Mirror, sometimes our behavior is as meaningless as trying to polish a tile into a mirror, sometimes we realize concrete things through Buddhist practice, and sometimes our

129  Two examples of real situations in daily life.

130  Ejō, he lived on Basozan in the Jiangxi district, where he taught more than one hundredHōjō.Master Baso Dōitsu (709–788). After receiving the Dharma from Master Nangakuand thirty disciples, including Hyakujō Ekai, Seidō Chizō, Nansen Fugan, and Daibai

131  Jiangxi, a province in southeast China.

132  Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744).

133  the Masen.Keitokudentōroku.The words first appear in the story of Masters Nangaku and Baso in vol. 5 ofSee also Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 8.

134  Sabutsu. Sa, tsukuru, [to] nasu means to produce, to make, to become, or to act as. 135 Ma-sa-kyo,ceding note.or mashi te kagami to nasu. “Into” represents sa, [to] nasu, as in the pre-

136  jō, nasu,Jōkyō, or lit., “to accomplish,” “to realize,” or “to make.”kagami [to] nasu. “Make it into” is in this case represented by the character

137  “Make you into a buddha” is sabutsu, translated previously as “to become buddha.” 138 important. Because polishing makes the mirror—whether the object is a tile or a mirror is not

139  Making and becoming are the same character, sa.

140  1241.

 

[Chapter Twenty-one]

                                                   Kankin                                            

Reading Sutras

Translator’s Note: Kan means “to read” and kin means “sutras.” Many Buddhist sects revere reading sutras, because they think that the Buddhist truth is theory which can be understood through abstract explanation. They think that we can understand Buddhism only by reading sutras. At the same time, there are other sects who deny the value of reading sutras; they say that because Buddhist truth is not a theoretical system, we cannot attain the truth by reading sutras. Master Dōgen took the middle way on the problem: rather than deny the value of reading sutras, he said that reading sutras is one way of finding out what Buddhist practice is. He did not believe, however, that we can get the truth by reading sutras; he did not think that reciting sutras might exercise some mystical influence over religious life. In this way Master Dōgen’s view on reading sutras was very realistic. However, his understanding of “reading sutras” was not limited to written sutras; he believed that the universe is a sutra. He thought that observing the world around us is like reading a sutra. So for him, grass, trees, mountains, the moon, the sun, and so forth were all Buddhist sutras. He even extended his view of reading sutras to include walking around the master’s chair in the middle of the zazen hall. This viewpoint is not only Master Dōgen’s; it is the viewpoint of Buddhism itself. So in this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the wider meaning of reading sutras.

[183] The practice-and-experience of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi sometimes relies on [good] counselors and sometimes relies on the sutras. “[Good] counselors”1 means Buddhist patriarchs who are totally themselves. “Sutras” means sutras that are totally themselves. Because the self is totally a Buddhist patriarch and because the self is totally a sutra, it is like this.2 Even though we call it self, it is not restricted by “me and you.” It is vivid eyes, and a vivid fist.

[184] At the same time,3 there is the consideration of sutras, the reading

341

of sutras,4 the reciting of sutras, the copying of sutras, the receiving of sutras, and the retaining of sutras: they are all the practice-and-experience of Buddhist patriarchs. Yet it is not easy to meet the Buddha’s sutras: “Throughout innumerable realms, even the name cannot be heard.”5 Among Buddhist patriarchs, “even the name cannot be heard.” Amid the lifeblood, “even the name cannot be heard.” Unless we are Buddhist patriarchs we do not see, hear, read, recite, or understand the meaning of sutras. After learning in practice as Buddhist patriarchs, we are barely able to learn sutras in practice. At this time the reality of hearing [sutras], retaining [sutras], receiving [sutras], preaching sutras, and so on, exists in the ears, eyes, tongue, nose, and organs of body and mind,6 and in the places where we go, hear, and speak. The sort who “because they seek fame, preach non-Buddhist doctrines”7 cannot practice the Buddha’s sutras. The reason is that the sutras are transmitted and retained on trees and on rocks, are spread through fields and through villages, are expounded by lands of dust, and are lectured by space.

[186] Great Master Kōdō,8 the ancestral patriarch of Yakusan Mountain, has not ascended [his seat in the Dharma] hall for a long time. The temple chief 9 says, “The monks have long been hoping for your compassionate instruction, master.”

[Yaku]san says, “Strike the bell!”

The temple chief strikes the bell, and a few of the monks assemble. [Yaku]san ascends [the seat in the Dharma] hall and passes a while. Then he gets down from the seat and goes back to the abbot’s quarters. The temple chief follows behind him and says, “Just before, the master agreed

to preach the Dharma for the monks. Why have you not bestowed a single word upon us?”

[Yaku]san says, “For sutras there are sutra teachers. For commentaries there are commentary teachers. How could you doubt the old monk?”10

[188] The compassionate instruction of the ancestral patriarch is that for fists there is a fist-teacher, and for eyes there is an eye-teacher. At the same time, with due respect, I would now like to ask the ancestral patriarch this: I do not deny [your words] “how can the old monk be doubted?” but I

still do not understand: the master is a teacher of What.11

[188]     The order of the Founding Patriarch Daikan12 is on Sōkeizan in Shōshū district. Hōtatsu,13 a monk who recites the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma,14 comes to practice there. The Founding Patriarch preaches for Hōtatsu the following verse:

When the mind is in delusion, the Flower of Dharma turns.

When the mind is in realization, we turn the Flower of Dharma.

Unless we are clear about ourselves, however long we recite [the     sutra],

It will become an enemy because of its meanings.

Without intention the mind is right.

With intention the mind becomes wrong.

When we transcend both with and without, We ride eternally in the white ox cart.15

[189]     So when the mind is in delusion we are turned by the Flower of Dharma; when the mind is in realization we turn the Flower of Dharma. Further, when we spring free from delusion and realization, the Flower of Dharma turns the Flower of Dharma. On hearing this verse Hōtatsu jumps for joy and praises it with the following verse:

Three thousand recitations of the sutra With one phrase from Sōkei, forgotten.

Before clarifying the import of [the buddhas’] appearance in the world, How can we stop recurring lives of madness?

[The sutra] explains goat, deer, and ox as an expedient,

[But] proclaims that beginning, middle, and end are good.

Who knows that [even] within the burning house, Originally we are kings in the Dharma?

Then the Founding Patriarch says, “From now on, you will rightly be called the Sutra-reading Monk.” We should know that there are sutra-reading monks in Buddhism: it is the direct teaching of the eternal buddha of Sōkei. “Reading” in this [phrase] “Sutra-reading Monk” is beyond “having ideas,” “being without ideas,” and so on.16 It is “transcendence of both having and being without.” The fact is only that “from kalpa to kalpa the hands never put down the sutra, and from noon to night there is no time when it is not being read.”17 The fact is only that from sutra to sutra it is never not being experienced.18

[191]          The twenty-seventh patriarch is Venerable Prajñātara19 of eastern India. A king of eastern India, the story goes, invites the Venerable One to a midday meal, at which time the king asks, “Everyone else recites20 sutras.

Why is it, Venerable One, that you alone do not recite?” The patriarch says:

 

                My21 out-breath does not follow circumstances,

The in-breath does not reside in the world of aggregates.22 I am constantly reciting sutras like this.23

Hundred thousand myriad koṭis of scrolls.

Never only one scroll or two scrolls.24

[192]          The Venerable Prajñātara is a native of an eastern territory of India.He is the twenty-seventh rightful successor from Venerable Mahā kāśyapa,25 having received the authentic transmission of all the tools of the Buddha’s house: he has dwelled in and retained the brains, the eyes, the fist, and the nostrils; the staff, the pātra, the robe and Dharma, the bones and marrow, and so on. He is our ancestral patriarch, and we are his distant descendants.26 The words into which the Venerable One has now put his total effort [mean] not only that the out-breath does not follow circumstances, but also that circumstances do not follow the out-breath. Circumstances may be the brains and eyes, circumstances may be the whole body, circumstances may be the whole mind, but in bringing here, taking there, and bringing back here again, the state is just “not following circumstances.” “Not following” means totally following; therefore it is a state of bustling and jostling. The out-breath is circumstances themselves; even so, “it does not follow circumstances.” For countless kalpas we have never recognized the situation of breathing out and breathing in, but just now the moment has come when we can recognize it for the first time, and so we hear “it does not reside in the world of aggregates” and “it does not follow circumstances.” This is the moment when circumstances study for the first time such things as “the in-breath.” This moment has never been before, and it will never be again: it exists only in the present. “The world of aggregates” means the five aggregates: matter, perception, thought, enaction, and consciousness. The reason he does not reside in these five aggregates is that he is in the world where “five aggregates” have never 89a arrived. Because he has grasped this pivotal point, the sutras he recites are never only one or two scrolls; he is “constantly reciting hundred thousand myriad koṭis of scrolls.” Though we say that “hundred thousand myriad koṭis of scrolls” just cites for the present an example of a large number, it is beyond only numerical quantity: it assigns the quantity of “hundred thousand myriad koṭis of scrolls” to one out-breath’s “not residing in the world of aggregates.” At the same time, [the state] is not measured by tainted or faultless wisdom27 and it is beyond the world of tainted and faultless dharmas.28 Thus, it is beyond the calculation of wise intelligence, it is beyond the estimation of intelligent wisdom; it is beyond the consideration of non-wise intelligence, and it is beyond the reach of non-intelligent wisdom. It is the practice-and experience of buddhas and of patriarchs, it is their skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, their eyes, fists, brains, and nostrils, and their staffs and whisks, springing out of the moment.

[196]  Great Master Shinsai29 of Kannon-in Temple in Jōshū, the story goes, is sent a donation by an old woman, who asks the Great Master to recite the whole of the sutras. The master descends from the zazen chair, goes around it once, and says to the messenger, “I have finished reciting the sutras.” The messenger returns and reports this to the old woman. The old woman says, “I asked him before to recite the whole of the sutras. Why did the master only recite half the sutras?”30

[197]  Evidently, the recitation of the whole of the sutras or half of the sutras amounts to three scrolls of sutras in the old woman’s case.31 “I have finished reciting the sutras” is the whole of Jōshū’s sutra. In brief, the situation of his reciting the whole of the sutras is as follows: There is Jōshū going around the zazen chair; there is the zazen chair going around Jōshū, there is Jōshū going around Jōshū, and there is the zazen chair going around the zazen chair. At the same time, all instances of reciting the sutras are neither limited to going around a zazen chair, nor limited to a zazen chair going around.

[198]  Great Master Shinshō32 of Daizuizan in Ekishū, whose original Dharma name was Hōshin,33 succeeded Zen Master Daian34 of Chōkeiji. In the story, an old woman sends a donation and asks the master to recite the whole of the sutras. The master descends from his zazen chair, goes around it once, and says to the messenger, “I have already recited the whole of the sutras.” The messenger returns and reports this to the old woman. The old 89b woman says, “I asked him before to recite the whole of the sutras. Why did the master only recite half the sutras?”35

[199]  Now, do not study that Daizui is going around the zazen chair,and do not study that the zazen chair is going around Daizui. It is not only a grouping together of fists and eyes; his making of a circle is enaction of a circle. Does the old woman have the eyes, or does she not have the eyes [to see it]? Even though she has got the expression “He only recited half the sutras” in the authentic transmission from a fist,36 the old woman should also say, “I asked him before to recite the whole of the sutras. Why did the master only worry his soul?”37 If she spoke like this, even by accident, she would be an old woman with eyes.

[200]  [In the order] of the founding patriarch, Great Master Tōzan Gohon,38 the story goes, there is a government official who prepares the midday meal, offers a donation, and requests the master to read and recite the whole of the sutras. The Great Master descends from his zazen chair and bows to39 the official. The official bows to the Great Master, who leads the official once around the zazen chair, then bows to the official [again]. After a while he says to the official, “Do you understand?” The official says, “I do not understand.” The Great Master says, “You and I have read and recited the whole of the sutras. How could you not understand?”

[201]  That “You and I have read and recited the whole of the sutras “is evident. We do not learn that to go around the zazen chair is to read and recite the whole of the sutras, and we do not understand that to read and recite the whole of the sutras is to go around the zazen chair. All the same, we should listen to the compassionate instruction of the founding patriarch. My late master, the eternal buddha, quoted this story when, while he was residing [as master] on Tendōzan, a donor from Korea entered the mountain, made a donation for the monks to read the sutras, and requested that my late master should ascend the lecture seat. When he had quoted [the story], my late master made a big circle with his whisk and said, “Tendō today has read and recited for you the whole of the sutras.” Then he threw down the whisk and descended from the seat. We should read and recite now the words spoken by the late master, never comparing them to [the words of] others.

89c Still, should we think that [Master Tendō], in reading and reciting the whole of the sutras, uses a whole eye or uses half an eye? Do the words of the founding patriarch and the words of my late master rely on eyes or rely on tongues? How many [eyes and tongues] have they used? See if you can get to the bottom of it.

[202]  The ancestral patriarch, Great Master Kōdō40 of Yakusan Mountain, does not usually let people read sutras. One day he is reading a sutra himself. A monk asks him, “The master does not usually let others read sutras. Why then are you reading yourself?”

The master says, “I just need to shade my eyes.” The monk says, “May I copy the master?”

The master says, “If you were to read you would surely pierce holes

even in ox-hide!”

[203]  The words “I just need to shade my eyes” spoken now are words naturally spoken by shaded eyes41 themselves. “Shading the eyes” describes getting rid of eyes and getting rid of sutras, it describes complete eye shading and completely shaded eyes. “Shading the eyes” means opening the eyes in the shaded state, invigorating the eyes within shade, invigorating shade within eyes, adding an extra eyelid, utilizing the eyes within shade, and eyes themselves utilizing shade. This being so, the virtue of “shading the eyes” is never [mentioned] in any [sutras] other than eye-sutras. “You would surely pierce holes even in ox hide” describes complete ox hide and a complete-hide ox, it describes utilizing the ox to become a hide.42 This is why [possession of] the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, and horns on the head, and nostrils, has been seen as the vigorous activity of bulls and cows.43 In “copying the master,” the ox becomes the eye—this is described as “shading the eyes.” It is the eye becoming the ox.

[205]        Zen Master Yafu Dōsen44 says:

To serve offerings to buddhas hundred million thousands of times     is boundless happiness,

[But] how can it compare to everyday reading of the old teachings?

On the face of white paper characters are written in black ink. Open your eyes, I beg you, and look before you.45

[206]        Remember, serving offerings to ancient buddhas and reading the old teachings may be equal in happiness and good fortune and may go beyond happiness and good fortune. “The old teachings” means characters written in black ink on white paper, [but] who can recognize the old teachings as such? We must master just this principle.

[206]      [In the order of] Great Master Kōkaku46 of Ung Ozan, the story

90a goes, there is a monk who is reading a sutra in his quarters. The Great Master asks from outside the window, “Ācārya, what sutra is that you are reading?” The monk replies, “The Vimalakīrti Sutra.

The master says, “I am not asking you if it is the Vimalakīrti Sutra. That which you are reading is a What sutra.”47

At this the monk is able to enter.48

[207]      The Great Master’s words “That which you are reading is a What sutra” mean that the “state of reading,”49 in one line, is age-old, profound, and eternal; and it is not desirable to represent it as “reading.” On the road we meet deadly snakes. This is why the question “What sutra?” has been realized. In meeting as human beings, we do not misrepresent anything. This is why [the monk replies] “The Vimalakīrti Sutra.” In sum, reading sutras means reading sutras with eyes into which we have drawn together all the Buddhist patriarchs. At just this moment, the Buddhist patriarchs instantly become buddha, preach Dharma, preach buddha, and do buddha-action.50 Without this moment in reading sutras, the brains and faces of Buddhist patriarchs could never exist.51

[209] At present in the orders of Buddhist patriarchs, forms for the reading of sutras are many and varied: for when a donor52 enters the mountain and requests the whole sangha to read sutras; for when the monks have been requested to read sutras regularly;53 for when the monks read the sutras of their own volition, and so on. Besides these, there is the sutra reading by the whole sangha for a deceased monk.

[209] When a donor enters the mountain and requests the monks to read sutras, from breakfast on the day [of the reading] the hall chief54 hangs an advance notice of the sutra reading in front of the monks’ hall55 and in all quarters. After breakfast the prostration mat is laid before the [image of the] Sacred Monk.56 When it is time [for the reading], the bell in front of the monks’ hall is struck three times, or struck once—according to the instructions of the abbot. After the sound of the bell, the head monk57 and all the monks put on the kaṣāya and enter the cloud hall.58 They go to their own place59 and sit facing forward. Then the abbot enters the hall, goes before the Sacred Monk, bows with joined hands, burns incense, and then sits at the [abbot’s] place. Next the child helpers60 are told to distribute the sutras. These sutras are arranged beforehand in the kitchen hall, placed in order and made ready to be given out when the time comes. The sutras are either distributed from inside the sutra box, or placed on a tray and then distributed. Once the monks 90b have requested a sutra, they open and read it immediately. During this time, at the [right] moment, the guest supervisor61 leads the donor into the cloud hall. The donor picks up a handheld censer just in front of the cloud hall and enters the hall holding it up with both hands. The handheld censer is [kept] in the common area by the entrance to the kitchen hall.62 It is prepared with incense in advance, and a helper63 is [instructed] to keep it ready in front of the cloud hall. When the donor is about to enter the hall, [the helper], upon instruction, hands [the censer] to the donor. The guest supervisor gives the orders regarding the censer. When they enter the hall, the guest supervisor leads and the donor follows, and they enter through the southern side of the front entrance to the cloud hall. The donor goes before the Sacred Monk, burns a stick of incense, and does three prostrations, holding the censer while doing the prostrations. During the prostrations the guest supervisor, hands folded,64 stands to the north of the prostration mat, facing south but turned slightly toward the donor.65 After the donor’s prostrations, the donor turns to the right, goes to the abbot, and salutes the abbot with a deep bow, holding the censer up high with both hands. The abbot remains on the chair to receive the salutation, holding up a sutra with palms held together.66 The donor then bows to the north. Having bowed, [the donor] begins the round of the hall from in front of the head monk. During the walk around the hall, [the donor] is led by the guest-supervisor. Having done one round of the hall and arrived [again] in front of the Sacred Monk, [the donor] faces the Sacred Monk once more and bows, holding up the censer with both hands. At this time the guest supervisor is just inside the entrance to the cloud hall, standing with hands folded to the south of the prostration mat, and facing north.67 After saluting the Sacred Monk, the donor, following the guest supervisor, goes out to the front of the cloud hall, does one circuit of the front hall,68 goes back inside the cloud hall proper, and performs three prostrations to the Sacred Monk. After the prostrations, [the donor] sits on a folding chair to witness the sutra reading. The folding chair is set, facing south, near the pillar to the Sacred 90c Monk’s left. Or it may be set facing north near the southern pillar. When the donor is seated, the guest supervisor should turn to salute the donor, and then go to his or her own place. Sometimes we have a Sanskrit chorus while the donor is walking round the hall. The place for the Sanskrit chorus is either on the Sacred Monk’s right or on the Sacred Monk’s left, according to convenience. In the handheld censer, we insert and burn valuable incense like jinko or sanko.69 This incense is supplied by the donor. While the donor is walking around the hall, the monks join palms. Next is the distribution of donations for the sutra reading. The size of the donation is at the discretion of the donor. Sometimes things such as cotton cloth or fans are distributed. The donor personally may give them out, or the main officers may give them out, or helpers may give them out. The method of distribution is as follows: [The donation] is placed in front of [each] monk, not put into the monk’s hands. The monks each join hands to receive the donation as it is given out in front of them. Donations are sometimes distributed at the midday meal on the day [of the sutra reading]. If [donations] are to be distributed at lunch time, the head monk, after offering the meal,70 strikes down the clapper71 once again, and then the head monk gives out the donations. The donor will have written on a sheet of paper the aim to which [the sutra reading] is to be directed, and [this paper] is pasted to the pillar on the Sacred Monk’s right. When reading sutras in the cloud hall, we do not read them out in a loud voice; we read them in a low voice. Or sometimes we open a sutra and only look at the characters, not reading them out in phrases but just reading the sutra [silently]. There are hundreds or thousands of scrolls provided in the common store72 for this kind of sutra reading—mostly of the Diamond Prajñā Sutra; the “Universal Gate” chapter and the “Peaceful and Joyful Practice” chapter of the Lotus Sutra; the Golden Light Sutra,73 and so on. Each monk

 

 goes through one scroll. When the sutra reading is finished, [the child helpers] pass in front of the [monks’] seats, carrying the original tray or box, and the monks each deposit a sutra. Both when taking [the sutra] and when replacing it, we join hands. When taking, first we join hands and then we take. When replacing, first we deposit the sutra, then we join hands. After that, each person, palms together, makes the dedication in a low voice. For sutra readings in the common area,74 the chief officer or the prior burns incense, does prostrations, goes around the hall, and gives out the donations, all in the same

way as a donor, and holds up the censer also in the same way as a donor. If one of the monks becomes a donor and requests a sutra reading by the whole of the sangha, it is the same as for a lay donor.75 There is burning of incense, prostrations, going around the hall, distribution of donations, and so on. The guest supervisor leads, as in the case of a lay donor.

[216] There is a custom of reading sutras for the emperor’s birthday. So if the celebration of the birthday of the reigning emperor is on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the sutra readings for the emperor’s birthday begin on the fifteenth day of the twelfth lunar month. On this day there is no formal preaching in the Dharma hall. Two rows of platforms are laid out in front of [the image of] Śākyamuni Buddha in the Buddha hall. That is to say, [the rows] are laid out facing each other east and west, each running from south to north. Desks are stood in front of the east row and the west row, and on them are placed the sutras: the Diamond Prajñā Sutra, the Benevolent King Sutra, the Lotus Sutra, the Supreme King Sutra,76 the Golden Light Sutra, and so on. Several monks each day are invited from among the monks in the [zazen] hall to partake in refreshments before the midday meal. Sometimes a bowl of noodles and a cup of soup are served to each monk, or sometimes six or seven dumplings with a portion of soup are served to each monk. The dumplings also are served in a bowl, [but in this case] chopsticks are provided; spoons are not provided. We do not change seats to eat, but remain at our seat for the sutra reading. The refreshments are placed on the desk that 91b the sutras are placed on; there is no need to bring another table. While refreshments are being eaten, the sutras are left on the desk. After finishing the refreshments, each monk rises from his or her seat to [go and] rinse the mouth, then returns to the seat and resumes sutra reading immediately. Sutra reading continues from after breakfast until the time of the midday meal. When the lunch time drum sounds three times, we rise from our seats: the day’s sutra reading is limited to before the midday meal. From the first day a board saying “Established as a Practice Place for Celebration of the Em peror’s Birthday” is hung in front of the Buddha hall, under the eastern eaves. The board is yellow. In addition, notice of celebration of the emperor’s birthday is written on a shōji placard,77 which is then hung on the eastern front pillar inside the Buddha hall. This placard [also] is yellow. The name78 of the abbot is written on red paper or white paper; the two characters [of the name] are written on a small sheet of paper, which is pasted onto the front of the placard, beneath the date. The sutra reading continues as outlined above until the day of the imperial descent and birth, when the abbot gives formal preaching in the Dharma hall and congratulates the emperor. This is an old convention which is not obsolete even today. There is another case in which monks decide of their own accord to read sutras. Temples traditionally have a common sutra reading hall. [Monks] go to this hall to read sutras. The rules for its use are as in our present Pure Criteria.79

[219]          The founding patriarch, Great Master Kōdō80 of Yakusan Mountain, asks Śramaṇera Kō,81 “Did you get it by reading sutras, or did you get it by requesting the benefit [of the teaching]?”82

Śramaṇera Kō says, “I did not get it by reading sutras, and I did not get

it by requesting benefit.”

The master says, “There are a lot of people who do not read sutras and

who do not request benefit. Why do they not get it?”

Śramaṇera Kō says, “I do not say that they are without it. It is just that

they do not dare to experience it directly.”83

[220]          In the house of the Buddhist patriarchs, some experience it directlyand some do not experience it directly, but reading sutras and requesting the benefit [of the teaching] are the common tools of everyday life.

                                        Shōbōgenzō Kankin

  Preached to the assembly at Kōshōhōrinji in                                         the Uji district of Yōshū,84 on the fifteenth                                         day of the ninth lunar month in the autumn                                         of the second year of Ninji.85

Notes

1     See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Chishiki, short for zen-chishiki, from the Sanskrit kalyāṇamitra, or “good friend.”

2     Kakunogotoku, “like this,” describes the situation here and now.

3     signifies a change of viewpoint to the concrete phase. In the introductory paragraph, Master Dōgen explained sutras generally, as self. This

4     Kankin, as in the chapter title. The original meaning of kan is to see or to watch. 5      been located. The next two sentences Master Dōgen probably made himself, substi-This sentence is in the form of a quotation from a sutra, though the source has not tutting “Buddhist patriarchs” and “lifeblood” for “innumerable lands,” in order to emphasize the difficulty of encountering Buddhist sutras.

6     for example, LS 3.122: “Though he has not yet attained faultless real wisdom, his mind-organ is pure like this. “to the sense of touch. The mind as a sense organ is the seat of thought. Classing thought as one of six senses emphasizes that it is subordinate to real wisdom. See, Shinjin-jinsho, the last two of the six sense organs. The body as a sense organ refers

7     The source of this quotation from a sutra has not been located.

8     Master Yakusan Igen (745–828), successor of Master Sekitō Kisen. Great MasterKōdō is Master Yakusan’s posthumous title. 9 Inshu,a temple. See note 54.or “prior,” also called kansu and kanin; one of the six chiji or main officers in 10 Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 79. Also the story is no. 7 in the Wanshijuko.

11    “A teacher of What” is state and whose teaching cannot be understood intellectually. Nan no shi, i.e., a teacher of the ineffable, a teacher whose

12    Master Daikan Enō (638–713).

13    Seventeen, The story of Master Hōtatsu and his personal history are explained at length in Chapter Hokke-ten-hokke.

14    Hokkekyō, the Lotus Sutra. See Chapter Seventeen, Hokke-ten-hokke.

15 The poem is exactly the same as the one quoted in Chapter Seventeen, hokke. Hokke-ten-

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16       “Reading” and “ideas” are the same Chinese character images, or intention, and monk,” poem nennenis a noun, “ideas.” is a verb, “reading,” suggesting the action of reading the sutra. In themunen, Unen, “being without ideas,” describes the absence, or “having ideas,” describes the presence of ideas, Nen. In nen kinsō, “sutra-reading negation, of ideas, images, or intention.

17       Gyō Quotation of Master Daikan Enō’s words to Hōtatsu from the (Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch’s Dharma Treasure). The next line is Master Roku so daishi hōbōdan-

Dōgen’s addition.

18       and experiencing reality. “Sutra” and “experienced” are the same Chinese character 1)of time (see note 18 in Chapter Eleven,  sutra, as in the title of this chapter, and 2) passing through, experience, the passage). Master Dōgen identified reading Starsky, kin, or kei. Kyō means

19       Master Prajñātara (d. 457), was a successor of Master Puṇyamitra and the teacher of Master Bodhidharma. 20 Tenzu Chapter Seventeen, is literally “to turn,” that is, to turn a scroll on which a sutra is written; seeHokke-ten-hokke.

21    Hindō, lit., “poor way,” a humble form used by a Buddhist monk.

22    aggregates” is singular, but they both suggest the world. The first two lines stress the master’s independence. Perception, thought, enaction, and consciousness, representing all phenomena in the Unkai. Un represents the Sanskrit shu-enskandha.) in the first line is plural, whereas “the world of The five skandhas (aggregates) are matter, world. “Circumstances” (

23    Nyoze-kyō means sutras like this, sutras as they are, or sutras as reality.

24    Also quoted in Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III), Bukkyō.

25    The Buddha’s successor, counted as the first patriarch in India.

26    lit., “distant grandchildren. ”Unson, lit., “cloud-grandchildren,” a poetic variation of the usual expression nelson, 27 terms Urō, murō-chi,sāsrava-jñānaor “wisdom with excess and without excess,” represents the Sanskritand anāsrava-jñāna.

28    Urō, murō-hō,sāsrava-dharmaor “dharma and s with excess and without excess,” represents the Sanskritanāsrava-dharma. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. terms

29    Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), was a successor of Master Nansen Fugan, and especially highly revered by Master Dōgen (see for example Chapter Thirty-five [Vol.Hakujushi). Great Master Shinsai is his posthumous title.

II],

30    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 24.

31    Three scrolls of sutras means sutras limited by relative consideration of numbers.

Chapter Twenty-one

32    emperor sent his emissaries time and time again to invite Master Hōshin to the court, Master Daizui Hōshin (dates unknown), a successor of Master Chōkei Daian. The but he always declined. Great Master Shinshō is his posthumous title.

33    death, that is, the name a monk used in his lifetime. See notes to Chapter Sixteen, Shisho.Hōshin is the Master’s hōki. This means the name that was avoided after a monk’s

34    mous title is Great Master Enju. Quoted in Master Fukushu Daian (793–883), a successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. His posthu-Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 57.

35    Rentōeyō, vol. 10.

36    A practical Buddhist master.

37    should have said, “The master need not worry about anything! “of zazen itself (“to play sport with the soul”; see for example Chapter Sixty-eight[Rōzeikon,Vol. III], lit., “to play with the soul.” This expression usually suggests the practiced), but in this case Master Dōgen suggested that the old woman

38    Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869), a successor of Master Ungan Donjō. Great Master Gohon is his posthumous title. See Chapter Fifteen, Busso.

39    Iu su in this chapter also, “bow” indicates this form of salutation, as opposed to a prostration. means to bow the head slightly with the hands in shashu; see note 64. Hereafter

40    Master Yakusan Igen. See note 8.

41    different from the idealistic viewpoint. Hagan, “shaded eyes,” suggests the balanced and peaceful state of action which is

42    Interpreted simply, Master Yakusan’s words mean “Reading sutras will only make your intellect sharper!” But Master Dōgen interpreted that the words also include some ironic affirmation of the monk’s state—“becoming a hide” suggests realization of the concrete.

43    Oxen sometimes symbolize Buddhist practitioners. In the Lotus Sutra, for example, the white ox cart is the symbol of the bodhisattva way.

44    Ryūkō era (1163–1164) of the Southern Song dynasty. Authorities of the age on the called Ken of Tōsai, after which he changed his name from Tekisan to Dōsen. He Master Yafu Dōsen. He realized the truth listening to the preaching of a head monk Diamond Sutra, Diamond Sutra.and was considered one of seventeen He preached on Yafuzan during the made commentaries on the

45    Quoted from Master Yafu Dōsen’s commentary on the Diamond Sutra.

46    Master Ungo Dōyō (835?–902), a successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai. Great Master Busso. Kōkaku is his posthumous title. See Chapter Fifteen,

47    Master Ungo repeated exactly the words he had said before. He had phrased his words

355

ineffable.to sound like a simple question, but his idea was that the sutra itself was something 48 Keitokudentōroku, chapter 17.

49    Nentei.lit., “bottom,” means “state.” The latter usage occurs in the fushiryōtei,In Master Ungo’s words, “the state beyond thinking.”nentei means “that which you are reading,” but here Fukanzazengi, in the tei,phrase

50    pounds. Sabutsu su,Setsubutsu su,“become buddha,” and “preach buddha,” and seppō su, “preach Dharma,” are common com-butsusa su, “do buddha-action,” are

Master Dōgen’s variations. In addition, the first three compounds are conventional verb + object compounds, but the fourth, buddha” is not conventionally used as a verb. The effect is to oppose the idealism of butsusa, is unconventional because “to

“becoming buddha.”

51    In other words, if Buddhist sutras cannot be read intuitively, real Buddhism cannot exist—there are only abstract Buddhist patriarchs without heads and faces. 52 Seshu represents the Sanskrit dānapati.

53    monks read sutras in the morning, they dedicate the reading in accordance with theFor example, a lay sponsor bequeaths a sum of money to a monastery, and when the wishes of that sponsor.

54    caretaker. Supervision of the monks. The six main officers are 1) the temple office, comptroller; 2) supervisor of monks in the zazen hall, rector; 5) Dōsu is the fourth of the six main officers. He is the main officer in charge of dailykansu, prior; 3) tsūsu, chief officer, head ofdōsushishui,or inō, fūsu,tenzo,assistant prior; 4) head cook; and 6)

55    Sōdō, the zazen hall.

56    in Japan. Some halls in China have an image of Hōtei, the Happy Buddha.Shōsō, the image in the center of the zazen hall, almost always of Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī

57    Shuso, or “chief seat.” One of the assistant officers below the main officers.

58    Undō, another name for the zazen hall.

59    sleep. Hi-i, lit., “the place of their [night]wear,” i.e., the place in the zazen hall where they

60    Zunnan,monks in future. or “apprentices,” are children or youths who generally intend to become 61 Shika, or “guest prefect,” is the assistant officer in charge of supervising guests.

62    Inmon. however, it suggests In general inku-in, represents the Sanskrit the kitchen hall.    saṃghārāma or temple. In this case, Chapter Twenty-one

63    to become monks. Anja, or temple servants, worked as helpers in the temple, not necessarily intending

64    Shashu, and right hand cupped over the left. Hands held horizontally across the chest, with left hand in a fist, thumb inside, 65 front of you, and the donor is facing the mat, his back toward you. The guest supervisor If you imagine the scene from the front entrance, the prostration mat is directly in is to the right of the mat, facing the mat but turned slightly toward the donor and you. 66 Gasshō, palms together, fingertips at the level of the nostrils.

67    Again imagining the scene from the front entrance, the donor is standing between is now just in front of you, to the left of the mat and facing right in order to watch the prostration mat and the sacred image, his back toward you. The guest supervisor the donor.

68    of the zazen hall. modates the temple officers and others who can come and go there without disturbing the main body of monks in the zazen hall proper. Or it could indicate the area outside Dozen, lit., “hall-front,” probably means the zentan, the smaller hall which accom-

69    Jinko China that is now Cambodia and Vietnam. Means aloes. Sanko was a type of incense obtained from the area of southwest 70 of Taking MealsSejiki. The method is explained in detail in Master Dōgen’s ). Fushu kuhanhō (Method 71 Tsui, a small wooden block used to beat an octagonal wooden pillar.

72    Jōjū, time. short for jōjū-motsu, tools etc. available for the monks of a temple to use at any

73    The Konkōmyōkyō. In Sanskrit, Suvarṇaprabhāsa-sūtra.

74    Jōjū-kugai. Big temples had a communal hall for reciting sutras.

75    In Master Dōgen’s time there were monks who came from rich families and who retained their private wealth.

76    Light Supreme King Sutra,” from the Sanskrit Saishōōkyō. The full name of the Golden Light SutraSuvarṇaprabhāsottamarāja-sūtra,is appear to be one and the same. Konkōmyōsaishōōkyō, “Goldenso the Supreme King Sutra and the Golden Light Sutra

77    sliding doors, seen in Japanese houses. A placard made of paper stuck to a wooden frame—constructed like the shōji, paper

78    case of Master Dōgen, for example, it would be Dōgen.Myōji usually means surname, but in this case it means a monk’s usual name. In the

79    Shingi, “pure criteria,” means a temple’s rules and regulations.

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80    Master Yakusan Igen. See note 8.

81    and taught Buddhism to passing travelers. maṇera,Kō-shami. After succeeding Master Yakusan, he built a thatched hut by the roadside which means novice.   Shami represents the Sanskrit word śra-

82    Shin-ekipersonal instruction. Means listening to the preaching of Dharma and requesting a teacher’s

83    Keitokudentōroku, chapter 14.

84    Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture.

85    1241.

Appendix I

Chinese Masters

Japanese Baso Dōitsu                                          Mazu Daoyi                                           Pinyin

Busshō Tokkō                                       Fozhao DeguangBukkō Nyoman                                     Foguang Ruman

Butsuin Ryōgen                                    Foyin Liaoyuan Chōka Dōrin                                         Niaowo Daolin

Chōrei (Fukushu) Shutaku                   Changqing Daan Chōsha Keishin                                    Changsha Jingcen Daibai Hōjō                                          Damei Fachang Daie Sōkō                                             Dahui Zonggao Daii Dōshin                                          Dayi Daoxin

Daikan Enō                                           Dajian Huineng Daiman Kōnin                                      Daman Hongren Daizui Hōshin                                       Taisui Fazhen Dōan Dōhi                                            Tongan Daopi

Dōan Kanshi                                         Tongan Guanzhi Engo Kokugon                                      Yuanwu Keqin Fuketsu Enshō                                      Fengxue Yanzhao Fukushu (Chōkei) Daian                      Chanqing Daan Fun’yō Zenshō                                      Fenyang Shanzhao Fuyō Dōkai                                           Furong Daokai

Gensha Shibi                                        Xuansha Shibei Genshi                                                   Yuancai Goso Hōen                                            Wuzu Fayan Gozu Hōyū                                           Niutou Fayong Hōgen Bun’eki                                     Fayan Wenyi

359

Appendix I

Hōtatsu                                                 Foda

Iichi                                                       Weiyi

Isan Reiyū                                             Guishan Lingyou

Jimyō (Sekisō) Soen                             Shishuang Chuyuan

Jōshū Jūshin                                          Zhaozhou Congshen Kaie (Hakuun) Shutan                          Haihui Shoudan Kanchi Sōsan                                        Jianzhi Sengcan Kankei Shikan                                      Guanxi Zhixian Kōan Daigu                                          Gaoan Daiyu

Kōke Sonshō                                        Xinghua Congjiang Kokutai Kōtō                                        Guotai Hongdao Kyōgen Chikan                                     Xiangyan Zhixian Kyōzan Ejaku                                       Yangshan Huiji

Massan Ryōnen                                    Moshan Liaoran Mayoku Hōtetsu                                   Magu Baoche Musai Ryōha                                         Wuji Liaopai Myōshin                                                Miaoxin Nan’in Egyō                                         Nanyuan Huiyong Nan’yō Echū                                         Nanyang Huizhong Nangaku Ejō                                         Nanyue Huairang Nansen Fugan                                       Nanquan Puyuan Ōbaku Kiun                                          Huangbo Xiyun

Ōryū Enan                                            Huanglong Huinan

Reiun Shigon                                        Lingyun Zhiqin Rinzai Gigen                                         Linji Yixuan

Rōya Ekaku                                          Langye Huijiao

Ryōzan Enkan                                       Liangshan Yuanguan Ryūge Kodon                                        Longya Judun

Ryūmon Butsugen                                Longmen Foyan Ryūtan Sōshin                                       Longtan Chongxin Sanshō Enen                                         Sansheng Huiran Seigen Gyōshi                                      Qingyuan Xingsi Sekitō Kisen                                         Shitou Xiqian

Sensu Tokujō                                        Chuanzi Decheng Seppō Gison                                         Xuefeng Yicun

Appendix I

Setchō Chikan                                      Xuedou Zhijian

Setchō Jūken                                         Xuedou Chongxian Shinketsu Seiryō                                   Zhenxie Qingliao

Shōkaku (Torin) Jōsō                            Donglin Changzong Shōken Kishō                                       Yexian Guisheng

Shuzan Shōnen                                     Shoushan Shengnian Taiso Eka                                              Dazu Huike

Taiyō Kyōgen                                       Dayang Jingxuan Tanka Shijun                                         Danxia Zichun

Tendō Nyojō                                         Tiantong Rujing

Tendō Sōkaku                                       Tiantong Zongjue

Tokusan Senkan                                    Deshan Xuanjian Tōsu Gisei                                            Touzi Yiqing

Tōzan Ryōkai                                        Dongshan Liangjie Ungan Donjō                                        Yunyan Tansheng Ungo Dōyō                                           Yunju Daoying

Unmon Bun’en                                     Yunmen Wenyan Yafu Dōsen                                           Yefu Daochuan Yakusan Igen                                        Yueshan Weiyan

Yōgi Hōe                                              Yangqi Fanghui

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Appendix II

Fukanzazengi

Standard Method of Zazen Universal Guide to the

[Rufubon—The Popular Edition1]

Now, when we research it, the truth originally is all around: why should we rely upon 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?2 In general, we do not stray from the right state: of what use, then, are the tiptoes of training?

However, if there is a thousandth or a hundredth of a gap, the separation is as great as that between heaven and earth;3 and if a trace of disagreement arises, we lose the mind in confusion. Proud of our understanding and richly endowed with realization, we obtain special states of insight; we attain the truth; we clarify the mind; we acquire the zeal that pierces the sky; we ramble through remote intellectual spheres, going in with the head: and yet, we have almost completely lost the vigorous road of getting the body out.

Moreover, we can [still] see the traces of the six years spent sitting up straight by the natural sage of Jetavana Park.4 We can still hear rumors of the nine years spent facing the wall by the transmitter of the mind-seal of Shaolin [Temple].5 The ancient saints were like that already: how could people today fail to make effort?

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.6

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Appendix II

In general, a quiet room is good for practicing [za]zen, and food and drink are taken in moderation. Cast aside all involvements. Give the myriad things a rest. Do not think of good and bad. Do not consider right and wrong. Stop the driving movement of mind, will, consciousness. Cease intellectual consideration through images, thoughts, and reflections. Do not aim to become a buddha. How could [this] be connected with sitting or lying down?7

We usually spread a thick mat on the place where we sit, and use a round cushion on top of that. Either sit in the full lotus posture or sit in the half lotus posture. To sit in the full lotus posture, first put the right foot on the left thigh, then put the left foot on the right thigh. To sit in the half lotus posture, just press the left foot onto the right thigh.8

Spread the clothing loosely and make it neat.9 Then put the right hand above the left foot, and place the left hand on the right palm. The thumbs meet and support each other. Just make the body upright and sit up straight. Do not lean to the left, incline to the right, slouch forward, or lean backward. The ears must be aligned with the shoulders, and the nose aligned with the navel. Hold the tongue against the palate, keep the lips and teeth closed, and keep the eyes open. Breathe softly through the nose.

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.”10 This is just the pivot of zazen.

This sitting in zazen is not learning Zen concentration.11 It is simply the peaceful and joyful gate of Dharma. It is the practice-and-experience which perfectly realizes the state of bodhi. The universe is conspicuously realized, and restrictions and hindrances12 never reach it. To grasp this meaning is to be like a dragon that has found water, or like a tiger in its mountain stronghold. Remember, the right Dharma is naturally manifesting itself before us, and darkness and distraction13 have dropped away already.

When we rise from sitting, we should move the body slowly and stand up calmly. We should not be hurried or violent. We see in the past that those who transcended the common and transcended the sacred, and those who died while sitting or died while standing,14 relied totally on this power. Moreover, the changing of the moment, through the means of a finger,15 a pole,16 a needle, or a wooden

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clapper;17 and the experience of the state,18 through the manifestation of a whisk,19 a fist, a staff, or a shout,20 can never be understood by thinking and discrimination.21 How could they be known through mystical powers or practice and experience? They may be dignified behavior beyond sound and form.22 How could they be anything other than criteria that precede knowing and seeing?

Therefore, we do not discuss intelligence as superior and stupidity as inferior. Do not choose between clever people and dull ones. If we single-mindedly make effort [in zazen] that truly is pursuit of the truth. Practice-and-experience is naturally untainted.23 Actions are more balanced and constant.24

In general, [the patriarchs] of this world and of other directions, of the Western Heavens and of the Eastern Lands, all similarly maintain the Buddha’s posture, and solely indulge in the custom of our religion. They simply devote themselves to sitting, and are caught by the still state.

Although there are myriad distinctions and thousands of differences, we should just practice [za]zen and pursue the truth. Why should we abandon our own seat on the floor to come and go without purpose through the dusty borders of foreign lands?25 If we misplace one step we pass over the moment of the present. We have already received the essential pivot26 which is the human body: we must never pass time in vain.27 We are maintaining and relying upon the pivotal essence28 which is the Buddha’s truth: who could wish idly to enjoy sparks [that fly] from flint? What is more, the body is like a dewdrop on a blade of grass. Life passes like a flash of lightning. Suddenly it is gone. In an instant it is lost.

I beseech you, noble friends in learning through experience, do not become so accustomed to images that you are dismayed by the real dragon.29 Devote effort to the truth which is directly accessible and straightforward. Revere people who are beyond study and without intention.30 Accord with the bodhi of the buddhas. Become a rightful successor to the samādhi of the patriarchs. If you practice the state like this for a long time, you will surely become the state like this itself. The treasure house will open naturally, and you will be free to receive and to use [its contents] as you like.

                                    Fukanzazengi ends

 

Notes

1     Edition (literally, the edition written in the author’s own hand), and the There are two main versions of the Fukanzazengi: the Shinpitsu bon,Rufubon,the Originalthe China to Japan in 1227. He later revised this edition before settling upon the Popular Edition. Master Dōgen wrote the Shinpitsubon shortly after returning from divided into paragraphs for ease of reading.Whereas Master Dōgen wrote the zazengi in Chinese characters only. It is originally one long passage; here it has beenShōbōgenzō itself in Japanese, he wrote the Rufubon.Fukan-

2     The words “dust and dirt” (to a story about Master Daikan Enō and a monk called Jinshū. Jinshū compared Buddhist practice to making a mirror clean. Master Daikan Enō suggested that thereis originally no impurity in the first place. (See Chapter Twenty, Dōgen picked up the words of the story in these opening lines in which he expresses the fundamentally optimistic idea of Buddhist philosophy. Jinnai) and “sweeping and polishing” (Kokyō.hosshiki) Master) allude

3     Master Dōgen picked up these words from Master Kanchi Sōsan’s poem Shinjinmei. too much. In this part Master Dōgen cautions us against falling into the state in which we think

4     or Anāthapiṇḍada, and donated to the Buddha as a place for the rains retreat in ŚrāvastīJetavana literally means “Prince Jeta’s park.” This was a park purchased from PrinceJeta, a son of King Prasenajit of Kośala, by a lay disciple of the Buddha called Sudattanortheast of present-day Luck now).

(

5     Shin-in, comes from the Sanskrit word Dōgen identifies “mind-seal,” is an abbreviation of butsu-shin-inmudrā,with the full lotus posture. Shaolin is the name of the which means “seal.” In the butsu-shin-in, “buddha-mind–seal.” InShōbōgenzō Master temple where Master Bodhidharma introduced zazen into China.

6     you want to attain the matter of the ineffable, you must have become someone ineffable.” Matter of the ineffable” is inmo [no] ji. Master Tōzan preached to the assembly, “If of the ineffable?” See Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Now that you are already someone ineffable, why worry about attaining the matterInmo.

7     Sitting and lying down represent the four kinds of behavior: sitting, standing, walking, actions of daily life. And lying down. Master Dōgen suggested that zazen is transcendent over the ordinary

8     Master Dōgen gives the left foot on the right thigh as an example. The right foot placed on the left thigh is also the correct lotus posture.

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9     knees. Specifically this refers to the custom of not stretching the kaṣāya tightly across the

10    These lines come from a conversation between Master Yakusan Igen and a monk. They are discussed at length in Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), Zazenshin.

11    Gyōji,sat in stillness facing the wall, but he was not learning Zen concentration. “people who were learning Zen concentration (The Sekimon-rinkanrokuparagraph 193. In his commentary, Master Dōgen says, “[Master Bodhi dharma]relates how historians listed Master Bodhidharma alongside shuzen). See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II),

12    catch birds and fish. “Restrictions and hindrances” is raro, silk nets and bamboo cages used in China to

13    Konsan,anced conditions of body and mind. resents vikṣepa,“darkness and distraction,” are representative examples of unnatural or limbal-two of the many defilements listed in Sanskrit commentaries.Kon represents the Sanskrit styāna and san rep-

14    Master Mahākāśyapa, for example, is said to have died while sitting on Kukkuṭapādahave died while standing up.Mountain, and Master Kankei Shikan (see Chapter Eight, Raihai-tokuzui), is said to

15    Master Gutei used to raise one finger to answer a question that could not be answered with words. 16 Master Ānanda realized the truth when a temple flagpole fell to the ground.

17 Mañjuśrī, for example, is said to have preached the truth by using the Tsui. This is a small wooden block used to beat an octagonal wooden pillar. Bodhisattva Tsui. 18 Shōkai,Buddha. See notes on Chapter Sixteen, literally “experience-accord,” means to experience the same state as GautamaShisho. 19 material.Hossu, a ceremonial whisk with a wooden handle and a plume of animal hair or other 20 Master Baso Dōitsu, for example, was famous for having a very loud yell.

21 Alludes to the Lotus Sutra, Hōben (“Expedient Means”) chapter. See LS 1.88–90. 22 Chikan, quoted in Chapter Nine, Shoshikino hoka no iigi. The same characters appear in a poem by Mas ter KyōgenKeisei-sanshiki.

23    Alludes to a conversation between Master Daikan Enō and Master Nangaku Ejō aboutSenjō. the oneness of practice and experience. See Chapter Seven,

24    stant mind” or “normal mind.” See Chapter Twenty-eight, heijōByōjō. Byō, heimeans normal. It appears in the phrase means level or peaceful. Jōbyōjōshin, heijōshin,means constant. As a compound Butsu-kōjō-no-ji.“balanced and con-byōjō,

25    Alludes to a parable in the Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”) chapter of the Lotus

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the heir to his father’s fortune. See LS 1.236.Sutra about a son who wanders in poverty through foreign lands, unaware that he is

26    Kiyō.

27    Koin munashiku wataru koto nakare.verse Sandōkai by Master Sekitō Kisen. The same characters appear at the end of the

28    Yōki.Kithe main point, important part, or pivot. Means mechanism or, sometimes, the state at the moment of the present. The words kiyō and yōki feature prominently in Chapter Twenty-seven, Zazenshin.Yō means

29    meet a real dragon. The “real dragon” means zazen. Refers to the story of Shoko, who loved images of dragons but who was terrified to

30    words, “Gentlemen, do you not see? A person beyond study and without intention, Zetsu-gaku-mu-ireality.”who is at ease in the truth, does not try to get rid of delusion and does not want to get[no] hito. Master Yōka Genkaku’s poem Shōdōka begins with the

 

Appendix III Busso The Buddhist Patriarchs

The recitation in Japanese of the names of the Buddhist patriarchs, from the seven ancient buddhas to Master Dōgen, is as follows:

(1)                   Bibashibutsu Daioshō

(2)                   Shikibutsu Daioshō

(3)                   Bishafubutsu Daioshō

(4)                   Kurusonbutsu Daioshō

(5)                   Kunagonmunibutsu Daioshō

(6)                   Kashobutsu Daioshō

(7)                   Shakamunibutsu Daioshō

[1]              Makakasho Daioshō [2]              Ananda Daioshō

[3]              Shonawasu Daioshō [4]              Ubakikuta Daioshō [5]              Daitaka Daioshō

[6]                   Mishaka Daioshō

[7]                   Basumitta Daioshō

[8]                   Buddanandai Daisho

[9]                   Fudamitta Daioshō[10]            Barishiba Daioshō

[11]            Funayasha Daioshō [12]            Memyo Daioshō

[13]                Kapimara Daioshō

[14]                Nagārajuna Daioshō[15]            Kanadaiba Daioshō [16]            Ragorata Daioshō

Appendix III

[17]            Sogyanandai Daioshō [18]            Gayashata Daioshō [19]            Kumorata Daioshō [20]            Shayata Daioshō

[21]            Bashubanzu Daioshō [22]            Manura Daioshō

[23]            Kakurokuna Daioshō [24]            Shishibodai Daioshō [25]            Bashashita Daioshō

[26]            Funyomitta Daioshō [27]            Hannyatara Daioshō

[28] [1]      Bodaidaruma Daioshō [29] [2]      Taiso Eka Daioshō

[30] [3]      Kanchi Sōsan Daioshō [31] [4]      Daii Dōshin Daioshō

[32] [5]      Daiman Kōnin Daioshō [33] [6]      Daikan Enō Daioshō

[34] [7]      Seigen Gyōshi Daioshō [35] [8]      Sekitō Kisen Daioshō

[36] [9]      Yakusan Igen Daioshō [37] [10]    Ungan Donjō Daioshō

[38] [11]     Tōzan Ryōkai Daioshō [39] [12]    Ungo Dōyō Daioshō [40] [13]    Dōan Dōhi Daioshō

[41]  [14]    Dōan Kanshi Daioshō

[42]  [15]    Ryōzan Enkan Daioshō [43] [16]    Taiyō Kyōgen Daioshō

[44]  [17]    Tōsu Gisei Daioshō

[45]  [18]    Fuyō Dōkai Daioshō

[46]  [19]    Tanka Shijun Daioshō

[47]  [20]    Shinketsu Seiryō Daioshō [48] [21]    Tendō Sōkaku Daioshō

[49] [22]    Setchō Chikan Daioshō [50] [23]    Tendō Nyojō Daioshō [51] [24]    Eihei Dōgen Daioshō

372

Appendix IV The Kaṣāya

A large saṃghāṭi robe made of nine vertical stripes of cloth, with two long segments and one short segment in each stripe. This style of robe is known in Japanese as the kassetsu-e.

 

Appendix V Traditional Temple Layout

The ground plan of the Hokuzankeitokuryōonji in modern-day Hangzhou province, together with a list of Facilities at Major Buddhist Monasteries in the Southern Song, upon which this appendix is based, was obtained by Nishijima Roshi several years ago at a conference of the American Academy of Religions. Unfortunately, the name of the original compiler, to whom acknowledgment is due, is not known.

The Seven Main Temple Buildings

The seven main temple buildings are the Buddha hall, the Dharma hall, the

zazen hall, the kitchen hall, the gate, the bathhouse, and the toilet.

In former ages, the toilet was located to the west and was called saichin, “west lavatory,” but later the toilet was located to the east and called tosu, “east office.” In the original ground plan of Hokuz an keito kuryōonji both toilets, east and west, are marked as tosu.

The essential temple layout can be represented in brief as follows:

(North)

Dharma Hall

(West)           Zazen Hall            Buddha Hall          Kitchen Hall           (East)                           Toilet                       Gate                  Bathhouse

Facilities at Major Buddhist Monasteries in the Southern Song

  1. Butsuden                     Buddha Hall
  2. Tochidō                        “Lands Hall”; Local Deities Hall
  3. Shindō                         “Trueness Hall”; Hall for Patriarchs’ Images Sodō                            Patriarchs’ Hall
  4. Rakandō                      Arhats Hall

Appendix V

  1. Shōmon                       Main Gate
  2. Suirikudō                     All Beings Hall
  3. Kannondō                    Pavilion of Regarder of the Sounds;

                                        Pavilion of Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara

  1. Rushanaden                Vairocana’s Hall
  2. Danna                         Donors’ [Hall]
  3. Hattō                        Dharma Hall; Lecture Hall
  4. Zōden                        “Storage Hall”; Sutra Library

Rinzō                         “Circle Library”—alludes to a big circular table

                                        provided in the library

  1. Kankindō                  Sutra Reading Hall; Kyōdō                        Sutra Hall
  2. Shindō                       Abbot’s Reception Hall; Zen-hōjō                    “Front of Abbot’s Quarters”;

Daikōmyō-zō             “Treasury of Great Brightness”

  1. Shūryō                       Common Quarters; Monks’ Dormitories
  2. Sōdō                          Monks’ Hall; Sangha Hall

Undō                         Cloud Hall;

Zazendō                     Zazen Hall

  1. Gosōdō                      Rear Monks’ Hall
  2. Niryō                         Nuns’ Quarters
  3. Hōjō                          “Ten Square Feet”; Abbot’s Quarters Dōchō                        The Abbot
  4. Jisharyō                     Attendant Monks’ Quarters
  5. Anjadō                       Temple Servants’ Hall Sensōdō                     Novice Monks’ Hall
  6. Kuge-anja-ryō           Servants’ Quarters in the Kitchen Hall
  7. Tangaryō                   Overnight Lodgings;

Unsuidō                    “Clouds and Water Hall”; Transient Monks’ Quarters

  1. Kaku-i                       Guest Rooms
  2. Kansu                        “Office of the Prior” (in general, kansu suggests the                                         monk himself, and may thereafter suggest his quar                                        ters. However, in the present ground plan, no. 24                                         may be assumed to be the Prior’s Office and no. 26                                         the Prior’s Quarters)

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Appendix V

  1. Tsusu                         Chief Officer
  2. Kansu                        Prior
  3. Fusu                         Assistant Prior
  4. Sho-chōshu-ryō         Assistant Officers’ Quarters
  5. Shika                        Guest Supervisor
  6. Yokusu                       Bath Manager
  7. Chiden                      Supervisor of the Buddha Hall
  8. Shissui                       Labor Steward
  9. Kajuryō                     Fire Chief’s Quarters; Stove Chief’s Quarters
  10. Inosu                         Ino; Supervisor of Monks in the Zazen Hall; Dōsu                          Hall Chief
  11. Shuso                        Head Monk
  12. Mōdō                        “Twilight Hall”; Quarters of Retired Main Officers
  13. Zenshiryō                 Former Officers’ Quarters; Retired Officers’ Quarters
  14. Sonchōryō                 Retired Abbot’s Quarters; Rōshuku                    “The Old Patriarch”
  15. Ninriki                      Laborers
  16. Sanmon                     “Three Gates”—refers to the main entrance and the                                         side entrances on either side of the main entrance;

Sanmon                     “Mountain Gate”—poetically reproduces the pro                                        nunciation of sanmon

  1. Gai-sanmon              “Outer Mountain Gate”; Outer Gate
  2. Chūmon                     Inner Gate
  3. Kudō                          “Pantry Hall”; Kitchen Hall; Administration Hall; Ku-in                        “Pantry Office”
  4. Kōshaku-chu            “Fragrance-Accumulation’s Office”; Kitchen
  5. Enjudō                       “Prolongation of Life Hall”; Infirmary

Nehandō                    Nirvana Hall;

Shōgyōdō                  “Hall of Reflection of Conduct”

  1. Jūbyōkaku                Pavilion for the Seriously Ill 47. Yokushitsu                 Bathhouse;

Senmyō                      “Promulgation of Brightness”

  1. Senmenjo                   Washroom; Washstand;

Suige                        “Water Office”;

Koka                          Rear Stand

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Appendix V

  1. Tōsu                           “East Office”; Toilet;

Saichin                      “West Lavatory”; Toilet

  1. Shiryō                       Urinal;

Shōkenjo                   Urinal

  1. Hashinjo                   Needlework Room; Sewing Room
  2. Sen-e-jo                    Laundry
  3. Daishō                      Big Bell;

Shōrō                        Bell Tower

  1.                               Stupas
  2. Rōbu                          Corridors
  3. Kosō                          Stable
  4. Shōdō                       Illuminated Hall 58. Chi                             Pond

378

Appendix V

 

 

Appendix VI Lotus Sutra References

The Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtra (Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful

Dharma) was translated from Sanskrit into Chinese by Kumārajīva in 406 C.E.

The Kumārajīva translation, the Myōhōrengekyō, which Master Dōgen quotes in the Shōbōgenzō and which remains the most widely used in Japan, is reproduced in a Chinese/Japanese edition published in three parts by Iwanami Bunko. References below refer to this edition: LS 1.68 means part 1, page 68, of the Iwanami edition. The correlating citation in the Shōbōgenzō is indicated by the initials SBGZ followed by the chapter number(s) and paragraph number(s), in brackets, where applicable.

Kumārajīva’s Chinese was rendered into English by Bunno Kato and William Soothill and published in 1930 as The Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Law. This Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Law, revised by Wilhelm Schiffer and Yoshiro Tamura, forms the core of The Threefold Lotus Sutra first published by Weather hill/Kosei in 1975. The extracts that follow are basically revisions of the Weather hill/Kosei version.

Chapter One: Jo (Introductory)

LS 1.8      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II) [83] Thus have I heard. At one time the Buddha was living at Rājagṛha. On Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa, he was with twelve thousand great bhikṣus. They were all arhats, having ended all excesses, being without troubles, self-possessed, realizing all bonds of existence, and liberated in mind.

LS 1.14    SBGZ Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III) [237]

At that time [there was] Śakra-devānām-indra with his following of twenty thousand heavenly sons. . . . There were the eight dragon kings. . . each with some hundreds or thousands of followers.

381

LS 1.18    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

At that time the Buddha radiated light from the circle of white hair between

his eyebrows, illuminating the eastern quarter.

LS 1.26–28     SBGZ Chapter Forty (Vol. II) [216]

There are some who give alms Of gold, silver, and coral, Pearls and jewels, Moonstones and agates.

LS 1.38    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

At that time Mañjuśrī spoke to Bodhisattva Mahāsattva Maitreya and all the other great beings: “Good sons! According to my consideration, now the

Buddha, the World-honored One, is going to preach the great Dharma.” LS 1.40    SBGZ Chapter Eleven [21]; Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty (Vol.

III) [203]

He proclaimed the right Dharma, which is good in the beginning, good in

the middle, and good in the end.

LS 1.42    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

The Dharma that they should preach is good in the beginning, middle, and

end.

LS 1.42, 1.44       SBGZ Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV) [83]

Before the last of those [Sun Moon Light] buddhas left home, he had eight royal sons. . . . These eight princes, unrestricted in their majesty, each ruled four continents. These princes, hearing that their father had left home and attained [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, all renounced the throne and, following him, also left home and established the mind of the Great Vehicle. They constantly practiced pure conduct, and all became teachers of Dharma. Under thousands of myriads of buddhas, they had planted many roots of goodness.

LS 1.46    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

The listeners in that order also remained seated in one place, for sixty minor

kalpas, unmoving in body and mind.

LS 1.52    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III) [21] Therefore I consider that the Tathāgata today will preach the sutra of the Great Vehicle, which is called the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma, the method of teaching bodhisattvas, that which buddhas guard and remember.

LS 1.54    SBGZ Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II) [126]

This light illuminated the eastern quarter Of eighteen thousand buddha lands.

LS 1.58   SBGZ Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [214] When the Buddha [Sun Moon Light] had preached this Flower of Dharma And caused the assembly to rejoice,

Then he, on that very day,

Proclaimed to the assembly of gods and people:

“The truth that all dharmas are real form Has been preached for you all. . . .”

LS 1.62    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen This teacher of Dharma, Mystic Light,

At that time had a disciple

Whose mind was always lazy,

Who was greedily attached to fame and gain, Who sought fame and gain tirelessly,

Who often found amusement in the homes of aristocratic families, Who abandoned what he had learned by heart,

Forgetting everything before he had understood it clearly,

And who for these reasons Was called Fame Seeker.

He also by practicing good works

Was able to meet countless buddhas,

To serve offerings to buddhas,

To follow them in practicing the great truth, And to perfect the six pāramitās.

Now he has seen Śākyamuni the lion.

Afterward he will become a buddha.

And will be named Maitreya.

LS 1.64

Now the Buddha radiates brightness To help disclose the meaning of real form.

People, now you must be aware!

Hold palms together and wholeheartedly wait!

Chapter Two: Hōben (Expedient Means)

LS 1.66    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

At that time the World-honored One rose calmly and clearly from samādhi and addressed Śāriputra: “The wisdom of the buddhas is profound and unfathomable. Their lineage of wisdom is difficult to understand and difficult to enter. All śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas cannot know it. Why? [Because] a buddha has experienced familiarity with countless hundred thousand myriad koṭis of buddhas, and has totally practiced the unfathomable truth and reality of the buddhas; bravely persevering; [letting the buddhas’] names be universally heard; accomplishing the profound unprecedented Dharma; and preaching, as convenience permits, the meaning that is difficult to understand.”

LS 1.68    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

The Tathāgata is perfectly equipped with expediency and the pāramitā of wisdom. Śāriputra! The wisdom of the Tathāgata is wide, great, profound, and eternal.

LS 1.68    SBGZ Chapter Ten [21]; Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty (Vol. III)

[203]; Chapter Fifty-four (Vol. III) [98]; Chapter Ninety-one (Vol. IV) [71]

Buddhas alone, together with buddhas, are directly able to perfectly realize that all dharmas are real form. What is called “all dharmas” is form as it is, the nature as it is, body as it is, energy as it is, action as it is, causes as they are, conditions as they are, effects as they are, results as they are, and the ultimate state of equality of substance and detail, as it is.

LS 1.70    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [210] I, and buddhas in the ten directions,

Are directly able to know these things.

LS 1.72    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen Even if the world were full

Of beings like Śāriputra

Who together exhausted their intellects to gauge it, They could not fathom the buddha-wisdom.

LS 1.72    SBGZ recurrent phrase

As [abundant as] rice, hemp, bamboo, and reeds.

LS 1.74    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Sixty (Vol. III) [7]

Only I know concrete form, And the buddhas of the ten directions Are also like that.

LS 1.74    SBGZ Chapter Seventy-nine (Vol. IV) [169]

At that time in the great assembly, there were śrāvakas, the arhat who had ended excesses, Ajñāta-Kauṇḍinya, and others, [altogether] twelve hundred people.

LS 1.80    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen Children born of the Buddha’s mouth, Palms held together, looking up, we wait.

Please send forth the fine sound

And now preach for us [the truth] as it really is.

LS 1.82–84       SBGZ Chapter Seventeen Stop, stop, no need to explain.

My Dharma is too fine to think about.

Arrogant people,

If they hear, will surely not believe it with respect.

LS 1.86    SBGZ Chapter One [27]; Chapter Seventeen

When he preached these words, some five thousand bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās in the assembly rose at once from their seats, bowed to the Buddha, and withdrew.

LS 1.86    SBGZ Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II) [117]

The roots of wrongdoing of these fellows were deep and heavy.

LS 1.86–88       SBGZ Chapter One [11]; Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III)

Thereupon the Buddha addressed Śāriputra: “Now in this assembly I am

free of twigs and leaves, and only the true and real remain. Śāriputra! That arrogant people like these withdraw also is fine. Now listen well and I will preach for you.” Śāriputra said, “Please do so, World-honored One, I desire joyfully to listen.” The Buddha addressed Śāriputra: “Wonderful Dharma like this the buddha-tathāgatas preach only occasionally, just as the uḍumbara flower appears only once in an age.”

LS 1.88–90     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Fukanzazengi

This Dharma cannot be understood by thinking and discrimination. Only buddhas are directly able to know it. Why? The buddhas, World-honored Ones, appear in the world only by reason of the one great purpose. Śāri putra, why do I say that the buddhas, World-honored Ones, appear in the world only by reason of the one great purpose? The buddhas, World-honored Ones, appear in the world because they desire to cause living beings to disclose the wisdom of Buddha that will make them able to become pure. They appear in the world because they desire to show living beings the wisdom of Buddha. They appear in the world because they desire to cause living beings to realize the wisdom of Buddha. They appear in the world because they desire to cause living beings to enter the state of truth which is the wisdom of Buddha. Śāriputra, this is why the buddhas appear in the world only by reason of the one great purpose.

LS 1.90    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Śāriputra. The Tathāgata only by means of the One Buddha Vehicle preaches the Dharma for living beings. There is no other vehicle, neither a second nor a third. Śāriputra, the Dharma of all the buddhas of the ten directions is also like this.

LS 1.98–100     SBGZ Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II) [87], [91]

Śāriputra! If any of my disciples, calling themselves arhats or pratyekabuddhas, neither hear nor recognize the fact that the buddha-tathāgatas teach only bodhisattvas, they are not the Buddha’s disciples, nor arhats, nor pratyekabuddhas. Again Śāriputra! If these bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs think to themselves, “I have already attained the state of arhat; this is my last life, ultimate nirvana,” and then they no longer want to pursue [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, you should know that these are all people of lofty arrogance. Why? [Because] there is no such thing as a bhikṣu really attaining the state of arhat without believing this teaching.

LS 1.104    SBGZ Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II) [177]

This my Dharma of nine divisions,

Preached as befits living beings,

Is the basis for entry into the Great Vehicle. Therefore, I preach this sutra.

LS 1.106    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II) [99];

Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [210]; Chapter Sixty (Vol. III) [4]

In the buddha lands of the ten directions, There only exists the One-Vehicle Dharma. There is neither a second nor a third.

LS 1.108    SBGZ Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [213] I, body adorned with signs,

And brightness illuminating the world, Am honored by countless multitudes

For whom I preach the seal of real form.

LS 1.116    SBGZ Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV) [150]

If people, to stupas and shrines,

To jewel images and painted images,

With flowers, incense, flags, and canopies Reverently serve offerings;

[Or] if they cause others to make music,

To beat drums, to blow horns and conches,

[To play] panpipes, flutes, lutes, lyres, Harps, gongs, and cymbals, And many fine sounds such as these They serve continually as offerings; Or [if] with joyful hearts,

They sing the praises of the Buddha’s virtue, Even in one small sound,

They all have realized the Buddha’s truth. If people whose mind is distracted, With even a single flower

Serve offerings to a painted [buddha] image,

They will gradually see numberless buddhas.

Again, people who do prostrations Or who simply join palms,

Even those who raise a hand

Or slightly lower the head,

And thus serve an offering to an image Will gradually see countless buddhas,

Will naturally realize the supreme truth,

And will widely save numberless multitudes.

LS 1.120    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II) [99]; Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [215]

The Dharma abides in its place in the Dharma,

And the form of the world is constantly abiding. Having recognized this in a place of the truth,

Guiding teachers teach it by expedient means.

LS 1.124    SBGZ Chapter Sixty-nine (Vol. III) [181]

At the time of this consideration,

The buddhas of the ten directions all appear.

LS 1.128    SBGZ Chapter Ten [14]; Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty-three

(Vol. III) [57]

In the same manner that the

Buddhas of the three times

Preach the Dharma,

So now do I also

Preach the Dharma that is without distinction.

The appearances of buddhas in the world Are far apart and hard to meet,

Even when they do appear in the world, It is still hard for this Dharma to be preached.

Chapter Three: Hiyu (A Parable)

LS 1.134    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

At that time, Śāriputra, jumping for joy, stood up at once and joined together

the palms of his hands.

LS 1.134    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

In the past I heard such Dharma from the Buddha and saw bodhisattvas

receiving affirmation and becoming buddhas.

LS 1.140–42

In my mind there was great alarm and doubt: Was it not a demon acting as Buddha, Distressing and confusing my mind?

LS 1.146    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

The land [of Flower-Light Tathāgata] is level and straight, pure and mag-

nificent, tranquil and prosperous.

LS 1.160    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Though I can leave safely through this burning gate, the children in the burning house are absorbed in their play, neither sensing nor knowing, neither alarmed nor afraid.

LS 1.162    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

This house only has one gate; moreover, it is narrow and small. The children are young and do not yet possess knowledge; they love the places where they play. They may fall into and be burned in the fire. I must explain to them the fearfulness of this matter.

LS 1.164    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Many kinds of such goat carts, deer carts, and ox carts are now outside the gate to play with. Come quickly out of this burning house and I will give you all whatever you want.

LS 1.166    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Then the wealthy man sees that his children have got out safely and are all sitting on open ground at the crossroads, with nothing impeding them; his mind is eased and he jumps for joy. Then each of his children says to the father, “Father, please now give us those lovely playthings you promised us before; the goat carts, deer carts, and ox carts.” Śāriputra! At that time the wealthy man gives to each of his children equally a great cart. The cart is high and wide, adorned with all kinds of treasures . . . and yoked by white oxen.

LS 1.176    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Quickly get out of the triple world and you will attain to the three vehicles, the vehicles of śrāvaka, pratyekabuddha, and Buddha. I now give you my guarantee of this, and in the end it will not be false. You all must solely be diligent and persevere.

LS 1.186–88     SBGZ Chapter Thirty-one (Vol. II) [8] Whereupon the house Suddenly catches fire.

In the four directions, all at once, Its flames are in full blaze.

LS 1.198    SBGZ Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III) [112]

All living beings

Are my children

[But] deeply attached to worldly pleasures They are without wisdom. . .

The Tathāgata, already free from

The burning house of the triple world Lives serenely in seclusion

Abiding peacefully in forests and fields.

Now this triple world All is my possession

And the living beings in it All are my children.

LS 1.202    SBGZ Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II) [175]

Riding in this precious carriage,

[We] arrive directly at the place of truth. Chapter Four: Shinge (Belief and Understanding)

LS 1.222    SBGZ Chapter One [62]

Then they rose from their seats, and, arranging their garments, bared only

their right shoulders.

LS 1.224    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Without expectation, we now suddenly are able to hear the rarely encountered Dharma. We profoundly congratulate ourselves on having acquired a great benefit, on having got for ourselves, without seeking it, an immeasurable treasure. LS 1.224      SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [26]; Chapter Seventy-three

(Vol. IV) [66]

It is like a person who, while still a youth, leaves a father and runs away.

LS 1.236      SBGZ Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II) [211]

This is my son begotten by me. [Since,] in a certain city he left me and ran

away, he has been wandering and suffering hardship for over fifty years.

LS 1.260      SBGZ Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II) [86]

Now we are

Truly voice-hearers,

The voice of the Buddha’s truth We cause all to hear.

Now we are

Truly arhats.

Chapter Five: Yakusō-yu (Parable of the Herbs)

LS 1.272      SBGZ Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II) [99]

The Dharma King who breaks “existence,”

Appears in the world

And according to the wants of living beings, Preaches the Dharma in many ways. . . The wise if they hear it,

Are able to believe and understand at once, The unwise doubt and grieve, Thus losing it forever.

LS 1.274      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Plants, shrubs, and herbs; Large and small trees,

Grain of all kinds, and seedlings, Sugarcane and grapevines, Are moistened by the rain, Without insufficiency.

Dry ground is all soaked,

Herbs and trees flourish together.

LS 1.286      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Your actions

Are the bodhisattva way itself. By gradual practice and learning, You will all become buddhas.

Chapter Six: Juki (Affirmation)

LS 1.300      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

This my disciple Mahākāśyapa, in a future age, will be able to serve three hundred myriad koṭis of World-honored buddhas, to make offerings to them, to revere, to honor, and to praise them, and to proclaim widely the limitless great Dharma of the buddhas.

LS 1.322      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

My disciples,

Five hundred in number,

Perfectly equipped with dignified virtues,

All will receive affirmation,

And in a future age,

All will be able to become a buddha.

Chapter Seven: Kejō-yu (Parable of the Magic City)

LS 2.12–14     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen Suppose a person, with [his or her own] power,

Grinds a three-thousand-great-thousandfold world, And every kind of earth therein, Entirely into ink,

And, passing through a thousand lands, Then lets one drop fall.

Dropping them like this as [the journey] proceeds, [The person] uses up all these specks of ink.

All the countries thus described,

Specked and unpacked alike,

Again are entirely ground to dust, And one speck is one kalpa.

LS 2.30

Leaving the profound joy of the immovable state of dhyāna In order to serve the Buddha.

LS 2.36

Sacred ruler, god among gods! With the voice of a kalaviṅka.

LS 2.56    SBGZ Chapter One [32]

He said, “This is suffering; this the accumulation of suffering; this the cessation of suffering; this the way of cessation of suffering.” And he preached extensively the law of the twelve causal connections: “Ignorance leads to action. Action leads to consciousness. Consciousness leads to name and form. Name and form lead to the six sense organs. The six sense organs lead to contact. Contact leads to feeling. Feeling leads to love. Love leads to taking. Taking leads to [new] existence. [New] existence leads to life. Life leads to aging and death; grief, sorrow, suffering, and distress. If ignorance ceases, then action ceases. If action ceases, then name and form cease. If name and form cease, then the six sense organs cease. If the six sense organs cease, then contact ceases. If contact ceases, then feeling ceases. If feeling ceases, then love ceases. If love ceases, then taking ceases. If taking ceases, then [new] existence ceases. If [new] existence ceases, then life ceases. If life ceases, then cease aging and death, grief, sorrow, suffering, and distress.”

LS 2.58    SBGZ Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV) [83]

The sixteen royal sons, all being youths, left home and became śra maṇeras.

LS 2.60    SBGZ Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV) [83]

At that time, eight myriad koṭis of people among the masses led by the sacred wheel-turning king, seeing the sixteen royal sons leave home, also sought to leave home, whereupon the king permitted them.

LS 2.62    SBGZ Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV) [83]

Buddha [Universal Surpassing Wisdom] preached this sutra for eight thousand kalpas without cessation. When he had finished preaching this sutra, he at once entered a quiet room and remained in the immovable state of dhyāna for eightyfour thousand kalpas. During this time the sixteen bodhisattva śrāmaṇeras, knowing that the Buddha had entered the room and was serenely set in dhyāna, each ascended a Dharma-seat and also for eighty-four thousand kalpas widely preached and discriminated to the four groups the Sutra of the [Lotus] Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

LS 2.66 (Ref. for Kattō)      SBGZ Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III) [90]

Two of those śrāmaṇeras became buddhas in the eastern quarter, the first named Akṣobhya who lived in the Land of Joy, the second named Sumeru Peak.

Chapter Eight: Gohyaku-deshi-juki (Affirmation of Five Hundred

Disciples)

LS 2.96    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Bhikṣus! Pūrṇa was able to become foremost among Dharma preachers under the Seven Buddhas. Now he has also become foremost among Dharma preachers in my order. He will again be foremost among Dharma preachers under future buddhas in [this] virtuous kalpa (bhadrakalpa) and will altogether guard, maintain, assist, and proclaim the Buddha-Dharma.

LS 2.112    SBGZ Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II) [45]

Five hundred bhikṣus,

One by one, will become a buddha,

With the same title, “Universal Light,”

And one after another, they will give affirmation.

LS 2.114    SBGZ Chapter Four [105]; Chapter Twelve [74]

World-honored One! It is as if some person goes to the house of a close friend, becomes intoxicated, and lies down. Meanwhile the close friend, having to go out on official business, ties a priceless pearl within [that person’s] garment as a gift, and departs.

LS 2.118    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen It is like a poor person

Going to the house of a close friend Whose family is very wealthy

[The friend] serves many fine dishes.

And a priceless pearl,

Ties inside [the poor one’s] inner garment.

LS 2.120      SBGZ Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II) [47]

Now, hearing from the Buddha

Of the wonderful fact of affirmation, And of the sequential reception of affirmation, Body and mind are full of joy.

Chapter Nine: Ju-gaku-mugaku-nin-ki (Affirmation of Students and People Beyond Study)

LS 2.128–30        SBGZ Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV) [27]

I have constantly practiced diligence, and for this reason I have already

realized anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

Chapter Ten: Hōsshi (A Teacher of the Dharma)

LS 2.140    SBGZ Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II) [50], [52]

At that time the World-honored One addressed eighty thousand great beings through Bodhisattva Medicine King: “Medicine King! You see among this great assembly countless gods (devas), dragon kings (nāgas), yakṣas, gandharvas, asuras, garuḍas, kiṃnaras, mahoragas, humans and nonhumans, as well as bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās, those who seek to be śrāvakas, those who seek to be pratyekabuddhas, and those who seek the truth of Buddha. When such beings as these are all before the Buddha, and they hear a single verse or a single word of the Sutra of the [Lotus] Flower of the Wonderful Dharma and rejoice in it even for a single moment of consciousness, I give affirmation to them all: ‘You will attain anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.’” The Buddha addresses Medicine King: “Moreover, after the Tathāgata’s extinction, if there are any people who hear even a single verse or a single word of the Sutra of the [Lotus] Flower of the Wonderful Dharma and rejoice in it for a single moment of consciousness, again, I give affirmation of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. . . .”

LS 2.152    SBGZ Chapter Nine [222]

This sutra, even while the Tathāgata is alive, [arouses] much hate and envy;

how much more after his extinction!

LS 2.154      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III) [221]

Medicine King! In every place where [this Lotus Sutra] is preached, or read, or recited, or copied, or where volumes of the sutra are kept, we should erect a stupa of the seven treasures, making it most high, wide, and ornate. [But] there is no need to place bones in it. Why? [Because] in it already there is the whole body of the Tathāgata. This stupa should be served, revered, honored, and extolled with all kinds of flowers, fragrance, strings of pearls, silk canopies, banners, flags, music, and songs of praise. If any people, being able to see this stupa, do prostrations and serve offerings to it, know that they are all close to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

LS 2.156      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [215]

For example, some people are parched and in need of water, for which they search by digging on a plateau. As long as they see dry earth, they know that water is still far away. Making effort unceasingly, in time they see moist earth, and then they gradually reach mud. Their minds are made up. They know that water must be near. Bodhisattvas are also like this. If they have not heard, nor understood, nor been able to practice this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma, we should know that they are still far from [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

If they are able to hear, to understand, to consider, and to practice it, we know for sure that they are close to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. Why? [Because] the anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi of all bodhisattvas totally belongs to this sutra. This sutra opens the door of expedient methods and reveals true and real form.

LS 2.156–58     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Medicine King! If a bodhisattva, on hearing this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma, is alarmed, doubting, or afraid, we should know that this is a bodhisattva with recently established intention. If a śrāvaka, on hearing this sutra, is alarmed, doubting, or afraid, we should know that this is an arrogant person.

LS 2.162

If, when they preach this sutra,

Someone abuses them with an evil mouth, Or lays upon them swords, sticks, tiles, or stones, Because they heed the Buddha, they will endure.

LS 2.166      SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [31] If we are close to a teacher of the Dharma,

We at once attain the bodhisattva way.

And if we learn following this teacher,

We are able to meet buddhas [numerous] as sands of the Ganges.

Chapter Eleven: Ken-hōtō (Seeing the Treasure Stupa)

LS 2.168      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

At that time, before the Buddha, a stupa of the seven treasures, five hundred yojanas in height, and two hundred and fifty yojanas in length and breadth, sprang out from the earth and abode in the sky.

LS 2.172      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV) [160]

When that Buddha [Abundant Treasures] was practicing the bodhisattva way in the past, he had made a great vow: “After I have realized [the state of] Buddha and died, if in the lands of the ten directions there is any place where the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma is preached, my stupa shall spring up and appear before that place so that I may hear the sutra. . . .” LS 2.176      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

[Bodhisattva] Great Eloquence said to the Buddha, “World-honored One! We also would like to see the many buddhas who are offshoots of the Worldhonored One, to perform prostrations and to serve offerings to them.” Then the Buddha sent forth a ray of light from [his circle of] white hair.

LS 2.186–88     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Fifty-one (Vol. III) [9]

Then all the assembly saw the Tathāgata Abundant Treasures sitting on the lion seat in the treasure stupa, his whole body undissipated, as if he had entered the balanced state of dhyāna. . . . Then the Buddha Abundant Treasures, in the treasure stupa, shared half his seat with Śākyamuni Buddha, and said, “Śākyamuni Buddha, please take this seat.” Thereupon Śākyamuni Buddha entered inside the stupa, sat down on the half-seat, and sat in the full lotus posture.

LS 2.190    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

A world-honored sacred lord, Though long extinct

Inside the treasure stupa,

Yet comes for the Dharma.

LS 2.194      SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [44]

If they preach this sutra

Then they will meet me, The Tathāgata Abundant Treasures, And many transformed buddhas.

LS 2.196–98     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

To take the great earth, Put it on a toenail,

And ascend to Brahmā heaven:

That also is not hard.

[But] after the Buddha’s death,

In a corrupt age,

To read this sutra even for a moment: That indeed will be hard.

LS 2.198    SBGZ Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II) [135]

After my extinction,

To keep this sutra,

And to preach it to [even] a single person:

That indeed will be hard. . .

After my extinction,

To listen to and to accept this sutra, And to inquire into its meaning:

That indeed will be hard.

Chapter Twelve: Daibadatta (Devadatta)

LS 2.208    SBGZ Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III)

Through the good counsel of Devadatta, I was caused to obtain the six pāramitās, kindness, compassion, joy, and detachment, the thirty-two signs, the eighty kinds of excellence, a golden complexion with purple luster, the ten powers, the four kinds of fearlessness, the four social methods, the eighteen uncommon [characteristics], the mystical abilities, and bodhi-powers. I realized the balanced and right state of awareness and widely saved living beings, all due to the good counsel of Devadatta.

LS 2.208      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV) [16]

Devadatta also, in future, after countless kalpas have passed, will be able

to become a buddha.

LS 2.212–214   SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Thereupon Mañjuśrī, sitting on a thousand-petal lotus flower as big as a carriage wheel, with the bodhisattvas who accompanied him also sitting on precious lotus flowers, naturally sprang up from the great ocean, out of the palace of the Sāgara Dragon, and abided in space. LS 2.216

[Bodhisattva Wisdom Accumulation says to Mañjuśrī:] “Very wise, virtuous, brave, and vigorous one!

You have converted and saved countless beings.

Now this great order

And I, all already have seen

[Your] expounding of the teaching of real form,

Revelation of the One-Vehicle Dharma, And universal guidance of living beings,

Whom you cause swiftly to realize bodhi.

LS 2.218      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Mañjuśrī said: “I, in the sea, am constantly preaching only the Sutra of the

[Lotus] Flower of the Wonderful Dharma. . . .”

LS 2.218      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

Mañjuśrī said: “There is the daughter of the Dragon King Sāgara. . . . She has profoundly entered the balanced state of dhyāna, and penetrated all dharmas. In a kṣāṇa she established the bodhi-mind and attained the state of not regressing or deviating.”

LS 2.218–20     SBGZ Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III) [227]

Bodhisattva Wisdom Accumulation said, “I have seen [how] Śākyamuni Tathāgata, during countless kalpas of hard practice and painful practice, accumulating merit and heaping up virtue, has pursued the bodhisattva way and has never ceased. I have observed that in the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world, there is no place even the size of a mustard seed where he has not abandoned his body and life as a bodhisattva for the sake of living beings. After acting thus, he was then able to realize the truth of bodhi.

LS 2.224      SBGZ Chapter Eight [187]; Chapter Seventeen

All saw the dragon’s daughter suddenly become a male, equipped with all the practices of a bodhisattva. She went at once to the southern quarter, the world which is free of impurity, [where she] sat on a precious lotus flower, realizing the balanced and right state of truth, with the thirty-two signs and the eighty kinds of excellence, and preaching the wonderful Dharma for all living beings throughout the ten directions. Then the sahā world of bodhisattvas, śrāvakas, the eight groups of gods and dragons, and human and nonhuman beings, all seeing from afar the dragon’s daughter becoming a buddha and universally preaching the Dharma for the human beings and gods in that order, rejoiced greatly in their hearts and they all bowed from afar in veneration.

Chapter Thirteen: Kan-ji (Exhortation to Hold Firm)

Chapter Fourteen: Anrakugyō (Peaceful and Joyful Practice)

LS 2.244      SBGZ Chapter Nine [230]

A bodhisattva mahāsattva should not get close to kings, princes, ministers,

and administrators.

LS 2.258      SBGZ Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III) [121]

[The bodhisattva] applies oil to the body,

Having bathed away dust and dirt,

And puts on a fresh and clean robe: Totally clean within and without.

LS 2.266–68          SBGZ Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III) [122]

Though those people neither hear, nor believe in, nor understand this sutra, when I attain [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, wherever I am, through mystical power and through the power of wisdom, I will lead them and cause them to be able to abide in this Dharma.

LS 2.276–78 SBGZ Chapter Four [105]; Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Seventy-six (Vol. IV) [115]

If there is a brave and vigorous person, Able to perform difficult deeds,

The king unties from inside his topknot, The bright pearl, and this he gives. . . It is like the king releasing from his topknot The bright pearl, and giving it.

This sutra is honored

As supreme among all sutras, I have always guarded it, And not revealed it at random. Now is just the time

To preach it for you all.

LS 2.282      SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [34] Having profoundly entered the balanced state of dhyāna, We meet the buddhas of the ten directions.

LS 2.282      SBGZ Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II) [187]; Chapter Sixty-nine

(Vol. III) [175]; Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III) [237]

The buddhas’ bodies, golden colored,

Adorned with a hundred signs of happiness: In the hearing of Dharma and in preaching for others, This pleasant dream exists forever.

And in the dream-action, the king of a nation Forsakes his palace, his followers,

And the five desires for the superior and fine, And he goes to a place of the truth.

At the foot of a bodhi tree,

He sits on the lion seat,

Pursues the truth for seven days,

And attains the wisdom of the buddhas.

Having realized the supreme truth

He arises and turns the wheel of Dharma, Preaching the Dharma to the four groups For thousands of myriads of koṭis of kalpas.

He preaches the faultless wonderful Dharma And saves countless living beings,

After which he naturally enters nirvana

Like a lamp going out when its smoke is spent.

If [anyone] in future corrupt ages Preaches this paramount Dharma,

That person will obtain great benefit

Such as the virtuous effects [described] above.

Chapter Fifteen: Jū-chi-yūshutsu (Springing Out from the Earth)

LS 2.286      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

When the Buddha had preached this, all the earth of the three-thousandgreat-thousand worlds of the sahā world quaked and split, and from its midst countless thousand myriad koṭis of bodhisattva mahāsattvas sprang out together. These bodhisattvas, their bodies all golden, with the thirty-two signs and measureless brightness, had previously all been below the sahā world, living in the space there.

LS 2.310      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III) [62] Ajita, you should know,

All these great bodhisattvas,

For numberless kalpas,

Have practiced the Buddha’s wisdom,

All of them are my converts,

I have caused them to establish

The will to the great truth, They are my sons.

They remain in this world,

Always practicing the dhūta deeds, They hope to enjoy quiet places,

Shunning the clamor of crowds, Taking no pleasure in much explanation. Sons like these

Are learning the method which is my truth. They are ever diligent, day and night,

Because they want to get the Buddha’s truth.

In the sahā world,

Down below, they live in space.

LS 2.318    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III) [112]

It is as if a young and strong man, Just twenty-five years old,

Indicates to others’ centenarian sons, With white hair and wrinkled faces,

[Saying], “These are my offspring,”

And the sons also saying, “This is our father”— The father young and the sons old.

The whole world does not believe it.

So it is with the World-honored One:

He has attained the truth very recently.

All these bodhisattvas,

Are firm in will, and dauntless,

And for countless ages,

They have practiced the bodhisattva way.

Chapter Sixteen: Nyorai-juryō (The Tathāgata’s Lifetime)

LS 3.12–14       SBGZ Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III) [226]

Good sons! It is countless and infinite hundred thousand myriad koṭis of nayutas of kalpas since I actually realized the state of Buddha. For instance, suppose there are five hundred thousand myriad koṭis of nayutas of asaṃkheya three-thousand-great-thousandfold worlds; let someone grind them to atoms, pass eastward through five hundred thousand myriad koṭis of nayutas of asaṃkheya countries, and then drop one atom; [suppose the person] proceeds eastward like this [until] all those atoms are used up. Good sons, what do you think? Is it possible, or not, to conceive and compute all those worlds so as to know their number?

LS 3.16    SBGZ Chapter Eighty-three (Vol. IV) [21]

Good sons! Seeing living beings who take pleasure in small things, whose virtue is scant and whose filthiness is accumulated, the Tathāgata to these people states, “In my youth I transcended family life and attained anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” And since I actually realized [the state of] Buddha, [my] eternity has been such as it is. Only to teach and transform living beings, by expedient means, so that they will enter the Buddhist truth, do I make statements like this.

LS 3.18    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III) [44]; Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III) [110]

All that he says is real, not empty. Why? [Because] the Tathāgata knows and sees the form of the triple world as it really is, without life and death, or disappearance or appearance; without existence in the world and extinction; neither real nor void; neither thus nor otherwise. It is best to see the triple world as the triple world.

LS 3.18–20  SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II) [101]; Chapter Fifty (Vol. III) [215]; Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III) [226]

Thus, it is very far in the distant past since I realized [the state of] Buddha. [My] lifetime is countless asaṃkheya kalpas, eternally existing and not perishing. Good sons! The lifetime which I have realized by my original practice of the bodhisattva way is not even yet exhausted but will still be twice the previous number [of kalpas].

LS 3.30    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen [54]; Chapter Sixty (Vol. III) [44];

Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [43] In order to save living beings,

As an expedient method I manifest nirvana, Yet really I have not passed away,

Constantly abiding here preaching the Dharma, I am always living at this place, With mystical powers,

I make living beings who are upset,

Still fail to see me though I am close.

Many see that I have passed away,

And far and wide they serve offerings to my bones, All holding romantic yearnings

And bearing thirst in their hearts.

When living beings have believed and submitted, Being simple and straight, and flexible in mind,

And they wholeheartedly want to meet Buddha, Without begrudging their own body and life, Then I and many monks,

Appear together on Vulture Peak.

LS 3.32    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [48]; Chapter

Eighty-eight (Vol. IV) [188]

[I am] eternally present on Vulture Peak, And in other dwelling places.

Even when living beings see, at the end of a kalpa,

That they are to be burned in a great fire, This land of mine is tranquil,

Always filled with gods and human beings; Its parks and many palaces

Are adorned with every kind of treasure; Precious trees have abundant flowers and fruit:

It is a place where living beings enjoy themselves. The gods strike celestial drums,

And constantly make theater and music,

Showering mandārava flowers On the Buddha and the great assembly. My Pure Land is immortal,

Yet many view it as to be burned up, And thus entirely filled With grief, horror, and agonies.

These living beings of many sins,

With their bad conduct as direct and indirect causes, Even if they pass asaṃkheya kalpas

Do not hear the name of the Three Treasures.

Beings who practice virtue

And who are gentle, simple, and straight,

All see my body

Existing here and preaching the Dharma.

LS 3.36    SBGZ Chapter Seventy (Vol. III) [201] Constantly making this my thought:

“How can I make living beings

Able to enter the supreme truth,

And swiftly realize a buddha’s body?”

Chapter Seventeen: Funbetsu-kudoku (Discrimination of Merits)

LS 3.56    SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [39]

If good sons and good daughters, hearing my preaching of the eternity of [my] lifetime, believe and understand it with a profound mind, then they will see the Buddha constantly abiding on Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa surrounded by an assembly of great bodhisattvas and many śrāvakas, and preaching the Dharma. And they will see this sahā world with its land of lapis lazuli, level, normal, and right.

Chapter Eighteen: Zuiki-kudoku (The Merits of Joyful Acceptance)

LS 3.72–74       SBGZ Chapter Eight [70]; Chapter Thirteen [127]; Chapter Fourteen [200]; Chapter Twenty [125]

Then the Buddha addressed the bodhisattva mahāsattva Maitreya: “Ajita. If, after the Tathāgata’s death, bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās, or other wise people, old or young, having heard this sutra and accepted it with joy, leave the Dharma order and go elsewhere to stay in monasteries or deserted places, or in cities, streets, hamlets, fields, and villages, to expound [this sutra] as they have heard it, according to their ability, to their father and mother, relatives, good friends and acquaintances; and all these people, having heard it, accept it with joy and again go on to transmit the teaching; [then] other people, having heard it, also accept it with joy and transmit the teaching, which propagates like this to the fiftieth [generation]. . . .”

LS 3.88

How much more, if we hear [the sutra] with undivided mind, Elucidate its meaning,

And practice according to the teaching: That happiness is beyond limit.

LS 3.90

Then the Buddha addressed the bodhisattva mahāsattva Ever Zealous: “If any good son or good daughter receives and retains this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma or reads or recites or explains or copies it, that person will obtain eight hundred merits of the eye, twelve hundred merits of the ear, eight hundred merits of the nose, twelve hundred merits of the tongue, eight hundred merits of the body, and twelve hundred merits of the mind; these merits will adorn the six organs making them all pure. . . .”

Chapter Nineteen: Hōsshi-kudoku (The Merits of a Teacher of the

Dharma)

LS 3.122    SBGZ Chapter Twenty-one [184]

Though [he or she] has not yet attained faultless real wisdom, his or her

mind-organ is pure like this.

Chapter Twenty: Jōfugyō-bosatsu (Bodhisattva Never Despise)

LS 3.128    SBGZ Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II) [161]; Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III) [23]

In the eternal past, countless, infinite, inconceivable asaṃkheya kalpas ago,

there was a buddha named King of Majestic Voice.

LS 3.130    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

The right Dharma remained in the world for a number of kalpas equal to the atoms in one Jambudvīpa. The imitative Dharma remained in the world for a number of kalpas equal to the atoms in four continents.

LS 3.134–36

Thus he passed many years, constantly abused, never becoming angry, always saying, “You will become buddhas.” When he said these words, people would sometimes beat him with clubs, sticks, bricks, and stones. He ran away and, keeping his distance, he still called out in a loud voice, “I dare not despise you. You will all become buddhas.” Because he always spoke these words, arrogant bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās called him “Never Despise.”

Chapter Twenty-one: Nyorai-jinriki (The Mystical Power of the Tathāgata)

LS 3.158    SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II) [183]

Thereupon the worlds of the ten directions were realized without hindrance as one buddha land. Then the Buddha addressed Eminent Conduct and the other bodhisattvas in the great assembly: “The mystical powers of the buddhas are like this; countless, infinite, and unthinkable. . . .”

LS 3.162    SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [45]

One who is able to keep this sutra, Is already meeting me,

And also meeting the Buddha Abundant Treasures, And those [buddhas] who are [my] offshoots.

Chapter Twenty-two: Zoku-rui (The Commission)

Chapter Twenty-three: Yaku-ō-bosatsu-honji (The Story of Bodhisattva Medicine King)

LS 3.200      SBGZ Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV) [35]

As the Buddha is king of all dharmas, so it is also with this sutra. It is the king of sutras. Star Constellation King Flower! This sutra can save all living beings. This sutra can free all living beings from pain and suffering. This sutra can greatly benefit all living beings and fulfill their desires. Like a clear, cool pool that can satisfy all those who are thirsty; like the cold getting fire; like the naked getting clothing; like [a caravan of] merchants getting a leader; like a child getting its mother; like a crossing getting a ferry; like the infirm getting a doctor; like [those in] darkness getting a light; like the poor getting treasure; like a people getting a king; like traders getting the sea; like a torch dispelling the darkness; so it is also with this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma. It can free living beings from all suffering and all diseases, and can unloose all the bonds of life and death.

LS 3.210      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

You have accomplished unthinkable virtue, being able to ask Śākyamuni Buddha such things as these, and benefiting all countless living beings. Chapter Twenty-four: Myo-on-bosatsu (Bodhisattva Wonder Sound)

LS 3.214      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

[Bodhisattva Wonder Sound] had attained samādhi with the form of a wonderful banner, samādhi as the Flower of Dharma, samādhi as pure virtue, samādhi as the sport of the Constellation King, samādhi as the state without involvements, samādhi as the wisdom-seal, samādhi as the state of understanding the words of all living beings, samādhi as the accumulation of all virtues, samādhi as the state of purity, samādhi as the playing of mystical powers, samādhi as the torch of wisdom, samādhi as the king of adornments, samādhi as pure brightness, samādhi as the pure treasury, samādhi as a singular state, and samādhi as the function of the sun. He had attained hundred thousand myriad koṭis of great states of samādhi like these, equal to the sands of the Ganges.

Chapter Twenty-five: Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon (The Universal Gate of

Bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World)

LS 3.242      SBGZ Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II)

Good son! If there are countless hundred thousand myriad koṭis of living beings who, suffering from many agonies, hear of this bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World and with undivided mind call [the bodhisattva’s] name, the bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World will instantly regard their cries, and all will be delivered.

LS 3.252      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen; allusions in many chapters

Good son! If living beings in any land must be saved through the body of a buddha, the bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World manifests at once the body of a buddha and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a pratyekabuddha, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a pratyekabuddha and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a śrāvaka, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a śrāvaka and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of King Brahmā, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of King Brahmā and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of the god-king Śakra, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of the god-king Śakra and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of Īśvara, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of Īśvara and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of Maheśvara, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of Maheśvara and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a celestial great general, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a celestial great general and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of Vaiśravaṇa, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of Vaiśravaṇa and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a minor king, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a minor king and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a rich man, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a rich man and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a householder, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a householder and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a government official, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a government official and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a brahman, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a brahman and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a bhikṣu, bhikṣuṇī, upāsaka, or upāsikā, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a bhikṣu, bhikṣuṇī, upāsaka, or upāsikā and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of the woman of a rich man, householder, official, or brahman, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a woman and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a boy or a girl, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a boy or a girl and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a god, dragon, yakṣa, gandharva, asura, garuḍa, kiṃnara, or mahoraga, a human being or a non human being, [the bodhisattva], in every case, manifests at once this [body] and preaches for them the Dharma. To those who must be saved through the body of a vajra-holding god, [the bodhisattva] manifests at once the body of a vajra-holding god and preaches for them the Dharma. Infinite Thought! This bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World, accomplishing good effects like these, using all kinds of forms, roams many lands to save living beings. Therefore you all must wholeheartedly serve offerings to Bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World. This bodhisattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World, amid fear and distress, is able to give fearlessness. For this reason, in this sahā world, all call this [bodhisattva] “Giver of Fearlessness.”

LS 3.270      SBGZ Chapter One [20]

While the Buddha preached this “Universal Gate” chapter, the eighty-four thousand living beings in the assembly all established the will to the unequaled state of equilbrium which is anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

Chapter Twenty-six: Darani (Dhāraṇī)

LS 3.282–84     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen If anyone fails to heed our spell,

And troubles a preacher of the Dharma, May their head be split into seven Like an arjaka sprout.

Their crime is like killing a parent,

Like the sin of pressing oil,

Or cheating people with [false] weights and measures, Or Devadatta’s crime of splitting the sangha. People who offend such a teacher of the Dharma, Will acquire similar evil.

Chapter Twenty-seven: Myō-shōgon-ō-honji (The Story of King Resplendent)

LS 3.288–90     SBGZ Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV) [3]

These two sons possessed great mystical power, happiness, and wisdom. They had long cultivated the ways practiced by bodhisattvas; that is to say, dāna-pāramitā, śīla-pāramitā, kṣānti-pāramitā, vīrya-pāramitā, dhyāna-pāramitā, prajñā-pāramitā, and the expedience pāramitā, benevolence, compassion, charity, and the thirtyseven auxiliary bodhi methods—all these they had clearly realized.

LS 3.292–94     SBGZ Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II) [186]

Thereupon the two sons, because they cared for their father, sprang up into space, to a height of seven tāla trees, and manifested many kinds of mystical transformation, walking, standing, sitting, and lying in space; the upper body emitting water, the lower body emitting fire [or] the lower body emitting water and the upper body emitting fire.

LS 3.302      SBGZ Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV) [83]

That king at once gave his kingdom to his younger brother; [then] the king together with his queen, two sons, and many followers, in the Buddha-Dharma, left home to practice the truth.

LS 3.304

These two sons of mine have already done a buddha-deed, with transformations [achieved through] mystical powers, they have changed my wrong mind, enabling me to abide peacefully in the Buddha-Dharma and to meet the World-honored One. These two sons are my friends in virtue.

LS 3.306      SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [47]

Remember, great king! A friend of virtue is the great cause which leads us to be able to meet Buddha and to establish the will to [the supreme truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

Chapter Twenty-eight: Fugen-bosatsu-kanpotsu (Encouragement of

Bodhisattva Universal Virtue)

LS 3.326      SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

While the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma proceeds on its course through Jambudvīpa, anyone who receives it and retains it should reflect as follows: “This is all due to the majestic mystical power of Universal Virtue.” If anyone receives and retains it, reads and recites it, rightly remembers it, understands its meaning, and practices as it preaches, we should know that this person is doing the work of Universal Virtue.

LS 3.328–30     SBGZ Chapter Seventeen

[The bodhisattva Universal Virtue said,] “World-honored One! I now by my mystical power will guard and protect this sutra. After the death of the Tathāgata, I shall cause it to spread widely throughout Jambudvīpa, and shall never let it cease to exist.” Thereupon Śākyamuni Buddha praised him, saying, “How excellent, how excellent, Universal Virtue, that you are able to protect and to promote this sutra, causing peace, joy, and benefit to many living beings. You have already accomplished unthinkable virtue and profound compassion. From the long distant past, you have established the will to [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, and have been able to make this vow of mystical power, to guard and to protect this sutra. . . .”

LS 3.330             SBGZ Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III) [37]

Universal Virtue! If there is anyone who receives and retains, reads and recites, rightly remembers, practices, and copies this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma, know that this person is meeting Śākyamuni Buddha and hearing this sutra as if from the Buddha’s mouth.

Glossary of Sanskrit Terms

This glossary presents brief dictionary definitions of Sanskrit terms represented in theby Sir Monier Monier-Williams [MW]. Also used were present volume. Definitions are drawn in general from A Sanskrit Dictionary for StudentsA Sanskrit-English Dictionary[JEBD], and by A. A. Macdonell [MAC], the The Historical BuddhaArrangement is according to the English alphabet.Chapter references, unless otherwise stated, refer to chapters of the [HB] by H. W. Schumann.Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary Shōbōgenzō.

Abhidharma (“on Dharma,” prefix for names of Buddhist commentaries). Representedtoward (or additional to) Dharma.” One of the “three baskets,” or Tripi ṭaka (q.v.).or metaphysics. over, upon. The literal meaning of by ron, “doctrine, discussion, argument.” [MW] The dogmas of Buddhist philosophyAbhi: (a prefix to verbs and nouns, expressing) to, toward, into,abhi dharma is therefore “that which is directed

Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaKośa: a cask; a bucket; a box; the interior of a carriage; a storeroom; a treasury; a(name of a commentary). Represented phonetically. [MW]

Bhāṣya:dictionary, lexicon, or vocabulary; a poetical collection, collection of sentences, etc.Chapter Eighty-eight (Vol. IV).(q.v.): commentary. Ref: Bibliography; Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV);

Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣa-śāstra[MW] Vibhāṣā: great commentary. Ref: Bibliography; Chapter Seventy (Vol. III);(name of a commentary). Represented phonetically.

Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV); Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV).

abhijñā[MW] Knowing, skillful, clever; understanding, conversant with; remembrance,(mystical power, supernatural faculty). Represented by jinzū, “mystical power.”

Ref: Chapter Twelve [87]; Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II); ated, viz. 1) taking any form at will; 2) hearing to any distance; 3) seeing to anyrecollection; supernatural science or faculty of a buddha (of which five are enumer-distance; 4) penetrating men’s thoughts; 5) knowing their state and antecedents).Lotus Sutra, chapter 24.

abhimāna(of one’s self, self-conceit, pride, haughtiness. One of the seven categories of mānaarrogance). Ref: (haughtiness). Represented by Lotus Sutra, chapter 2.zōjōman, “lofty arrogance.” [MW] High opinion ācārya.good conduct),” a spiritual guide or teacher. Ref: Chapter Twenty-one [206].Represented phonetically. [MW] “Knowing or teaching the ācāra or rules (of

413

acintyasurpassing thought. Ref: Chapter Seventeen; (unthinkable). Represented by fukashigi, “unthinkable.” [MW] Inconceivable, Lotus Sutra, chapter 21. adbhuta-dharma and by marvels or prodigies.” One of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under Ref: Chapter Eleven [40].mi-zō-u-hō,(wonders, marvels). Represented by “unprecedented occurrences.” [MW] “A system or series ofkihō, “rare occurrences, marvels” aṅga.

Āgama (name of a group of sutras). Represented phonetically. [MW] A traditional doctrine fixed by tradition. Ref: Chapter Twelve; Bibliography. Or precept, collection of such doctrines, sacred work; anything handed down and aguruAquilaria agallocha.(aloes). Represented by Ref: Chapter Twelve [78]. jinkō, “aloes.” [MW] The fragrant aloe wood and tree,

Ajita (epithet of Maitreya). Represented phonetically. [MW] Not conquered, unsubdued, unsurpassed, invincible, irresistible; name of Viṣnu; Śiva; Maitreya or a future buddha. Ref: Lotus Sutra, chapter 15. ākāśaether, sky, or atmosphere. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [62]; (space). Represented by kokū, “space.” [MW] A free or open space, vacuity; the Lotus Sutra, chapters 12,

15.

akṣa-sūtra for gambling; a cube; a seed of which rosaries are made; the (rosary). Represented by Sūtra (q.v.): a thread. Ref: Chapter Five. juzu, “counting beads,” “rosary.” [MW] Eleocarpus ganitrus,Akṣa: a die producing that seed.

Akṣobhya (name of a mythical buddha). Represented phonetically. [MW] Immovable, imperturbable; name of a buddha; name of an immense number. Ref: Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III) [90]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 7.

Amitābha (name of a mythical buddha). Represented phonetically. [MW] “Of unmeasured splendor,” name of a dhyāni-buddha. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80]. amṛtanectar (conferring immortality, produced at the churning of the ocean), ambrosia. A god; a goddess; a spirituous liquor; world of immortality, heaven, eternity; the(nectar). Represented by kanro, “sweet dew, nectar.” [MW] Immortal, an immortal,

Ref: Chapter One [62]; Chapter Eight [198].

anāgāminfugen-ka,(the state that is not subject to returning). Represented phonetically and by“the effect of not returning.” [MW] Not coming, not arriving, not future, not subject to returning. Ref: Chapter Two.

Ānanda (name of the Buddha’s half-brother and the second patriarch in India). Represented Fifteen. phonetically and by Keiki, “joy.” [MW] Happiness, joy, enjoyment. Ref: Chapter anāsrava(before a vowel (without excess, faultless). Represented by an): a prefix corresponding to the English “in” or “un,” and havingmuro, “without leakage.” [MW] A one [192].a negative or contrary sense. Āsrava (q.v.): excess, distress. Ref: Chapter Twenty Anāthapiṇḍada or Anāthapiṇḍika (a name of Sudatta [q.v.]). [MW] “Giver of cakes or food to the poor.” Ref: Fukanzazengi.

Anavatapta (name of a dragon king and of a lake). Represented phonetically and by Munetsu-chi, “Lake of No Heat.” [MW] Name of a serpent king; of a lake (= Rāvaṇa-hrada). Ref: Chapter Twelve [71].

aṅgaavadāna, of the body; a subordinate division or department. The twelve divisions of the teaching are 1) (division). Represented by 8) itivṛttaka,sūtra, 2)9)  geya,jātaka,bun[3)kyōLotus Sutra,10) vyākaraṇa,] , “divisions [of the teaching].” [MW] A limbvaipulya, chapter 2.4)11) gāthā, adbhuta-dharma,5) udāna, 6)12) nidāna, upadeśa7)

(q.v.). Ref: Chapter Eleven [40];

anitya occasional, incidental; irregular, unusual; unstable, uncertain. Ref: Chapter Seventeen[39](inconstant). Represented by ; Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. IImujō,). “inconstant.” [MW] Not everlasting, transient, añjalipalms.” [MW] The open hands placed side by side and slightly hollowed (as if by(salutation with joined hands). Represented by gasshō, “joining together of the a beggar to receive food; hence when raised to the forehead, a mark of supplication),reverence, salutation. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [62]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 3.

antarā-bhavaon the way. Ref: Chapter Twelve [74].chū-u, “middle existence.” [MW] (the intermediate stage of existence, middle existence). Represented by Bhava: coming into existence; being, state of being, existence, life. The soul in its middle existence between death and regeneration. Antarā: in the middle, inside, within, between;

Antarā-bhava-sattva:

Antarvāsa Twelve [95].“inner robe,” by (inner robe). Represented phonetically and by “practice and work robe.” [MW] An inner- or undergarment. Ref: Chapter Gojo-e, “five-stripe robe,” by shō-e,ge-e ,“small robe,” and by “under robe,” by gyōdō-nai-e, samu-e,

anuttara samyaksaṃbodhisamyañc. Samyañc:resented phonetically, and by mujō-tōshō-kaku,(the supreme right and balanced state of complete truth). Repmujō-shōtō-kaku,“supreme balanced and right state of truth.” [MW]“supreme right and balanced state Samyak: in compounds for of truth” or by Anuttara: chief, principal, best, excellent. [Supreme.] going along with or together, turned together or in one direction,

  illuminated or enlightened intellect. [State of truth.] Note: In the expressing conjunction, union, thoroughness, intensity, completeness. [Complete.]is not intellectual knowledge but a state of body and mind. Ref: Chapter One; proper, true, right; uniform, same, identical. [Right and balanced.] combined, united; turned toward each other, facing one another; correct, accurate, perfect knowledge or wisdom (by which a person becomes a buddha); the Lotus Sutra, chapter 1.                   Shōbōgenzō, bodhiSam: a prefix

Bodhi:

Chapter Two;

araṇya desert, forest. Ref: Chapter Twelve [115].(forest). Represented phonetically. [MW] A foreign or distant land; a wilderness, arhat. Represented phonetically and by worthy, venerable, respectable; praised, celebrated; the highest rank in the Buddhist Shika, “fourth effect.” [MW] Able, allowed to; Lotus Sutra, chapter 1. hierarchy. Ref: Chapter One [62]; Chapter Two;

arjakainto seven pieces. Kern identifies the plant as LSW notes: “It is said that if one touches an (name of a plant). Represented phonetically. [MW] The plant arjaka Symplocos racemosa, gratissimum.f lower its petals open and fall Ocimum gratissimum.” Ref: Lotus Sutra,while [the]

Monier-Williams dictionary has chapter 26. Ocinum [sic.]

aśaikṣapupil,” an arhat. Ref: (those beyond study). Represented by Lotus Sutra, chapter 9.mugaku, “no study.” [MW] “No longer a asamasama without equal.” [MW] Unequaled. Ref: Chapter One [20]; (the unequaled state of equilibrium). Represented by Lotus Sutra,mutōtō,chapter 25.“equality asaṃjñi-sattvāḥ[[195].MW] Asaṃjña:(thoughtless heaven). Represented by senseless; not having full consciousness. Ref: Chapter Fourteen musōten, “thoughtless heaven.” asaṃkhyey numerous. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80]; (innumerable). Represented phonetically. [MW] Innumerable, exceedingly Lotus Sutra, chapter 16. asaṃskṛta natural.” [MW] Not prepared, not consecrated; unadorned; unpolished, rude (as(unadorned, without elaboration). Represented by mui, “without artificiality, speech). Ref: Chapter One [11]; Chapter Twelve [64].

Aśoka (name of a great Indian emperor who ruled in the third century phonetically. [MW] Not causing sorrow, not feeling sorrow. Ref: Chapter  Fifteen; Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III) [73]; Bibliography. B.C.E.). Represented āsrava boiling rice; a door opening into water and allowing the stream to descend through it; (with Jainas) the action of the senses which impels the soul towards external(the superfluous, excess). Represented by Lotus Sutra, Ro, “leakage.” [MW] The foam on chapters 1, 10. objects; distress, affliction, pain. Ref: asura10.demon, ghost, opponent of the gods. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80]; (demon). Represented phonetically and by hiten, “anti-gods.” [MW] An evil spirit, Lotus Sutra, chapter Aśvaghoṣa (name of a Buddhist patriarch). Represented by Memyō, “Horse Whinny.”[Fifteen.MW] Aśva: a horse, stallion. Ghoṣa: any cry or sound, roar of animals. Ref: Chapter avadānaact, achievement (object of a legend, Buddhist literature). One of the twelve divisions(parable). Represented by hiyu, “metaphor, parable.” [MW] A great or glorious

3.of the teachings. See under aṅga. Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]; Lotus Sutra, chapter

avadāta-vāsana[Twelve [107].dazzling white; white color. MW] Avadāta:(clothed in white; layperson). Represented by cleansed, clean, clear; pure, blameless, excellent; of white splendor; Vasana: covering, clothing, garment, dress. Ref: Chapter byaku-e, “white robe.”

Avalokiteśvara (Regarder of the Sounds of the World). Represented by Kannon, “RegarderChapter Two; Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II); of Sounds” and by Kanjizai, “Free in Reflection.” [MW] Name of a bodhisattva worshiped by the northern Buddhists. Ava lo kita:Lotus Sutra,seen, viewed, observed. Recharter 25.

AvataṃsakaAvataṃsa:(name of a sutra). Represented by a garland. Ref: Chapter One [32]; Chapter Seven [141]; Bibliography. kegon, “flower-solemnity.” [MW] Avīci (name of a particular hell). Represented phonetically and by hell.” [MW] Waveless; a particular hell. Ref: Chapter Fourteen [195].mugen-jigoku, “incessant avidyāunwise; ignorance, illusion. Ref: Chapter Two; (ignorance). Represented by mumyō, “ignorance, darkness.” [MW] Unlearned, Lotus Sutra, chapter 7. avyākṛta[were created. Ref: Chapter Ten.MW] Undeveloped, unexpended; elementary substance from which all things(indifferent, undifferentiated). Represented by muki, “without writing,” “blank.”

Āyatan aceived by the above (the outer senses and Resting place, support, seat, place, home, house, abode; (with Buddhists) the five(seat [of sense perception]). Represented by manas (considered as the inner seats or āyatanas). Ref: Chapter Two.sho,āyatana“place” ors) and the qualities per-nyu, “entry.” [MW] āyuṣmat“ experienced-old” or “veteran senior.” [MW] Possessed of vital power, healthy,(venerable monk). Represented by gu-ju, “possessing longevity” and by chōrō, honorific title (especially to royal personages and Buddhist monks). Ref: Chapter long-lived; alive, living; old, aged; “life-possessing,” often applied as a kind of

One [52]; Chapter Two.

Bhadanta applied to a Buddhist, a Buddhist mendicant. Ref: Chapter Two.(virtuous one). Represented by daitoku, “great virtue.” [MW] Term of respect bhadrakalpaRef: friendly, kind; excellent, fair, beautiful, lovely, pleasant, dear. “kalpa Bhadra: Lotus Sutra, of the sages.” [MW] “The good or beautiful (good blessed, auspicious, fortunate, prosperous, happy; good, gracious,kalpa chapter 8., virtuous kalpa). Represented by kalpa,kengō,” name of the present “kalpaKalpa: of the wise, “eon (q.v.). age.

Bhadrapāla (“Good Guardian,” name of a bodhisattva). Represented phonetically. [MW]pond (as “receptacle” of water?). Ref: Chapter Twelve [49].Name of a bodhisattva. Bhadra: good. Pāla: a guard, protector, keeper; an oblong Bhagavat. Represented phonetically and by illustrious, divine, adorable, venerable; holy (applied to gods, demigods, and saints seson, “World-honored One.” [MW] Glorious, as a term of address; with Buddhists often prefixed to the titles of their sacred writ-Two; ings); “the divine or adorable one,” name of a buddha or a bodhisattva. Ref: Chapter Lotus Sutra, chapter 2. bhikṣua Buddhist mendicant or monk. Ref: (monk). Represented phonetically. [MW] A beggar, mendicant, religious mendicant; Lotus Sutra, chapter 1. bhikṣuṇīRef: (Lotus Sutra,nun). Represented phonetically. [MW] A Buddhist female mendicant or nun. chapter 2.

Bhīṣmagarjitasvararāja (name of a legendary Buddha). Represented by I-on-ō, “King of buddhas. Ref: Chapter Fourteen [176]; Majestic Voice” and by Kū-ō, “King of Emptiness.” [MW] Name of a number of Lotus Sutra, chapter 20. bodhisamyaksaṃbodhi.(truth, state of truth). Represented phonetically and by dō, “way.” See anuttara bodhicitta and by Five [111]; Chapter Sixty-nine (Vol. III); Chapter Seventy (Vol. III); (bodhi-doshin ,mind, the will to the truth). Represented by “will to the truth.” [MW] Citta (q.v.): intelligence, mind. Ref: Chapter bodaishin, bodhi-Lotus Sutra, mind” chapter 12.

bodhimaṇḍaby dōjō,(“truth-place,” “way-place,” “exercise hall,” “gymnasium.” [MW] Seat of place of practicing the truth, place of practice, seat of truth). Represented scum of boiled rice (or any grain); ornament, decoration. Ref: Chapter One [20];successive trees where Gautama Buddha attained to perfect wisdom). wisdom (name of the seats which were said to have risen out of the earth under four chapter 2.    Maṇḍa: the

Lotus Sutra,

bodhisattva (Buddhist practitioner). Represented phonetically. [MW] “One whose essence essence, nature, disposition of mind, character. Ref: is perfect knowledge [bodhi, q.v.].” Sattva: being, existence, entity, reality; trueLotus Sutra. brahmādivine; relating to sacred knowledge. Ref: Chapter One [51]; (moral, pure). Represented phonetically. [MW] Relating to Brahmā, holy, sacred, Lotus Sutra, chapter 1.

Brahmā (name of the creator deity in the Hindu triad). Represented phonetically. [MW]of the triad of personal gods. Ref: Chapter Ten [19]; The one impersonal universal spirit manifested as a personal creator and as the first Lotus Sutra, chapters 11, 25.

brahmacaryaa sacred text, religious or spiritual knowledge; holy life). chastity; the unmarried state, continence, chastity; leading the life of an unmarried of the Veda, the state of an unmarried religious student, a state of continence and(pure conduct). Represented by Brahma:bongyō,in compounds for “brahma-Carya: conduct.” [MW] Study brahmanto be practiced or(the Veda, religious student, practicing chastity.

Lotus Sutra, performed; driving (in a carriage); walking or roaming about; proceeding, behavior, conduct; a religious mendicant’s life; practicing, performing. Ref: Chapter  One [51];chapter 1.

brahman (a brahman (generally a priest, but often in the present day a layman although the brāhmaṇa). Represented phonetically. [MW] One who has divine knowledge, name is strictly applicable only to one who knows and repeats the Veda). Ref: Chapter One [37]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 25. buddha. Represented by intelligent, clever, wise; learned, known, understood; a wise or learned man, sage; butsu, hotoke, “buddha.” [MW] Awakened, awake; conscious, the principal Buddha of the present age (born at Kapilavastu about the year 500district, and his mother, Māyādevī, being the daughter of B.C.E.he belonged to the , his father, Śuddhodana of the Śākya tribe or family, being the kṣatriya caste and his original name Śākyamuni or Śākyasiṃharāja Suprabuddha; hence rāja of that was really his family name, while that of Gautama was taken from the race to which and not only Gautama Buddha and other historical buddhas, but also the concrete his family belonged). Note: In the Shōbōgenzō, “buddha” means not only awakened, state in zazen which is the same as the state of Gautama Buddha.

buddha[rule over; an order, command, edict; a writing; any written book or work of authority, scripture; teaching, instruction, discipline, doctrine. Ref: Chapter One [68]; Chapter MW] -śāsanaŚāsana:(the Buddha’s teaching). Represented by punishing; teaching, instructing, an instructor; government, dominion, bukkyō, “buddha-teaching.”

Twenty-four (Vol. II).

caityaa funeral monument or stupa or pyramidal column containing the ashes of deceased(tomb). Represented by tō, “tower.” [MW] Relating to a funeral pile or mound; Lotus Sutra, chapter 10. persons. Ref: Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV) [160];

cakra province, district; the wheel of a monarch’s chariot rolling over his dominions, sov-chariot, of time); a discus or sharp circular missile weapon; a number of villages,(wheel). Represented by rin, “wheel.” [MW] The wheel (of a carriage, of the sun’s erringly, realm.

cakravarti-rāja[MW] Cakravartin:(wheel-turning king). Represented by rolling everywhere without obstruction; a ruler the wheels often-rin-jō, “wheel-turning king.” ruler of a Ref: Chapter Ten [19]; whose chariot roll everywhere without obstruction; emperor; sovereign of the world,cakra (or country described as extending from sea to sea). Lotus Sutra, chapter 7. Rāja: king. cakṣus faculty of seeing, sight; the eye. Ref: Chapter Two.(seeing, eyes). Represented by gen, “eyes.” [MW] Seeing; the act of seeing; caṇḍāla and most despised of the mixed tribes (born from a mother). Ref: Chapter Eight; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV) [26].(outcaste). Represented phonetically. [MW] An outcaste, person of the lowest śūdra father and a brahman candana either the tree, wood, or the unctuous preparation of the wood held in high estimation(sandal[wood]). Represented phonetically. [MW] Sandal (Sirium my rtifolium,

Chapter Twelve [78].as perfumes; hence a term for anything that is the most excellent of its kind). Ref: caṅkramaa walk; a place for walking about. Ref: Chapter Thirty (Vol. II) [119].(walking about). Represented by kinhin, “walking about.” [MW] Going about, cārinlowing established practice. Ref: Chapter Twelve [64].(practitioner). Represented phonetically and by gyōja, “practitioner.” [MW] Folcatvāro yonayaḥ([MW] Catur:(jarāyu-jafour kinds of birth). Represented by four. Yoni:(birth from womb); the womb; place of birth, source, origin, spring, fountain. upapāduka (metamorphosis). Ref: Chapter Nine aṇḍ a-jashishō,(birth from egg); “four [kinds of] birth.”saṃsveda-ja[222].

The four are birth from moisture); and

cintāmaṇi pleases.” [MW] “Thought gem,” a fabulous gem supposed to yield its possessor all  desires. Ref: Chapter Fourteen [189].(name of a fabulous gem). Represented by nyo-i-ju, “the gem of doing as one

citta (intelligence, reason. One of the three kinds of mind, the others being sourness” or by observing; thinking, reflecting, imagining, thought; intention, aim, wish; memory; intelligence). Represented phonetically and by ryo-chi-shin, “considering and recognizing mind.” [MW] Attending, shinshiki, “mental/intellectual con-hṛdaya and vṛddha (q.v.). Ref: Chapter One [27]; Chapter Seventy (Vol. III).

citta-manas-vijñānawill, consciousness.” [MW] regarded as synonyms for mind. Ref: will. Vijñāna (q.v.): consciousness. [JEBD] In the Hinayana, all three terms are(mind, will, consciousness). Represented by Citta (q.v.): thought; intelligence. Fukanzazengi. shin-i-shiki,Manas (q.v.): mind,“mind,

dānapaying back, restoring; adding, addition; donation, gift. One of the six act of giving; giving in marriage; giving up; communicating, imparting, teaching;(giving). Represented phonetically and by fuse, “alms, charity, giving.” [MW] Thepāramitās

(q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two; Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III); Lotus Sutra, chapter 27.

Dānapati ruler, sovereign. Ref: Chapter Five [118].ality-lord,” munificent person. (donor). Represented phonetically and by Dāna: giving. Pati:seshu,a master, owner, possessor, lord, “alms-lord.” [MW] “Liberdaśa-diśregion pointed at, direction, cardinal point. Ref: Chapter Sixty (Vol. III); Sutra,(ten directions). Represented by chapter 2. juppō, “ten directions.” [MW] Diś: quarter or Lotus devaSutra,(god). Represented by chapter 1. ten, “god.” [MW] Heavenly, divine; a deity, god. Ref: Lotus dhāraṇītation.” [MW] A mystical verse or charm used as a kind of prayer to assuage pain,(incantation, enchantment). Represented phonetically and by ju, “spell, incan Chapter Two; Chapter Fifty-five (Vol. III); prostrations, with which a practitioner asks a master for the Buddhist teaching. Ref:etc. Note: in the Shōbōgenzō, dhāraṇī is equated with “personal salutations,” i.e., Lotus Sutra, chapter 26.

dharmaRe presented by decree, statute, ordinance, law; usage, practice, customary observance or prescribed conduct, duty; right, justice (often as a synonym of punishment); virtue, morality,(Dharma, dharmahō, “law, method.” [MW] That which is established or firm, steadfast, reality, method, practice, real dharmas, things and phenomena). peculiar condition or essential quality, property, mark, peculiarity. Religion, religious merit, good works; the law or doctrine of Buddhism; nature, character,

dharmacakra or range of the law; a particular mythical weapon; “having or turning the wheel of(Dharma wheel). Represented by hōrin, “Dharma wheel.” [MW] The wheel Lotus the law,” a buddha. Ref: Chapter Three [87]; Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV); Sutra, chapter 14.

Dharmagupta (name of a Buddhist school). Represented by school.” [MW] One of the twenty Hinayana schools. Ref: Bibliography. Gupta: protected, guarded, preserved; hidden, concealed, kept secret. hōzō-bu, “Dharma-storage dharmakāyabody,” name of one of the three bodies of a buddha. Ref. Chapter Ten [11].(Dharma body). Represented by hōsshin, “Dharma body.” [MW] “Lawdhātustratum; constituent part, ingredient; element, primitive matter (usually reckoned(elements). Represented by kha or ākāśavijñāna[space], dai,[consciousness]); a constituent element or essential anila“ elements” or by [wind], tejas [fire], kai, “spheres.” [MW] Layer, jala [water], bhū [earth], as five, viz., to which Buddhists add ingredient of the body (distinct from the five mentioned above . . . with the southern Buddhists, [dhātuloka,dhātuq.v.]). Ref: Chapter Two. means either the six elements; or the eighteen elementary spheres

dhātuloka[MW] ([eighteen] elementary spheres). Represented by Dhātu:indriyaelements. s (sense organs): 1) Loka: world, sphere [q.v.]. The eighteen elementary spheresghrāṇendriyacakṣur-indriya(the body as sense organ, sense of touch),(organ of smell, nose), 4) (organ of sight, eyes), 2) jūhachi-kai, viṣaya“eighteen spheres.”rasa s (objects): 1)jihvendriya(tastes), śrotren-5)

are the six

6)(rūpadriyathe tongue as a sense organ), 5)  manendriya(organ of hearing, ears), 3)

Chapter Two.5)3)1)sparśa   cakṣur-vijñānaghrāṇa-vijñānakāya-vijñāna(forms or colors), 2) (sensations), 6) ((mind as a sense center, intelligence); the six body consciousness), 6) (visual consciousness), 2) (olfactory consciousness), 4) dharmaśabda(kāyendriyaproperties); and the six (sounds), 3) mano-vijñānaśrotra-vijñānagandhajihvā-vijñāna(vijñānasmells), 4) (mind consciousness). Ref(auditory consciousness),(taste consciousness),s (consciousnesses)::

dhūtaguṇa:(hard practice, austerity). Represented phonetically. [MW] ascetic practice or precept. Ref: Chapter Four; Chapter Thirty (Vol. II); chapter 15. Dhūta: morality. Dhūta-Lotus

Sutra,

dhyānaRef: Chapter Two [71]; resented also by esp.) profound and abstract religious meditation. One of the six (zen, concentration, meditation). Represented phonetically by jō-ryo, “quiet meditation.” [MW] Meditation, thought, reflection,Lotus Sutra, chapters 7, 27.                                                                          zenpāramitāor zen-na; s (q.v.).rep-

( dhyāni-buddha. [MW] A spiritual (not material) buddha or bodhisattva.

Dignāga (name of a logician). [JEBD] A native of southern India who lived from theVasubandhu. He created a new school of logic using deductive reasoning.end of the fifth century to the middle of the sixth, and belonged to the school of

Dīpaṃkara (name of a buddha). Represented by Nentō-butsu, “Burning Lamp Buddha.”[MW] “Light-causer,” name of a mythical buddha. Ref: Chapter Nine. dukkha four noble truths. Ref: Chapter Two; unpleasant, difficult; uneasiness, pain, sorrow, trouble, difficulty. The first of the(suffering). Represented by ku, “suffering.” [MW] Uneasy, uncomfortable, Lotus Sutra, chapter 7. duṣkṛta wickedness. Ref: Chapter Seven [158].badly arranged or organized or applied; a particular class of sins; a wicked deed,(a class of sins). Represented phonetically. [MW] Wrongly or wickedly done, dvādaśāṅga-pratītyasamutpādainnen,pratītyasamutpāda.“twelvefold [chain of] causation,” or by Ref: Chapter One [32]; (twelvefold chain of causation). Represented by Lotus Sutra,jūni-rinden,chapter 7.“twelvefold cycle.” Seejūnidvādaśāyatanāni“twelve places.”  See under (twelve seats). Represented by āyatana. Ref: Chapter Two.jūni-nyū, “twelve entries,” or juni-sho,

Ekottarāgamaby One.”tara: greater or more by one, increasing by one. ([name of a sutra). Represented byMW] Name of the fourth Āgama or sacred book of the Buddhists. Zōichiagonkyō, “Āgama Sutras IncreasedĀgama [q.v.]: a traditional doctrineEkotliography.or precept. Ref: Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III); Chapter Eighty-eight (Vol. IV); Bibgandha substance, fragrance, scent, perfume; the mere smell of anything, small quantity. Ref: Chapter Two.(smell). Represented by kō, “fragrance, smell.” [MW] Smell, odor; a fragrant Gandhāra (place name). Represented phonetically. [JEBD] An ancient country in North India, located north of Punjab and northeast of Kashmir. The capital was Puruṣapura, present-day Peshawar. Ref. Chapter Fifteen.

Gandharva form the orchestra at the banquets of the gods; they follow after women and are Sutra,Gandha:in epic poetry the desirous of intercourse with them; they are also feared as evil beings. Ref: (chapter 10.fragrance-devouring celestial musicians). Represented phonetically. [MW smell, odor; a fragrant substance, fragrance, scent, perfume. gandharvas are the celestial musicians or heavenly singers who Gandharva:Lotus] garuḍa chapter 10.chō-ō,(king of birds, dragon-devouring bird). Represented phonetically and by “golden-winged king of birds.” [MW] Name of a mythical bird (chief of the Lotus Sutra,kin-shi feathered race, enemy of the serpent race). Ref: Chapter Twelve [107];

gāthā Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II); fuju,of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under (poem, independent verse). Represented phonetically and by poetic eulogy.” [MW] A song; a verse, stanza; the metrical part of a sutra. One Lotus Sutra, chapter 10.aṅga. Ref: Chapter Eleven [40];ge, “verse” or by

genealogy.” [MW] Being sung or praised [in song]. One of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under II).(verse, summarizing verse). Represented by aṅga. Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]; Chapter Twenty-four (Vol.ōju, “adaptational eulogy,” or “additional ghrāṇasmell, odor; the nose. Ref: Chapter Two.(nose, smelling). Represented by bi, “nose.” [MW] Smelling, perception of odor;

Gṛdhrakūṭa (Vulture Peak). Represented phonetically and by “sacred mountain,” or of a mountain near Rājāgṛha. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [54]; ryōjusen, “sacred vulture peak.” [MW] “Vulture peak,” name jusen, Lotus Sutra, “vulture peak,” chapter 1.ryōzen, gṛhapatiSutra, house, householder; householder of peculiar merit. Ref: Chapter Eight [187]; (householder). Represented by chapter 25. koji, “lay gentleman.” [MW] The master of a Lotus guṇa property; good quality, virtue, merit, excellence. Ref: Chapter Twelve [54]; (virtue, merit). Represented by chapters 17, 18. kudoku. [MW] A quality, peculiarity, attribute or Lotus

Sutra,

hats from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger = twenty-four inches). Ref: Chapter Twelve [95].(cubit). Represented by chū, “elbow.” [MW] The forearm (a measure of length āngulas or about eighteen hetu-pratyayaand conditions.” [MW] q.v.): a cooperating cause. Ref: Chapter One [32]; (causes and conditions). Represented phonetically and by Hetu: “impulse,” motive, cause, cause of, reason for. Lotus Sutra, chapter 2.innen,Pratyaya“causes

(

Himālaya (the Himalayas). Represented by nine (Vol. III).of snow,” the Himalaya range of mountains. Ref. Chapter Twelve; Chapter Sixty-setsuzan, “snowy mountains.” [MW] “Abode

Hinayana (small vehicle). Represented by lesser vehicle,” name of the earliest system of Buddhist doctrine (opposed toshojo, “small vehicle.” [MW] “Simpler or

Mahayana) [q.v.]. Ref: Chapter Thirteen [155]. hṛdayaand trees.” [MW] The heart, soul, mind; the heart or interior of the body; the heart(heart). Represented by shin, “heart,” and by somoku-shin, “the mind of grass Two; Chapter Seventy (Vol. III).of the three kinds of mind, the others being or center or core or essence or best or dearest or most secret part of anything. Onecitta and vṛddha (q.v.). Ref: Chapter

indriyaable to Indra; power, force, the quality which belongs especially to the mighty Indra; Chapter Two. Exhibition of power, powerful act; bodily power, power of the senses; faculty ofsense, sense, organ of sense; the number five as symbolical of the five senses. Ref:(sense organ). Represented by kon, “root.” [MW] Fit for or belonging to or agree-

Īśvara (“Almighty,” a name of Śiva). Represented by Jizaiten, “God of Free Will.” [MW]Able to do, capable of; master, lord, prince, king, mistress, queen; God; the Supreme25.Being; the supreme soul (ātman); Śiva. Ref: Chapter Ten [19]; Lotus Sutra, chapter itivṛttaka teachings. See under Iti: been said or thought). in this manner, thus (in its original signification, (stories of past occurrences). Represented by aṅga.Vṛt:Ref: Chapter Eleven [40].take place, occur. One of the twelve divisions of the honji,iti refers to something that has “past occurrences.” [MW]

Jambudvīpa (the southern continent). Represented phonetically. [MW] The central one of the seven continents surrounding the mountain Meru (India; named so either from the an island, peninsula, sandbank; a division of the terrestrial world (either seven or Meru visible like a standard to the whole continent). jambu trees abounding in it, or from an enormous Jambu: rose apple tree. jambu tree on Mount Dvīpa:

     Sutra, rated from each other by distinct concentric circumambient oceans). Ref: four or thirteen or eighteen; they are situated around the mountain Meru, and sep-chapter 20. Lotus

jantubeings.” [MW] Child, offspring, creature, living being. Ref: (living beings). Represented by shūjō, “living beings,” and by gunshō,Lotus Sutra,“miscellaneous chapter

2.

Jataka under; the story of a former birth of Gautama Buddha. One of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under (past lives). Represented by aṅga.honshō,Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]; Bibliography.“ past lives.” [MW] Engendered by, born jāti-maraṇahuman, animal, etc.). Ninety-two (Vol. IV); “living-and-dying.” [MW] (birth and death). Represented by Maraṇa: Lotus Sutra,Jāti:the act of dying. Ref: Chapter Nineteen [95]; Chapter birth, production; rebirth; the form of existence (as chapter 16.shōji, “birth and death,” “life and death,”

Jetavana (“Jetṛi’s Park,” name of a grove near Śrāvasti). Represented phonetically. [MW]of Kośala. Jeta: in compounds for “Jetṛi” (“Victorious”), the name of a son of King Prasenajit Vana: wood, grove. Ref: Fukanzazengi. jihvā (tongue). Represented by zetsu, “tongue.” [MW] The tongue. Ref: Chapter Two. jñānawith, knowledge, (especially) higher knowledge (derived from meditation on the one universal spirit). Ref. Chapter Twenty-one [192].(knowing). Represented by chi, “wisdom.” [MW] Knowing, becoming acquainted kalpakalpa(eon). Represented phonetically. [MW] A fabulous period of time (at the end of athe world is annihilated). Ref: Lotus Sutra, chapter 1.

kalyāṇamitratance.” [MW] A friend of virtue; a well-wishing friend; a good counselor. (good friend, good counselor). Represented by zen-chishiki, “good acquain-Kalyāṇa:Mitra: friend, companion, associate. Ref: Chapter Twenty-one [183]; beautiful, agreeable; illustrious, noble, generous; excellent, virtuous, good. 12, 18, 27.        Lotus Sutra, chapters kāṇa Fifteen.(one-eyed). Represented phonetically. [MW] One-eyed, monoculous. Ref. Chapter

Kaniṣka (name of a king). Represented phonetically. [JEBD] A ruler of Northern India dynasty, who lived either in the latter half of the first century or the first half of theand Central Asia. He is said to have been the third important king of the Kuśāṇa

Aśvaghoṣa, he became a great patron of Buddhism. Ref. Chapter Fifteen. Second century. He established a country called Gandhāra. Converted by Master

Kapilavastu (name of a city and country). [JEBD] The capital of the country of the same dhodana, was the king of the country. Ref: Chapter Fifteen.name. The Buddha was born at Lumbinī on the outskirts of the city. His father, Śudkarmanbusiness. Ref: Chapter One [20]; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV).(action, form of behavior). Represented by go. [MW] Act, action, performance, karuṇāerable, lamenting; compassionate. Ref: Chapter Twelve [64]; (compassion). Represented by hi, “sadness, compassion.” [MW] Mournful, mis-Lotus Sutra, chapter

12.

Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtrabeauty). Ref: Chapter Twelve [80]; Bibliography. “Flower of Compassion Sutra.” [MW] compassionate. Puṇḍarīka:(Sutra of the Flower of Compassiona lotus flower (especially a white lotus; expressive of Karuna: mournful, miserable, lamenting;). Represented by Higekyō, kaṣāyared, yellowish-red (as the garment of a Buddhist (robe). Represented phonetically and by ejiki, bhikṣu“broken color.” [MW] Red, dull); a yellowish-red color; a dull or yellowish-red garment or robe. Ref: Chapter Twelve [107].

Kauśika. Represented phonetically. [MW] Relating to Kuśika [the father of Viśvāmitra];Kuśika] or friendly to them). Ref: Chapter Two.name of Indra (as originally perhaps belonging to the Kuśikas [descendants of kaya of a lute (the whole except the wires). Ref: Chapter Two.(body). Represented by shin, “body.” [MW] The body; the trunk of a tree; the body kiṃnaraa mythical being with a human figure and the head of a horse (or with a horsetails choristers, and celebrated as musicians). Ref: body and the head of a man; in later times reckoned among the (half horse, half man). Represented phonetically. [MW] “What sort of man?”, Lotus Sutra,Gandharva chapter 10.s or celeskleśaPain, affliction, distress, pain from disease, anguish; wrath, anger; worldly occupation, care, trouble. Ref: Chapter Twelve [54]; (affliction, trouble). Represented by bonnō,Lotus Sutra, “affliction, trouble, hindrance.” [MW]chapter 1.

Kośala (place name) [HB] Name of an ancient Indian kingdom situated to the north of Benares). One of the two main kingdoms (together with Magadha [q.v.]) determining the political scene in the areas covered by the Buddha in his travels. the river Ganges and containing the cities of Śrāvasti and Vārāṇasī (present-day koṭi (of a bow or of claws, end or top of anything, edge or point; the highest number intends of millions). Represented by oku, “hundred millions.” [MW] The curved end Lotus Sutra, chapter the older system of numbers (viz., a crore or ten millions). Ref: 2.

krośa“ the range of the voice in calling or hallooing,” a measure of distance (= one-quarter(a measure of distance). Represented phonetically. [MW] A cry, yell, shriek, shout; according to others = eight thousand hastas). yojana;

kṣama balance, indulgence. Ref: Chapter Nine [236].(confession). Represented by sange, kṣama-repentance.” [MW] Patience, forkṣāṇaneous point of time, instant, twinkling of an eye, moment. Ref: Chapter One [134];(moment, instant, instantaneous). Represented phonetically. [MW] Any instant Lotus Sutra, chapter 12. -

Chapter Twelve [64];

kṣānti“ bearing patiently.” [MW] Patient waiting for anything; patience, forbearance,(patience, endurance, forbearance). Represented by pāramitās (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two; annin, “calm endurance” or Lotus endurance, indulgence. One of the six Sutra, chapter 27.

kṣatriyaer eignty; a member of the military or reigning order (which in later times constituted the second caste). Ref. Chapter Eight.(ruling class). Represented phonetically.[MW] Governing, endowed with sovkṣayation, destruction, decay, wasting or wearing away; removal; end, termination; con-(exhausting, end). Represented by jin, “exhaust.” [MW] Loss, waste, wane, diminu-Lotus Sutra, chapter 1. sumption; the destruction of the universe. Ref: kṣetra[MW] Landed property, land, soil; place, region, country; a house; a town; depart(countries, lands, temple). Represented phonetically and by setsudo, kṣetra-land.”plot of ground, portion of space. Ref: Chapter One [62].ment, sphere of action; a sacred spot or district, place of pilgrimage; an enclosed Kṣudrakāgama[MW] Kṣudraka:(name of a sutra). Represented by small, minute. Āgama [q.v.]: a traditional doctrine or precept.Shōagonkyō, “Small Āgama Sutra.”

Ref: Bibliography.

Kukkuṭapāda (name of a mountain). Represented by foot,” name of a mountain. [JEBD] The name of a mountain in Magadha, Centralkeisoku, “cock foot.” [MW] “Cock-

Gayā. Ref. Chapter One [66]; Chapter Fifteen. India, where Mahākāśyapa died. Present-day Kurkeihar, sixteen miles northeast of

kulaputrafamily, respectable youth. girl. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80]; (good sons). Represented by Kulaputrī:Lotus Sutra,zen-nanshi,the daughter of a good family, respectablechapter 1.“good sons.” [MW] A son of a noble

Kumārajīva (name of a translator). Represented phonetically. [MW] The plant jīva. Ref: Lotus Sutra.        putraṃkumbhāṇḍaticles shaped like (name of a class of demons). Represented phonetically. [MW] “Having teskumbha,” a class of demons. Kumbha: jar, pitcher, water pot. Ref:-

Chapter Twelve [80].

Lalitavistara-sūtraof Shining [Artlessness].” [MW] Name of a sutra work giving a detailed account of the artless and natural acts in the life of the Buddha. beautiful. Bibliography.Vistara:(name of a sutra). Represented by spreading, extension, diffuseness. Ref: Chapter Twelve [98];Fuyōkyō, Lalita: “Sutra of the Diffusion artless, innocent;

loka place, scope, free motion; a tract, region, district, country, province; the wide space(world). Represented by kai, “world, sphere.” [MW] Free or open space, room, affairs. Ref: Chapter Two.or world (either “the universe” or “any division of it”); the earth or world of humanbeings; the inhabitants of the world, humankind, folk, people; ordinary life, worldly Madhyamāgama[Chapter Twelve [115].MW] Madhyama:(name of a sutra). Represented by middle. Āgama [q.v.]: a traditional doctrine or precept. RefChūagonkyō, “Middle Āgama Sutra.”:

Madhyamaka (name of a school). Represented by [MW] Relating to the middle region; name of a Buddhist school. [JEBD] One ofchūgan-ha, “middle view school.” the two major Mahayana schools in India (together with the Yogācāra). The basic maka-kārikā.statement of the doctrines of this school is found in Master Nāgārjuna’s Ref. Chapter Fifteen. MadhyaMadhyamaka-kārikārelating to the middle region. (name of seminal work by Master Nāgārjuna). [MW] Kārikā: concise statement in verse of (especiallyMadhyamaka: philosophical and grammatical) doctrines. Ref. Chapter Fifteen.

Magadha (place name). [HB] An ancient state in central India stretching along the southernbank of the Ganges, with its capital at Rājagṛha. One of the two main kingdoms plain in the sixth century (truth and first turned the Dharma wheel. Ref: Chapter Twenty [125].together with Kośala, q.v.) determining the political scene in the central GangeticB.C.E. It was in Magadha that the Buddha realized the

Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtraAccumulation Sutra.” [MW] (name of a sutra). Represented by Ratna: treasure. Kūṭa:Daihōshakkyō,a heap. Ref: Chapter Twelve;“Great Treasure

Chapter Fourteen; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV); Bibliography.

Mahāsaṃghika (“Of the Great Sangha,” name of a Buddhist school). Represented pho-netically and by daishubu, “great sangha school.” Together with the Theravāda

[165].school, one of the two principal schools of Hinayana Buddhism. Ref: Chapter Seven

Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra Sutra.” [MW] Saṃnipāta:(name of a sutra). Represented by falling in or down together, collapse, meeting, encounter; Daijikkyō, “Great Aggregation conjunction, aggregation, combination, mixture. Ref: Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV);Chapter Eighty-eight (Vol. IV); Bibliography.

mahāsattvalarge animal; having a great or noble essence; noble, good (of persons); name of(great being). Represented phonetically. [MW] Mahāsattva: a great creature,

Gautama Buddha as heir to the throne. Mahā: great. Sattva: being. Ref: Chapter Two; Lotus Sutra, chapter 1. Mahayana (Great Vehicle). Represented by Ref: Chapter Eight [198]; Lotus Sutra,daijō, chapter 1.“great vehicle.” [MW] Great vehicle. Maheśvara (name of Śiva). Represented by Daijizaiten, “Great God of Free Will.” [MW]A great archer; name of Śiva (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Ten [19]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 25. mahoragaa class of demons). Ref: (serpent). Represented phonetically. [MW] A great serpent (with Buddhist Lotus Sutra, chapter 10. maitreya[MW] Friendly, benevolent; name of a bodhisattva and future buddha (the fifth of(benevolence). Represented phonetically and by Lotus Sutra,zu, ji, chapter 1.“love, affection, pity.” the present age). Ref: Chapter Twelve [64];

manassense as applied to all the mental powers), intellect, intelligence, understanding, perception, sense, conscience, will. Ref: Chapter Two; Chapter Ten.(mind, will). Represented by i, “intention.” [MW] Manas: mind (in the widest maṇḍala (circle). See pañca maṇḍalaka. mandāravacoral tree. Ref: Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III); (name of a tree and of its flowers). Represented phonetically. [MW] The Lotus Sutra, chapter 16. maṇiRef: Chapter Fourteen [189].(jewel, gem). Represented phonetically. [MW] Jewel, gem, pearl. See also cintāmaṇi.

Mañjuśrī (name of a bodhisattva). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of one of the[39]most celebrated bodhisattvas among the northern Buddhists. Ref: Chapter Seventeen; Lotus Sutra, chapter 12.

mantraspeech, sacred text or speech, a prayer or song of praise; a Vedic hymn or sacrificial(mantra). Represented by shingon, “truth-word.” [MW] “Instrument of thought,” formula; a sacred formula addressed to any individual deity; a mystical verse ormagical formula, incantation, charm, spell. Ref: Chapter One [51].

māra-pāpīyas“demons of death.” [MW] (Pāpīyas:māraḥ-pāpīyān,Vol. III) [216]; (worse, lower, poorer, more or most wicked or miserable; (with Buddhists)deadly demons, demons of death). Represented phonetically and by Lotus Sutra,the evil spirit, the devil. Ref: Chapter Nine [232]; Chapter SeventyMāra:chapter 3.the world of death, killing, the inhabitants of hell.shima,

mārgahunting; the track of a wild animal, any track, road, path, way to or through (inusage; the right way, proper course. The last of the four noble truths. Ref: Chaptercompounds), course (also of the wind and the stars); a way, manner, method, custom,(path, way). Represented by Lotus Sutra, chapter 7. dō, “the Way.” [MW] Seeking, search, tracing out,

Two;

Maudgalyāyana (name of a disciple of the Buddha). Represented phonetically. [MW]Name of a pupil of Gautama Buddha. Ref: Chapter Twelve [98].

moha consciousness, bewilderment, perplexity, distraction, infatuation, delusion, error,(delusion, ignorance). Represented by chi or guchi, “foolishness.” [MW] Loss of (folly; (in philosophy) darkness or delusion of mind; (with Buddhists) ignorance one of the three roots of vice). Ref: Chapter Eight [194].

mudrāor impression; an image, sign, badge, token; name of particular positions or inter-sealing or stamping, a seal ring, signet ring, any ring; any stamp or print or mark(seal, stamp). Represented by in, “seal.” [MW] A seal or any instrument used for worship, and supposed to possess an occult meaning and magical efficacy). Ref: Chapter Nineteen [90]; Chapter Thirty-one (Vol. II); twining’s of the fingers (twenty-four in number, commonly practiced in religiousLotus Sutra, chapter 2.

Muhurta day, a period of forty-eight minutes. Ref: Chapter Twelve [64].instant, any short space of time; a particular division of time, the thirtieth part of a(moment, short space of time). Represented phonetically. [MW] A moment, muktāhāra. Chapter Three [90]; Represented by Lotus Sutra,yōraku, “necklace-ornament.” [MW] A string of pearls. Ref: chapter 10. mūlabasis, foundation, cause, origin, commencement, beginning.(root, fundamental). Represented by kon, “root.” [MW] “Firmly fixed,” a root; Mūlasarvāstivādin (name of a school). Represented by School of the Preaching That All Things Exist.” [MW] konpon-setsu-issai-i-bu,Mūla (q.v.): fundamental. “Original added because many schools derived from the Sarvāstivādins. Ref: Chapter One. Sarvāstivāda (q.v.): the doctrine that all things are real. The prefix “mūla” was later

nāga are supposed to have a human face with serpentlike lower extremities; with Buddhists(dragon). Represented by ryū, “dragon.” [MW] A snake; a serpent-demon (they Lotus Sutra, chapter 10. they are also represented as ordinary men). Ref:

Nāgārjuna (name of a Buddhist patriarch). Represented phonetically and by tree.” [MW] Nāga: a snake; a serpent demon. Arjuna: the tree Terminalia arjuna.ryūju, “dragon

Ref: Chapter Twelve; Chapter Fifteen.

Naraka torment. Ref: Chapter Twelve [87].(hell). Represented phonetically and by jigoku, “hell.” [MW] Hell, place of nayutaAyuta: praise. Ref: (numerical unit, equal to one hundred “enjoined, unbounded,” ten thousand, a myriad; in compounds a term of Lotus Sutra, chapter 16. ayuta). Represented phonetically. [MW] nidānaings. See under and conditions.” [MW] A band, rope, halter; a first or primary cause; original form or essence; any cause or motive; pathology. One of the twelve divisions of the teach-(historical accounts [of causes and conditions]). Represented by aṅga. Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]. innen, “causes nirodha[MW] Confinement, locking up, imprisonment; enclosing, covering up; restraint,(dissolution, cessation). Represented by metsu, “death, destruction, annihilation.”

but rather as dissolution of, or liberation from, the intellectual restraints of idealism of pain. Note: in and materialism. Ref: Chapter Two; check, control, suppression, destruction; (with Buddhists) suppression or annihilationism negation of the intellectual views of the first two phases, namely, idealism andShōbōgenzō,nirodhathe third phase of Master Dōgen’s four-phased systemmay be interpreted not as suppression of painLotus Sutra, chapter 7. materialism. On that basis,

nirvana extinguished). Ref: Chapter One [45]; extinction, nirvana.” [MW] Blown or put out, extinguished (as a lamp or fire), seats the sun), calmed, quieted, tamed, dead, deceased (lit., having the fire of life(extinction). Represented phonetically and by Lotus Sutra,jakumetsu, chapter 2.“death, annihilation,

(

niṣīdanaNiṣadana:(sitting mat, prostration cloth). Represented by sitting down. Ref: Chapter Two [104]. zagu, “sitting gear.” [MW] nityacontinual, perpetual, eternal; constantly dwelling or engaged in, intent upon, devoted(eternal). Represented by jōjū, “constantly abiding,” “eternal.” [MW] Innate, native; One [45]; Chapter Fourteen; or used to; ordinary, usual, invariable; always, constantly, regularly. Ref: Chapter Lotus Sutra, chapter 2.

pad apart, portion, division; a plot of ground; the foot as a measure of length; a portion of a verse, quarter or line of a stanza. Ref: Chapter One [9]; (phrase). Represented by ku, “phrase.” [MW] A step, pace, stride; the foot itself; a Lotus Sutra, chapter 10. pāṃsu-kūla(clothing. Ref: Chapter Twelve [71].especially) a collection of rags out of a dust heap used by Buddhist monks for their(a dust heap, rags). Represented by funzō, “filth-swept.” [MW] A dust heap,

pañca dṛṣṭayaḥ precepts and observances. Ref: Chapter Twelve [107].view; five. view; theory, doctrine, system. The five are Dṛṣṭi:antagrāha-dṛṣṭi, henken,(five [wrong] views). Represented by seeing, viewing, beholding; view, notion; (with Buddhists) a wrongdogmatism; extremism; śilavrata-parāmarśa, kaigonju-ken,mithyā-dṛṣṭi, jaken,satkāya-dṛṣṭi, shinken,goken, “five views.” [MW] atheism; the personality attachment todṛṣṭi-parā-Pañca: marśa, ken ju-ken,

pañca maṇḍalakaPañca: five. Maṇḍala:(five circles). Represented by circular, round; a disk; anything round; a circle, globe, orb, Orin, “five circles, five wheels.” [MW] ring, circumference, ball, wheel. Ref: Chapter Fourteen [189]. pañca viṣayaPañca: five. (five objects [of desire]). Represented by Viṣaya (q.v.): sense object. Ref: Chapter Twelve goyoku, “five desires.” [MW][107]. Pārājika propel, throw, cast. or similarity. Ref: Chapter Eight [192].phonetically. [MW] (violation of the precepts warranting expulsion from the community). Represented Ka:Pāra:suffix added to nouns to express diminution, deterioration, far, distant, beyond, extreme, exceeding. Aj: to drive, paramāṇuatom. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [54]; (atom). Represented by mijin,Lotus Sutra, “particle.” [MW] An infinitesimal particle or chapter 16.

pāramitā“to cross over” or “to have crossed over.” [MW] Gone to the opposite shore; crossed, traversed, transcendent, coming or leading to the opposite shore, complete attainment, ten, viz., satya, adhiṣṭhāna, Maitra, perfection in (compounds); transcendental virtue, accomplishment (there are six or(an accomplishment). Represented phonetically and by dāna, śīla, kṣanti, vīrya, dhyānaand upekśā). Ref: Chapter Two; , prajñā, to which are sometimes added Lotus Sutra, do, which represents chapter 27.do,

pariṇāma maturity; alteration of food, digestion; result, consequence, issue, end. Ref: Chapter[Twenty-one [209].MW] Change, alteration, transformation into, development, evolution; ripeness,(dedication). Represented by ekō, “turning,” “[merit]-transference,” “dedication.” parinirvāṇaguished or finished. Ref: Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II).(complete extinction). Represented phonetically. [MW] Completely extirpative dependents, followers. Ref: Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III); (followers). Represented by kenzoku, “kin.” [MW] Surroundings, train, suite, Lotus Sutra, chapter 1. parṣadRef: Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III); (followers). Represented by kenzoku, Lotus Sutra,“kin.” [MW] Assembly, audience, company.chapter 1. Pātra bowl, cup, dish, pot, plate, utensil, etc.; any vessel or receptacle. Ref: Chapter Five[122](bowl). Represented by ; Chapter Seventy-eight (Vol. IVhatsu-u, pātra-).        bowl. [MW] A drinking vessel, goblet,

piṇḍavana Piṇḍa:(monastery). Represented by any round or roundish mass. sōrin,Vana: “thicket-forest” or “clump of forest.” [MW]forest, wood, grove, thicket, quantity of

Five [122].lotuses or other plants growing in a thick cluster. Ref: Chapter One [65]; Chapter

piśāca of demons (possibly so called either from their fondness for flesh [(name of a class of demons). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of a class Piśita: flesh which has not been cut up or pre-piśa for piśita] pared, any flesh or meat. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80].or from their yellowish appearance).

Prabhūtaratna (name of a Buddha). Represented by Tahō, “Abundant Treasures.” [MW]chapter 11.goods, wealth, riches; a jewel, gem, treasure. Ref: Chapter Twelve [95]; Name of a Buddha. Prabhūta: abundant, much, numerous. Ratna: a gift, present, Lotus Sutra, prajñā Lotus Sutra,[true or transcendental wisdom. One of the six MW] Wisdom, intelligence, knowledge, discrimination, judgment; (with Buddhists(real wisdom). Represented phonetically and by chapters 2, 27. Paramita chiken, “knowing,” or s (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two; e, “wisdom.”)

Prasenajit (name of a king). Represented phonetically. [HB] The king of Kośala whoof the Buddhist order. Ref. resided in Śrāvastī (q.v.) and became a lay follower of the Buddha and supporter Fukanzazengi; Chapter Fifty-nine (Vol. III). Pratītyasamutpāda origin, origination,” and by (dependent origination). Represented by innen, “causes and conditions.” [MW] engi, “arising from conditions, Pratīti: going

[32]clear or intelligible by itself. toward, approaching; the following from anything (as a necessary result), being; Lotus Sutra, chapter 7.Samutpāda: rise, origin, production. Ref: Chapter One

Pratyaya condition.” [MW] Belief, firm conviction, trust, faith, assurance of certainty; proof,(cooperating cause). Represented by en, “relation, connection, circumstance, ascertainment; (with Buddhists) fundamental notion or idea; consciousness, under-basis, motive, or cause of anything; (with Buddhists) a cooperating cause; the con-standing, intelligence, intellect; analysis, solution, explanation, definition; ground,current occasion of an event as distinguished from its approximate cause.

Pratyekabuddha realization” and by (sensory Buddhist). Represented phonetically by engaku, “realizer of conditions.” [MAC] Solitary Buddha who Lotus Sutra, doku-kaku ,chapter 2. “independent works out his individual salvation only. Ref:

pretaare performed), a ghost, an evil being. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80].dead, a dead person; the spirit of a dead person (especially before obsequie rites(hungry ghost). Represented by gaki, “hungry ghost.” [MW] Departed, deceased, pṛthagjanaof lower caste or character or profession. Ref: Chapter Nineteen [11].(common person). Represented by bonbu, “common person.” [MW] A person puṇya-kṣetrahappiness.” [MW] A holy place, a place of pilgrimage; name of Buddha. (field of virtue). Represented by fukuden, “field of good fortune,” “field of Puṇya: sacred; the good or right, virtue, purity, good work, meritorious act, moral or religious merit. [120]auspicious, propitious, fair, pleasant, good, right, virtuous, meritorious, pure, holy,; Chapter Thirteen; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IVKṣetra (q.v.): place, sphere of action; plot of ground. Ref: Chapter Twelve) [37].

puruṣa low.” [MW] A man, male, human being; a person; a friend; the personal and animating(human being). Represented by nin, “person, human being,” and by jōbu, “stout felinities in humans and other beings, the soul or spirit. Ref: Chapter Eight [169].

Rāgarāja (King of Love). Represented by Aizenmyōō, “King with the Hue of Love.”[color, redness; inflammation; any feeling or passion, (especially) love, affection orsympathy for, vehement desire of. MW] Rāga: the act of coloring or dyeing; color, hue, tint, dye, (especially) redRāja: king. Ref: Chapter Eleven [29].

Rāhula (name of a son and disciple of the Buddha). Represented phonetically. Ref:Chapter Seven [163].

Rājagṛha (name of a city). Represented by Ōshajō, “City of Royal Palaces.” [HB] Capitaltruth, and the site of the First Council following the Buddha’s death. Ref: Sutra, of the ancient Indian kingdom of Magadha, where the Buddha first realized the chapter 1.  Lotus rasa of fruit, any liquid or fluid, the best or finest part of anything; taste, flavor (as the(taste, flavor). Represented by mi, “taste.” [MW] The sap or juice of plants, juice condiment, sauce, spice, seasoning; the tongue (as the organ of taste); taste or incli-principal quality of fluids, of which there are six original kinds); any object of taste, nation or fondness for; the taste or character of a work. Ref: Chapter Two.

Ratnagarbha (name of a Buddha). Represented by Hōzō, “Jewel Treasury.” [MW] Filled with precious stones, containing jewels, set with jewels; name of a bodhisattva. Anything; an inner apartment, sleeping-room; any interior chamber, adytum or sanc-Ratna:tuary of a temple. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80].a jewel, gem, treasure. Garbha: the womb; the inside, middle, interior of

ṛddipādafoot.” [MW] One of the four constituent parts of supernatural power. accomplishment, perfection, supernatural power. (basis of mystical power, excellent disciple). Represented by Pāda (q.v.): foot. Ref: Chapter jin-soku,Ṛddi: “mystical success;

Eight [178]; Chapter Twenty [163]. ṛṣi (hermit, sage). Represented by an inspired poet or sage, any person who alone or with others invokes the deities Sen, “hermit, wizard.” [MW] A singer of sacred hymns, generations as patriarchal sages or saints, occupying the same position in Indianan rhythmical speech or song of a sacred character; [they] were regarded by later

the Vedic hymns. Ref: Chapter Fourteen; Chapter Fifteen. Class of beings in the early mythical system; they are the authors or rather seers of history as the heroes and patriarchs of other countries, and constitute a peculiar

rūpaor phenomenon or color, form, shape, figure; (with Buddhists) material form. One(matter, form). Represented by skandhas (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two.shiki, “color, form.” [MW] Any outward appearance of the five

śabdanote; a word; speech, language; the right word, correct expression. Ref: Chapter(sound). Represented by shō, “sound, voice.” [MW] Sound, noise, voice, tone,

Two.

Saddharma “wonderful/fine/wonderful Dharma” and by The good law, true justice; (with Buddhists) designation of the Buddhist doctrines. Right, beautiful, wise, venerable, honest. Ref: Chapter One [11]; Chapter Seventeen; Sat: Lotus Sutra, being, existing; real, actual, as anyone or anything ought to be, true, good,(wonderful chapter 1.Dharma, right Dharma). shōbō, “right/true Dharma.” [MW]Represented by myōhō,

saddharma-pratirūpakazōbō, “imitative Dharma.” [MW] ([the age of] imitation of the right Dharma). Represented by Saddharma: right Dharma (q.v.). Pratirūpaka: an image, a picture; forgery; similar, corresponding, having the appearance of any-thing; a quack, a charlatan. Ref: Chapter One; Lotus Sutra, chapter 20.

Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraresented by [a white lotus; expressive of beauty). Ref: Chapter Seventeen; Bibliography.MW] Saddharma:Myōhōrengekyō, wonderful Dharma (q.v.). (Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma“Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.”Puṇḍarīka: a lotus flower (especially Lotus Sutra, chapter 1;). Rep-

saddharma-vipralopamappō, “the end of the Dharma,” “the latter Dharma.” [MW] Vipralopa:([the age of] annihilation of the right Dharma). Represented by destruction, annihilation. Ref: Chapter One. Saddharma: right

Dharma (q.v.). sādhuto a goal, hitting the mark, unerring (as an arrow or thunderbolt); straightened, not(good). Represented by zenzai, “How good!” [MW] Straight, right; leading straight peaceful, secure; powerful, excellent; fit, proper, right; good, virtuous. Ref: Chapter entangled; well-disposed, kind, willing, obedient; successful, effective, efficient; Lotus Sutra, chapter 28.

Twelve [80];

sāgara(a legend asserts that the bed of the ocean was dug by the sons of Sāgara [who was(ocean). Represented phonetically. [MW] The ocean; (plural) the sons of Sugar Lotus Sutra, chapter 12. a king of the solar race]). Ref:

sahālokadhātuSahā:stratum; part. Ref: Chapter Four; (with Buddhists) name of a division of the world. (the human world). Represented by Lotus Sutra, chapter 12.shaba-sekai,Loka:sahāworld. world.” [MW]Dhātu: layer, Śakra-devānām-indra (the god Indra). Represented phonetically and by Tentai-shaku,“the God-Emperor Śakra.” [MW] various gods, but especially to Indra). Śakra:Deva: strong, powerful, mighty (applied to heavenly, divine; a deity, god; the gods

of rain (who in Vedic mythology reigns over the deity of the intermediate Region or atmosphere; he fights against and conquers with his thunderbolt [demons of darkness, and is in general a symbol of generous heroism; Indra was no rain. Indra: the god of the atmosphere and sky; the Indian Jupiter Pluvius or lords the heavenly or shining ones; name of Indra as the god of the sky and giver of vajra] the and he was therefore addressed in prayers and hymns more than any other deity; originally lord of the gods of the sky, but his deeds were most useful to mankind, but remained the chief of all other deities in the popular mind). Ref: Chapter Two; in the later mythology Indra is subordinated to the triad Brahmā, Viṣnu, and Śiva, chapter 1.

Lotus Sutra,

sakṛdāgāminichi-rai-ka,(the state of returning only once again). Represented phonetically and by“the effect [which is subject to] one return.” [MW] “Returning only once again.” Ref: Chapter Two.

Śākyamuni (name of the Buddha). Represented phonetically or by Shakuson, “HonoredŚākya.” [MW] monk, devotee, hermit (especially one who has taken the vow of silence). Ref: chapter 1.Śākya: the Buddha’s family name. Muni: a saint, sage, seer, ascetic, Lotus

Sutra,

samadhi fixed, constant, regular.” [MW] Setting to rights, adjustment, settlement. Ref: Chapter One [11]; (the balanced state, the state). Represented phonetically or by Lotus Sutra, chapters 2, 24. jō, “definite, Samantabhadra (name of a bodhisattva). Represented by Fugen, “Universal Wisdom “or “Universal Virtue.” [MW] Wholly auspicious; name of a bodhisattva. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [39]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 28.

samantamukhaor “all-sidedness.” [MW] mouth, face, countenance; a direction, quarter; the mouth or spout of a vessel, open-boring, adjacent; “being on every side,” universal, whole, entire, all. ing, aperture, entrance into or egress out of. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [54]; Sutra, chapter 25.(universal gate, all-sidedness). Represented by Samanta: “having the ends together,” contiguous, neigh-fumon, “universal gate”Mukha:Lotus the

śamatha Chapter One [51].absence of passion. Note: (quiet). Represented by and vipaśyanā (Shikan,q.v.), is a fundamental practice of the Tendai sect. Refshi,“quieting and reflecting,” representing the Sanskrit “ceasing, quieting.” [MW] Quiet, tranquility,: śamatha

saṃghatitude.” [MW] “Close contact or combination,” any collection or assemblage, heap,(sangha, the community). Represented by sō, “monks,” and by shū, “the Mu multitude, quantity, crowd, host, number; any number of people living together for congregation, church; (especially) the whole community or collective body or broth-a certain purpose, a society, association, company, community; a clerical community, echoed of monks. Ref: Chapter Two [74]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 26. saṃghārāmaplace for a company (of monks),” a Buddhist convent or monastery. Ref: Chapter(temple). Represented phonetically and by in, “temple.” [MW] “Resting

Twenty-one [209]; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV).

saṃghāṭikind of garment, a monk’s robe. Ref: Chapter Twelve [80], [95].(large robe). Represented phonetically and by Saṃghāṭa: fitting and joining of timber, joinery.dai-e, “large robe.” [MW] A saṃjñāstanding, harmony; consciousness, clear knowledge or understanding or notion or(thinking). Represented by sō, “idea, thought.” [MW] Agreement, mutual under conception. One of the five skandhas (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two.

saṃsāraa succession of states, circuit of mundane existence, transmigration, the world, Seventeen [54].“turning of the wheel,” “revolving,” or by secular life, worldly illusion. Ref: Chapter Six [125]; Chapter Eight [198]; Chapter or wandering through, undergoing transmigration; course, passage, passing through(wandering). Represented by ruten, “wandering, constant change,” by rinne, “transmigration.” [MW] Goingrinden,

saṃskāra Putting together, forming well, making perfect, accomplishment, embellishment, preparation, refining, polishing, rearing; cleansing the body; forming the mind,of the five training, education; correction, correct formation or use of a word; the faculty of memory, mental impression, or recollection; (with Buddhists) a mental information sphere. or creation of the mind. However, (enaction, action). Represented by Saṃskāraskandhais the second link in the twelvefold chain of causation, and ones (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two; saṃskāragyō, need not always be limited to the mental “doing, acting, carrying out.” [MW]Lotus Sutra, chapter 7.

saṃskṛta or completely formed, perfected; made ready; prepared, completed, finished; dressed, cooked; purified, consecrated; refined, adorned, ornamented, polished, highly “artificial” (opposite of orated (especially applied to highly wrought speech). Ref: Chapter One [62]; Chapter Nineteen [118].(put together, artificial). Represented by mu-i; see asaṃskṛta). [MW] Put together, constructed, wellu-i, “presence of becoming,” “made,”

samudaya the four noble truths. Ref: Chapter One; (accumulation). Represented by shu,Lotus Sutra, “collection, accumulation.” Second of chapter 7.

SaṃyuktāgamaSutra.” [MW] (name of a sutra). Represented by Sam: conjunction expressing “conjunction.” Zōagonkyō,ĀgamaSaṃyukta:“Miscellaneous Āgama[q.v.]: a traditional joined, united, doctrine or precept. Ref: Chapter Eighty-five (Vol. IV); Bibliography. Connected, combined, following in regular succession.

Śāṇavāsa (name of the third patriarch). Represented phonetically. [MW] hemp or Bengal flax, hempen, flaxen, etc. Chapter Twelve [74]; Chapter Fifteen. Vāsa: a garment, dress, clothes. Ref:Śāṇa: made of

Śāriputra (name of a disciple of the Buddha). Represented phonetically. [MW] from Rūpaśārī, the name of Śāriputra’s mother. chapter 2.    Putra: son, child. Ref: Chapter Two;Śāri:

Lotus Sutra,

śarīrathe body (pl. the bones); a dead body. Ref: Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III); (bones). Represented phonetically. [MW] The body, bodily frame, solid parts of chapter 10. Lotus

Sutra,

Sarvāstivāda (the doctrine that all is real). Represented by that Preaches that All Things Exist.” [MW] speaking of or about; speech, discourse, talk, utterance, statement; a thesis, propo-Sarva: all. Asti:setsu-issasi-u-bu, existent, present. “School Vāda: the above doctrine. Ref: Chapter One [45]; Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV) [171].of one of the four divisions of the Vaibhāṣika system of Buddhism, said to have been founded by Rāhula, son of the great Buddha). Sarvāstivādin: an adherent position, argument, doctrine. Sarvāstivāda: the doctrine that all things are real (name

sāsrava[MW] (With Jainas) connected with the act called (having that which is superfluous, tainted). Represented by āsrava (q.v.). Ref. Chapter Twenty, “with leakage.” one [192].

śāstra order, command, precept, rule; teaching, instruction, direction, advice, good counsel; any instrument of teaching, any manual or compendium of rules, any book or trea-tise.(commentary). Represented by ron, “doctrine, discussion, argument.” [MW] An satya[noble] truths.” [MW] Truth, reality; speaking the truth, sincerity, veracity; a solemn(truth). Represented by tai, “clarity, enlightenment, truth,” as in shitai, “the four goodness or purity or knowledge. Ref: Chapter Two. Asseveration, vow, promise, oath; demonstrated conclusion, dogma; the quality of Senika (name of a person). Represented phonetically. A non-Buddhist who questions theBuddha in the Garland Sutra. Ref: Chapter One [45]; Chapter Six. śikṣā (training, learning). See tisraḥ śikṣāḥ. śīla (moral conduct). Represented by position, tendency, character, nature; good disposition or character, moral conduct, custom, usage, natural or acquired way of living or acting, practice, conduct, dis-jokai, “pure [observance of] precepts.” [MW] Habit, paramitas (q.v.). integrity, morality, piety, virtue; a moral precept. One of the six Ref: Chapter Two; Lotus Sutra, chapter 27.

sīmā-bandha of rules of morality. Ref: Chapter Eight [198].(sanctuary). Represented by kekkai, “bounded area.” [MW] A depository Śiva (name of the destroying deity in the Hindu triad). Represented by Jizaiten, “God and reproducing deity (who constitutes the third god of the Hindu triad, the other of Free Will.” [MW] “The Auspicious One,” name of the disintegrating or destroying name of the destroying deity was Rudra, “the terrible god,” but in later times it Chapter Ten [19]; became usual to give that god the euphemistic name Śiva, “the auspicious.” Ref: two being Brahmā, “the creator” and Viṣṇu, “the preserver”); in the Veda the only Lotus Sutra, chapter 25. skandha[MW] The shoulder; the stem or trunk of a tree; a large branch or bough; a troop,(aggregate). Represented by un, “accumulations,” or by shū, “multitudes.” Chapter Two. Elements of being (viz., multitude, quantity, aggregate; a part, division; (with Buddhists) the five constituent Rupa, vedanā, saṃjñā, saṃskāra, and vijñāna [q.v.]). Ref:

smṛti branch, reminiscence, thinking of or upon, calling to mind, memory; the whole body chapter 10 (“heed”), chapter 16 (“thought”), chapter 27 (“care for”).Two [74]; Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV); of sacred tradition or what is remembered by human teachers; the whole body of codes of law as handed down memoriter or by tradition; desire, wish. Ref: Chapter(mindfulness). Represented by nen, “idea, feeling, desire, attention.” [MW] Remem-Lotus Sutra, chapter 1 (“remember”),

sparśa touch, sense of touch, contact; the quality of tangibility (which constitutes the skin’sviṣaya ,smoothness, softness, etc.); feeling, sensation. Ref: Chapter Two.(touch, tangibility, sensation). Represented by q.v.), any quality that is perceptible by touching any object (e.g., heat, cold, soku, “touch.” [MW] Touching, śramaṇato Buddha himself). Ref: Chapter One [68].toiling, laboring; one who performs acts of mortification or austerity, an ascetic, monk, devotee, religious mendicant; a Buddhist monk or mendicant (also applied(striver, monk). Represented phonetically. [MW] Making effort or exertion, śrāmaṇeraciple admitted to the first degree of monkhood, a novice. Ref: Chapter Seven [163];Lotus Sutra,(novice). Represented phonetically. [MW] (Among Buddhists) a pupil or is chapter 7.  śrāvaka listening to; audible from afar; a pupil, disciple; a disciple of the Buddha (the disciples(intellectual Buddhist). Represented by shōmon, “voice-hearer.” [MW] Hearing, the Mahayana school; properly only those who heard the law from the Buddha’s own of the Hinayana school are sometimes so called in contradistinction to the disciples ofśrāvaka). Ref: Chapter One [11]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 2.

lips have the name

Śrāvastī (name of a city). [JEBD] The capital of Kośala, sometimes treated as an independent country. It is the present-day Sāhetmātet, Gonda, India. Ref. Chapter Fifteen.

Śrīmālā (name of a district, of a queen, and of a sutra addressed to the queen). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of a district and the town situated in it. siṃhanāda-sūtra:[JEBD] Śrīmālā: the daughter of King Prasenajit of Kośala (q.v.). Shename of a Buddhist sutra, the Sutra of the Lion’s Roar of QueenŚrīmālā devī -

Śrīmālā.

married the king of Ayodhyā and actively engaged in the propagation of Buddhismin that country. Ref: Chapter Twelve [100]. srotāpannais to have been received beforehand into the stream.” [MW] One who has entered(stream-enterer). Represented phonetically and by yoru-ka, “the effect that the river (leading to nirvana). Ref: Chapter Two.

Śrotra the act of hearing or listening to; conversancy with the Veda or sacred knowledge(ear, hearing). Represented by ni, “ear.” [MW] The organ of hearing, ear, auricle; itself. Ref: Chapter Two.

Sthavir ancient, venerable; an old man; an “elder” (name of the oldest and most venerable(elder). Represented by s). Ref: Chapter Sixteen [15]; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV).jōza, “senior seat,” and by chōrō, “veteran.” [MW] Old, bhikṣu stūpaof hair, the upper part of the head, crest, top, summit; a heap or pile of earth or(stupa, tower). Represented phonetically and by tō, “tower.” [MW] A knot or tuft domelike form and erected over sacred relics of the great Buddha or on spots con-bricks etc., (especially) a Buddhist monument, dagoba (generally of pyramidal or onward, the mound. Note: LSW notes that from the chapter opposed to stupas (pagodas for relics). Master Dōgen discusses the distinction integrated as the scenes of his acts); any relic shrine or relic casket; any heap, pile,Lotus Sutra stresses the erecting of Hōsshicaitya(“A Teacher of the Dharma”s (pagodas for sutras) as)

[160]Caity Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV). But MW does not distinguish between stupas and; s (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III); Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV)Lotus Sutra, chapter 10.

Styānakonjin ,bland; thick, bulky, gross; density, thickness; idleness, sloth, apathy. Ref: zazengi(sloth). Represented phonetically and by “depression.” [MW] Grown dense, coagulated; stiffened, become rigid; soft,.  kon, “darkness, stupefaction” and byFukan-

Sudatta (name of a person). [HB] A wealthy gold dealer and banker of Śrāvastī who and sangha could pass the rains retreat near Śrāvastī. Ref: become a lay follower of the Buddha and purchased Jetavana Park so that the Buddha Fukanzazengi. śūdraclasses). Ref. Chapter Eight; Chapter Eighty-two (Vol. IV).four original classes or castes (whose only business was to serve the three higher(servant). Represented phonetically. [MW] A person of the fourth or lowest of the

Śukra (name of a nun). Represented by Senbyaku, “Fresh-White.” [MW] Bright, resplen-dent; clear, pure; light-colored, white; pure, spotless. Ref: Chapter Twelve [74].

Sumeru (also Meru, name of a mountain). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of a the central point of Jambudvīpa [q.v.]; all the planets revolve around it and it is the different compared to the cup or seed vessel of a lotus, the leaves of which are formed by fabulous mountain (regarded as the Olympus of Hindu mythology and said to form dvīpas). Ref: Chapter Fourteen [183]; Lotus Sutra, chapter 7. Śūnyatā Emptiness, loneliness, desolateness; absence of mind, distraction; vacancy (of gaze);(space, emptiness). Represented by kū, “space,” “the sky,” “emptiness.” [MW]

One [45]; Chapter Two; Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III); absence or want of; nothingness, nonexistence, non-reality, illusory nature of all worldly phenomena. Note: The latter set of definitions reflects idealistic thought. The philosophical meaning of bare, bald, naked, raw, or transparent state, that is, the state in which reality is justcan often be interpreted as concrete space. Ref: Chapter sunyata that emerges in ShōbōgenzōLotus Sutra,is emptiness; thechapter 15. as it is. At the same time,

ŚūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśaŚūraṃgama:Vol. III); Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV); Bibliography.a particular samādhi;(name of a sutra). Represented phonetically. [MW name of a bodhisattva. Ref: Chapter Forty-three] (

sūtrato explanatory works). One of the “three baskets,” or Tripi ṭaka (q.v.); and one of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under volumes of the Sutra.” [MW] A thread, yarn, string, line, cord, wire; that which like a thread runs through or holds together everything, rule, direction; a short sentence together like threads (these sutra works form manuals of teaching in ritual, philosophy,or aphoristic rule, and any work or manual consisting of strings of such rules hanging grammar, etc.; with Buddhists the term “sutra” is applied to original texts as opposed(original texts, the sutras). Represented by kyō, aṅga.“sutras,” or by kyōgan, “sutras,

Suvarṇaprabhāsottamarāja-sūtra by Konkōmyōsaishō-ō-kyō, “Golden Light Supreme King Sutra.” [MW] (Golden Light Sutra of the Supreme King). Represented Suvarna: gold. of a good or beautiful color, brilliant in hue, bright, golden, yellow, gold, made of Prabhāsa:

Ref: Chapter Twenty-one [216]; Bibliography. beneficient). Uttama:“ splendor,” “beauty,” name of a uppermost, highest, chief; most elevated; best. vasu (one who is excellent, good, Rāja: king. Svāgata Well come; welcome; a greeting, salutation. Ref: Chapter Twelve [74].(well come, welcome). Represented by zenrai, “well come, welcome.” [MW] tāla (flabelliformisRef: palm leaf). Represented phonetically. [MW] The palmyra tree or fan-palm Lotus Sutra,), producing a sort of spirituous liquor; considered a measure of height. chapter 27. (Borassus

Tathāgata (“having arrived in the state of reality,” epithet of the Buddha). Representedby of such a quality or nature; he who comes and goes in the same way (as the buddhas[11]who preceded him). nyorai,; Lotus Sutra, “thus-come” or “reality-come.” [MW] Being in such a state or condition, chapter 1.Tathā: in that manner, so, thus. Gata: come. Ref: Chapter One

Tathata Appears, for example, in the compound (reality). Represented by nyo, “reality.” [MW] True state of things, true nature. ichi-nyo, “the oneness of reality.” Ref:

Chapter One [11]. tisraḥ śikṣāḥ “three kinds of learning.” [MW] (three kinds of training, three kinds of learning). Represented by Tisraḥ: three. Śikṣā: desire of being able to effects angaku, in higher wisdom). However, in Japan the three are traditionally interpreted as jo, e,higher thought; Chapter One [37].training (held by Buddhists to be of three kinds, viz., anything, wish to accomplish; learning, study, knowledge, art, skill in; teaching, “precepts, balanced state, wisdom,” that is, adhiśīla-śikṣā, training in higher morality; śīla, samādhi,adhicitta-śikṣā,adhiprajñā-śikṣā, and prajñā.training intrainingritsu,Ref:

tisro vidyāh[MW] Tisro:(three kinds of knowledge). Represented by three. Vidyā: knowledge, science, learning, scholarship, philosophy. sanmyō, “three kinds of clarity.”

Ref: Chapter Twelve [90].

Tripiṭaka (three baskets). Represented by baskets or collections of sacred writings (Sutra-piṭaka [q.v.]). Ref: Chapter Two sanzō,[136].“three storehouses.” [MW] The three-piṭaka, Vinaya-piṭaka, and Abhidharma

Tuṣita (name of a celestial world). Represented phonetically. [MW] A class of celestial beings. Ref: Chapter Four [117]. udānathe throat and rises upward); a kind of snake; joy, heart’s joy (Buddhists). One of Breathing upwards; one of the five vital airs of the human body (that which is in(spontaneous preaching). Represented by jisetsu,aṅga.“spontaneous preaching.” [MW]Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]. the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under

uḍumbara tree. Ref: Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III); . Represented phonetically. [MW] The tree Lotus Sutra, Ficus glomerata; chapter 2. the fruit of the upadeśa Pointing out to, reference to; specification, instruction, teaching, information, advice,(theoretical discourse). Represented by rongi, “discussion, argument.” [MW] prescription; name of a class of writings (Buddhist literature). One of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See under aṅga. Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]. Upādhyāya Chapter Fifteen.(master). Represented by oshō, “master.” [MW] A teacher, preceptor. Ref:

Upāli. Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of one of the Buddha’s most eminent formerly a barber). Ref: Chapter Twelve [95].pupils (mentioned as the first propounded of the Buddhist law and as having been upāsaka worshiper, follower; a Buddhist lay worshiper. Ref: (layman). Represented phonetically. [MW] Serving, a servant; worshiping, a Lotus Sutra, chapter 2. upasaṃpadāat, reach, obtain; to bring near to, lead near to, procure, give; to receive into the order of monks, ordain. Ref: Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV) [69].[MW] The act of entering into the order of monks. (ordination). Represented by gusoku-kai, “being equipped with the precepts.”Upasaṃpad: to come to, arrive upāsikāRef: (laywoman). Represented phonetically. [MW] A lay female votary of Buddha. Lotus Sutra, chapter 2. upāya-kauśalya expedient.” [MW] (skillful means). Represented by Upāya: coming near, approach, arrival; that by which one reacheszengō-hōben, “skillful means, skillful Kausalya: cleverness, one’s aim, a means or expedient, way, stratagem, craft, artifice. skillfulness, experience. Ref: Lotus Sutra, chapter 2. ūrṇā thread, thread; a circle of hair between the eyebrows. Ref: Chapter Seventeen [39];Lotus Sutra,(circle of hair). Represented by chapter 2. byaku-gō, “white hair.” [MW] Wool, a woolen utpala(Nympaea caerulea(blue lotus). Represented phonetically. [MW] The blossom of the blue lotus); any water lily; any flower. Ref. Chapter Twelve [90]; Chapter

Forty-three (Vol. III).

Utpala varna (name of a nun). Represented phonetically and by Renge-shiki, “Lotus-flower Color.” Ref: Chapter Twelve [87]. uttarasaṃghāṭijō-e,among the sangha.” [MW] An upper- or outer garment. Ref: Chapter Twelve [95].“seven-stripe robe,” (outer robe). Represented phonetically and by chū-e, “middle robe,” and nyū-shū-e,jō-e, “upper robe,” “robe for goingshichivaiḍūrya Twenty [125]; (lapis lazuli). Represented phonetically. [MW] A cat’s-eye gem. Ref: Chapter Lotus Sutra, chapter 17. vaipulyaor “exact and wide.” [MW] Largeness, spaciousness, breadth, thickness; a sutra of(extensions [of Buddhist philosophy]). Represented by hōkō, “square and wide” See under great extension, Buddhist literature. One of the twelve divisions of the teachings. aṅga. Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]; Bibliography. vairambhakaRef: Chapter Ten [14].(name of a wind) [JEBD] An all-destroying wind occurring between kalpas.

Vairocana (Sun Buddha). Represented phonetically and by Dainichi-nyorai, “Great SunTathāgata.” [MW] Coming from or belonging to the sun, solar; a son of the sun;name of a dhyāni-buddha. Ref: Chapter One [32]; Chapter Seventeen [54].

Vaiśravaṇa (a patronymic). Represented phonetically. [MW] A patronymic (especiallyof Kubera and Rāvana). Ref: Lotus Sutra, chapter 25. vaiśyaa peasant, or “working man,” agriculturist, person of the third class or caste (whose(business was trade as well as agriculture). Ref. Chapter Eight; Chapter Eighty-twoVol. IV(working class). Represented phonetically. [MW] “A man who settles on the soil,”).

Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtramond Sutra.” [MW] Vajra: diamond. (name of a sutra). Represented by Chedaka: cutting off. Ref: Chapter Eighteen;Kongōkyō, “Dia-

Chapter Nineteen; Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III); Bibliography.

Vajrasattva (Diamond Buddha). Represented by Kongō-satta, “diamondVajrasattva: “having a soul or heart of adamant,” name of a dhyāni--buddha. Vajra:sattva.” [MW] as hard as a thunderbolt or of the same substance). Ref: Chapter One [32].countries it is shaped like a dumbbell and called “the hard or mighty one,” a thunderbolt (especially that of Indra; in Northern Buddhistdorje); a diamond (thought to be

vandanakeirai,adoration; (with Buddhists) one of the seven kinds of ship; a mark or symbol impressed on the body (with ashes, etc.); the act of praising,praise; reverence (especially obeisance to a superior by touching the feet etc.), wor-ship, adoration. Ref: Chapter Two [74]; Chapter Eight.(worship, prostration). Represented by “venerative bow,” and by keishu, “striking the head.” [MW] Praise, worship,raihai, anuttara-pūja“worship,” “prostration,” byor highest wor-

vārṣikaseason, rainy; growing in the rainy season or fit for or suited to it; yearly, annual.(rains retreat). Represented by ango, “retreat.” [MW] Belonging to the rainy

Ref. Chapter Two [80]; Chapter Seventy-nine (Vol. IV).

Vedan proclaiming; perception, knowledge; pain, torture, agony; feeling, sensation. One(perception, feeling). Represented by skandhas (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two.ju, “accepting, feeling.” [MW] Announcing, of the five

vidyā (knowledge). See tisro vidyāh.

vihāradhists) a monastery or temple (originally a hall where the monks met or awakenment; walking for pleasure or amusement, wandering, roaming; sport, play, pastime, diversion, enjoyment, pleasure; a place of recreation, pleasure-ground; (with Bud-(temple). Represented by shōja, “spiritual building.” [MW] Distribution; arrange about; afterward these halls were used as temples). Ref: Chapter Seven [166]. vijñānatinguishing or discerning, understanding, comprehending, recognizing, intelligence,(consciousness). Represented by shiki, “consciousness.” [MW] The act of disof the chain of causation (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two; knowledge; (with Buddhists) consciousness or thought faculty. One of the five skandhas (aggregates), one of the six dhātus (elements), and one of the twelve links Lotus Sutra, chapter 7. vikṣepa throwing asunder or away or about, scattering, dispersion; casting, throwing, dis-(distraction). Represented by sanran or san, “distraction.”  [MW] The act of charging; moving about, waving, shaking; letting loose, indulging; letting slip, neglecting; inattention, distraction, confusion, perplexity. Ref: Fukanzazengi. Vimalakīrti (name of a lay student of the Buddha). Represented phonetically and by Chapter Six [56]; Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV).Jōmyō, “Pure Name.” [MW] “Of spotless fame,” name of a Buddhist scholar. Ref:

Vimalakīrtinirdeśa[two (Vol. II); Chapter Eighty-five (Vol. IV); Bibliography. description, specification, special mention, details or particulars. Ref: Chapter Thirty-MW] Nīrdeśa:(name of a sutra). Represented by pointing out, indicating, directing, order, command, instruction; Yuimagyō, “Vimalakīrti Sutra.” vimukti (liberation, salvation). Represented by gedatsu, “salvation, emancipation.” [MW] chapter 25.existence, final emancipation. Ref: Chapter Two [74]; Chapter Twelve; Disjunction; giving up; release, deliverance, liberation; release from the bonds of Lotus Sutra,

Vinaya Tripiṭaka (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Ninety-four (Vol. IV) [107]; Bibliography. Leading, guidance, training (especially moral training), education, discipline, control,with Buddhism) the rules of discipline for monks. One of the “three baskets,” or(discipline, precepts). Represented by ritsu, “rules, law, regulation.” [MW]

( vindhyavanasee also piṇḍavana(monastery). Represented by . [MW] A forest in the Vindhya, the name of a low range of hillssōrin, “thicket-forest” or “clump of forest”; connecting the northern extremities of the Western and Eastern Ghauts, and separating Hindustan proper from the Dekhan. Vana: forest, wood. Ref: Chapter Five [122].

vipāka-phalaresult, retribution (good or bad), gain or loss, reward or punishment. Ref: Chaptereffects.” [MW] (maturation of effects). Represented by Vipāka: ripe, mature; cooking, dressing; ripening, maturing (especiallyPhala:ijuku-ka,fruit, consequence, effect, “differently maturing of the fruit of actions), effect, result, consequence. Ten [21]; Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV).

vipaśyanāthree (Vol. IV).Vipaś: learn, know. Ref: Chapter One [51]; Chapter Twenty-two [14]; Chapter Seventy-(insight, reflection). Represented by to see in different places or in detail, discern, distinguish; to observe, perceive,kan, “reflection.” [MW] Right knowledge.

Vipaśyin (name of a Buddha). Represented phonetically and by Kōsetsu, “Universal Preaching.” [MW] Name of a buddha (sometimes mentioned as the first of the seven Tathāgatas or principal buddhas, the other six being Śikhin, Viśvabhū, Kraku cchanda, Kanakamuni, Kāśyapa, and Śakyasiṃha). Ref: Chapter Fifteen.

vīryaparamita virility. manliness, valor, strength, power, energy; heroism, heroic deed; manly, vigor, energy,(diligence, effort, fortitude). Represented by Vīrya pāramitās (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Two; : highest degree of fortitude or energy. One of the six Lotus Sutra,shōjin,chapter 27.“diligence.” [MW] Vīrya: viṣaya “boundary, environment.” [MW] Sphere (of influence or activity), dominion, kingdom;(object). Represented by kyō, “boundary, sphere, circumstances” or by kyōgai, scope, reach (of eyes, ears, mind etc.); an object of sense (there are five in number, indriya“sound,” for the ear; 2) s or organs of sense having each their proper five elements ether, air, fire, water, earth, respectively). Ref: Chapter Two. nose; and these five or “color,” for the eye; 4) 1)the five  śabda, viṣayarasa,s are sometimes called the “savor,” for the tongue; 5) sparśa, “tangibility,” for the skin; 3) guṇagandha, s or “properties” of theviṣaya “odor,” for the or object, viz.,rūpa, “form”

Viṣṇu (name of the preserver god in the Hindu triad) [MW] Name of one of the principalTen [19].Hindu deities (in the later mythology regarded as “the preserver”). Ref: Chapter vitarkaguess, fancy, imagination, opinion; doubt, uncertainty; reasoning, deliberation, con-sideration; purpose, intention. (reflection). Represented by Vitark:kaku, “awareness.” [MW] Conjecture, supposition, to reflect. Ref: Chapter Six [129].

vṛddhaold, senior; experienced, wise, learned. One of the three kinds of mind, the others and concentrated mind.” [MW] Grown, become larger or longer or stronger, increased, augmented, great, large; grown up, full-grown, advanced in years, aged,(experienced). Represented phonetically and by citta and hṛdaya (q.v.). Ref: Chapter Seventy (Vol. IIIshakujū-shōyō-shin,). “experienced being vyajana article used for fanning, fan, whisk. Ref: Chapter Sixteen [9]; (whisk). Represented by hossu, “whisk.” [MW] Fanning; a palm-leaf or other Fukanzazengi. vyākaraṇa discrimination; explanation, detailed description; manifestation, revelation; (with under chapter 3.and by Buddhists) prediction, prophecy. One of the twelve divisions of the teachings. See(aṅga. prediction, affirmation). Represented by juki, “affirmation” or “giving affirmation.” [MW] Separation, distinction, Ref: Chapter Eleven [40]; Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II); kibetsu, “certification-discrimination,”Lotus Sutra,

yakṣa spiritual apparition, ghost, spirit. Ref: Chapter Seventy (Vol. III) [207]; (demons, devils). Represented phonetically. [MW] A living supernatural being, Lotus Sutra, chapter 10.

yaṣṭi “Any support,” a staff, stick, wand, rod, mace, club, cudgel; pole, pillar, perch; a(pole, flagpole [as symbol of Buddhist temple]). Represented phonetically. [MW] flagstaff. Ref: Chapter One [61]; Chapter Sixteen [15].

Yogācāra (name of a school). [MW] The observance of yoga; a particular the act of yoking, joining; a means, expedient, method; undertaking, business, work; follower of a particular Buddhist sect or school; the disciples of that school. samādhi;Yoga:a gence. [JEBD] One of the two major Mahayana schools in India (together with the any junction, union, combination; fitting together, fitness; exertion, endeavor, dili-Madhyamika). Ref. Chapter Fifteen. yojananessing; course, path; a stage or (a measure of distance). Represented phonetically. [MW] Joining, yoking, haryojana (i.e., a distance traversed in one harnessingas equal to four or five miles, but more correctly = four Ref: Chapter Seventeen [62]; or without unyoking; especially a particular measure of distance, sometimes regardedLotus Sutra, chapter 11. krośas or about nine miles).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                    

I . Main Chinese Sources Quoted by Master Dōgen in the Shōbōgenzō

A. Sutras Attempts at English translations of sutra titles are provisional, and provided only for reference.

AgonkyōChōagonkyō(Āgama sutras). In Chinese translation, there are four((Middle Āgama Sutra;Long Āgama Sutra; Pāli Skt. Dīgha-nikāyaMadhyamāgama;Skt. Saṃyuktāgama;)                                                                     :Pāli Majjhima-nikāyaPāli Samyutta- )

ZōitsuagongyōChūagonkyōZōagonkyōAṅguttara-nikāyanikāya)(Miscellaneous Āgama Sutra;(Āgama Sutras Increased by One;)                    Skt. Ekottarāgama; Pāli

In the Pāli canon, the kāgama;fifteen short books.These are supplemented by the Pāli Khuddaka-nikāyaKhuddaka-nikāya), a collection of all the Āgamas beside the four Āgamas.Shōagonkyōis the fifth of the five Nikāyas and comprises(Small Āgama Sutras; Skt. Kṣudra -

Aikuōkyō (Aśoka Sutra)

Butsuhongyōjikkyō (Sutra of Collected Past Deeds of the Buddha)

Daibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōman and the Buddha) (Sutra of Questions and Answers between Mahābrah-

Daihannyakyō Great Prajñāpāramitā;(Great Prajñā SutraSkt. Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra), short for Daihannyaharamittakyō )                                                     (Sutra of the

Daihatsunehankyō (Sutra of the Great Demise; Skt. Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra) Daihōkōhōkyōgyō (Mahāvaipulya Treasure Chest Sutra)

Daihoshakkyō (Great Treasure Accumulation Sutra; Skt. Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtra)

DaijōhonshōshinchikankyōLives) (Mahayana Sutra of Reflection on the Mental State in Past

Daishūkyō (Great Collection Sutra; Skt. Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra) Engakukyō (Sutra of Round Realization)

Fuyōkyō (Sutra of Diffusion of Shining Artlessness; Skt. Lalitavistara-sūtra) Higekyō (Flower of Compassion Sutra; Skt. Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtra)

447

Hokkekyōof the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma;(Lotus Sutra, Sutra of the Flower of DharmaSkt. ), short for Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraMyōhōrengekyō (Sutra)

Hōkukyō (Sutra of Dharma Phrases; Pāli Dhammapada)

Honshōkyō (Past Lives Sutra; Skt. Jātaka)

Juokyō (Ten Kings Sutra)

Kanfugenbosatsugyōbōkyō Universal Virtue) (Sutra of Reflection on the Practice of Dharma by Bodhisattva

Kegonkyō (Garland Sutra; Skt. Avataṃsaka-sūtra)

Kengukyō (Sutra of the Wise and the Foolish)

Keukōryōkudokukyō (Sutra of Comparison of the Merits of Rare Occurrences)

Kongōkyō Prajñāpāramitā;(Diamond SutraSkt. ), short for Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtraKongōhannyaharamitsukyō ) (Sutra of the Diamond

Konkōmyōkyōof the Supreme King;(Golden Light SutraSkt. Suvarṇaprabhāsottamarāja-sūtra), short for Konkōmyōsaishookyō) (Golden Light Sutra

Mirokujōshōkyō (Sutra of Maitreya’s Ascent and Birth in Tuṣita Heaven) Mizōuinnenkyō (Sutra of Unprecedented Episodes)

Ninnōgyō Sutra of the Benevolent King(Benevolent King Sutra), short for )                                                          Ninnōhannyaharamitsugyō  (Prajñāpāramitā

Senjūhyakuenkyō (Sutra of a Hundred Collected Stories) Shakubukurakankyō (Sutra of the Defeat of the Arhat)

Shobutsuyōshūkyō (Sutra of the Collected Essentials of the Buddhas) Shugyōhongikyō (Sutra of Past Occurrences of Practice)

Shuryōgonkyō (Śūraṃgama Sutra; Skt. Śūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśa-sūtra) Yōrakuhongikyō (Sutra of Past Deeds as a String of Pearls)

Yuimagyō (Vimalakīrti Sutra; Skt. Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtra) Zuiōhongikyō (Sutra of Auspicious Past Occurrences)

  1. B.  Precepts

Bonmōkyō (Pure Net Sutra)

Daibikusanzenyuigikyō (Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms for Ordained Monks)

Jūjuritsu Sarvāstivādin school(Precepts in Ten Parts), a sixty-one–fascicle translation of the Vinaya of the Konponissaiubuhyakuichikatsuma tivādin School) (One Hundred and One Customs of the Mūlasarvās-

Makasōgiritsuof the Mahāsaṃghika school of Hinayana Buddhism (Precepts for the Great Sangha), a forty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya Shibunritsu the Dharmagupta school(Precepts in Four Divisions), a sixty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya of Zenenshingi (Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries)

C. Commentaries

Bosatsuchijikyō (Sutra of Maintaining the Bodhisattva State)

Daibibasharon (Skt. Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣa-śāstra)

Daichidoron prajñā pāramitopadeśa(Commentary on the Accomplishment which is Great Wisdom;)                                                                                              Skt. Mahā -

Daijōgishō (Writings on the Mahayana Teachings)

HokkezanmaisengiDharma) (A Humble Expression of the Form of the Samādhi of the Flower of

Kusharon (Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya)

Makashikan Chigi, founder of the Tendai sect(Great Quietness and Reflection), a record of the lectures of Master Tendai

Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu Quietness and Reflection), a Chinese commentary on the (Extensive Decisions Transmitted in Support of GreatMakashikan by Master

Keikei Tannen

D. General Chinese Buddhist Records

Daitōsaiikiki (Great Tang Records of Western Lands)

Gotōroku Rentōeyō in the Kataifutōroku compiled during the Song era (960–1279). They are represented in summary form(Five Records of the TorchGotōegen (Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch(Collection of the Fundamentals of the Five Torches(Keitoku Era Record of the Transmission of the Torch), five independent but complementary collections) ) ) ). They are)                                                                                                          :

Keitokudentōroku

Zokutōroku Tenshōkotōroku (Collection of Essentials for Continuation of the Torch(Supplementary Record of the Torch(Tensho Era Record of the Widely Extending Torch)

Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record)

Hōenshurin in one hundred volumes(A Forest of Pearls in the Garden of Dharma), a kind of Buddhist encyclopedia

Kaigenshakkyōroku (Kaigen Era Records of Śākyamuni’s Teaching)

Kosonshukugoroku (Record of the Words of the Venerable Patriarchs of the Past) Rinkanroku (Forest Record), short for Sekimonrinkanroku (Sekimon’s Forest Record) Sōkōsōden (Biographies of Noble Monks of the Song Era)

Zenmonshososhigeju (Verses and Eulogies of Ancestral Masters of the Zen Lineages) Zenrinhōkun (Treasure Instruction from the Zen Forest)

Zenshūjukorenjutsūshū of the Zen Sect) (Complete String-of-Pearls Collection of Eulogies to Past Masters

Zokudentōroku in China in 1635 as a sequel to the (Continuation of the Record of the Transmission of the TorchKeitokuden tōroku                                           ), published

E. Records of and Independent Works by Chinese Masters

Basodōitsuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Baso Dōitsu)

Bukkagekisetsuroku of Master Setchō Jūken(Record of Bukka’s Attacks on Knotty Problems); Bukka is an alias

Chōreishutakuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Chōrei Shutaku)

Daiefugakuzenjishūmonbuko Sōkō]) (War Chest of the School of Zen Master Daie Fugaku [Daie

Daiegoroku (Record of the Words of Daie Sōkō)

Daiezenjitōmei (Inscriptions on the Stupa of Zen Master Daie Sōkō)

Engozenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Engo Kokugon)

Jōshūroku (Records of Jōshū Jūshin)

Jūgendan (Discussion of the Ten Kinds of Profundity), by Master Dōan Josatsu Hōezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Yōgi Hōe)

Hōkyōzanmai (Samādhi, the State of a Jewel Mirror), by Master Tōzan Ryōkai

Hōneininyūzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Hōnei Ninyu)

Hyakujōroku (Record of Hyakujō Ekai)

Kidōshū by Rinsen Jurin(Kidō Collection), a collection of the words of Master Tanka Shijun, compiled

Kōkezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Kōke Sonshō)

Nyojōoshōgoroku (Record of the Words of Master Tendō Nyojō)

Ōandongezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Oan Donge)

Rinzaizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Rinzai Gigen)

Rokusodaishihōbōdankyō (Platform Sutra), attributed to Master Daikan Enō Sandōkai (Experiencing the State), by Master Sekitō Kisen

Setchōmyōkakuzenjigoroku Jūken]) (Record of the Words of Zen Master Setchō Myōkaku [Setchō

Sekitōsōan-no-uta (Songs from Sekitō’s Thatched Hut), by Master Sekitō Kisen Shinjinmei (Inscription on Believing Mind), by Master Kanchi Sōsan

Shōdōka (Song of Experiencing the Truth), by Master Yōka Genkaku

Sōtairoku (Record of Answers to an Emperor), by Master Busshō Tokkō Tōzangoroku (Record of the Words of Tōzan Ryōkai) Unmonkoroku (Broad Record of Unmon Bun’en)

Wanshijuko Record()Wanshi’s Eulogies to Past Masters), also known as the Sho yo roku (Relaxation

Wanshikoroku (Broad Record of Wanshi Shōgaku)

Wanshizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Wanshi Shōgaku)

Yafudōsenkongōkyō (Yafu Dōsen’s Diamond Sutra)

F. Chinese Non-Buddhist and Secular Works

Confucianist: Rongo Kōkyō ((Book of Filial PietyDiscourses of Confucius)         )

Rikutō

Daoist:Sōji,Shishi,Sangoryakuki Bunshi,Inzui Kanshi,from the Chinese (Rhymes of Good Fortune(from the Chinese from the Chinese Six Strategiesfrom the Chinese (History of the Three Elements and Five Elements) Zhangzi,Wenzi,Shizi,Guanzi,the name of the supposed author)the name of the author to whom the text is ascribedthe name of the supposed author the name of a disciple of Laozi (the ancient)

Chinese philosopher regarded as the founder of Daoism)

Jiruisenshu (

Miscellaneous: Meihōki Jōkanseiyō Jibutsugenki (Chronicles of the Underworld(Jōkan Era Treatise on the Essence of GovernmentCollection of Matters and Examples(Record of the Origin of Things)                                               )     )       )          )

Taiheikōki (Widely Extending Record of the Taihei Era

II. Other Works by Master Dōgen

Eiheikōroku (Broad Record of Eihei)

Eiheishingi Fushukuhanhō Cook), etc.(Pure Criteria of Eihei(The Method of Taking Meals), including: Bendōhō ), Tenzokyōkun (Methods of Pursuing the Truth(Instructions for the),

Fukanzazengi (Universal Guide to the Standard Method of Zazen)

Gakudōyōjinshū (Collection of Concerns in Learning the Truth) Hōgyōki (Hōgyō Era Record)

Shinji-shōbōgenzō (Right Dharma-eye Treasury, in Original Chinese Characters)

III. Japanese References

Akiyama, Hanji. Dōgen-no-kenkyu. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1935.

Eto, Soku-o. Shōbōgenzō-ji-i. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1965.

Hakuju, Ui, ed. Bukkyo-jiten. Tokyo: Daito Shuppansha, 1935.

Hashida, Kunihiko. Shōbōgenzō-shaku-i. 4 vols. Tokyo: Sankibo Busshorin, 1939–1950. Hokkekyō. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1964–1967.

Jinbo, Nyoten, and Bunei Ando, eds. —. Zengaku-jiten.Genzo Chukai Zensho Kankokai, 1965–1968.Kyoto: Heirakuji Shoten, 1976.Shōbōgenzō-chukai-zensho. 10 vols. Tokyo: Shobo Jingde chuan deng lu (Keitokudentōroku). Taibei: Zhenshan mei chu ban she, 1967. Kindaichi, Kyosuke, ed. Jikai. Tokyo: Sanseido, 1970.

Morohashi, Tetsuji. Dai-kanwa-jiten. 13 vols. Tokyo: Taishukan Shoten, 1955–1960.

Mujaku, Kosen. Shobo Genzo Shoten-zoku-cho. Tokyo: Komeisha, 1896.

Nakajima, Kenzo, ed. Sogo-rekishi-nenpyo. Tokyo: Nitchi Shuppan, 1951.

Nakamura, Hajime, ed. —. Shin-bukkyo-jiten. Tokyo: Seishin Shobo, 1962.Bukkyogo-daijiten. 3 vols. Tokyo: Tokyo Shoseki, 1975.

Nishiari, Bokuzan. Shōbōgenzō-keiteki. Tokyo: Daihorinkaku, 1979–1980.

Nishijima, Gudo. volumes plus a one-volume appendix. Tokyo: Kana zawa Bunko, 1970–1981.ShōbōgenzōteishorokuGendaigoyakushōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese(Record of Lectures on Shōbōgenzō). Thirty-four volumes.). Twelve

—. Tokyo: Kanazawa Bunko, 1982–1986.

Okubo, Doshu. Dōgen-zenji-den-no-kenkyu. Tokyo: Chikuma Shobo, 1966.

Oyanagi, Shigeta. Shinshu-kanwa-daijiten. Tokyo: Hakubunkan, 1937.

Satomi, Ton. Dōgen-zenji-no-hanashi. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1953.

Sawaki, Kodo. Sawaki-kodo-zenshu. 19 vols. Tokyo: Daihorinkaku, 1962–1967.

Shōbōgenzō.and Yaoko Mizuno. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, n.d.Commentaries by Minoru Nishio, Genryu Kaga mi shi ma, Tokugen Sakai,

Taishō-shinshū-daizōkyō. Tokyo: Taishō Issaikyō Kankōkai, 1924–1932.

Tetsugaku-jiten. Tokyo: Hibonsha, 1971.

Tetsugaku-shojiten. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1938.

Watsuji, Tetsuro. Watsuji-tetsuro-zenshu. Vols. 4, 5. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1961–1963. Zengaku-daijiten.1985. Edited by scholars of Komazawa University. Tokyo: Taishukan Shoten,

Zokuzokyō.Taibei: Xin Wen Feng chu ban gong si, 1976–1977.Collection of Buddhist sutras not included in the Taishō-shinshū-daizōkyō.

III. English References

Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary. Tokyo: Daito Shuppansha, 1979.

Macdonell, A. A. 1954–1958. A Practical Sanskrit Dictionary. London: Oxford University Press,

Masuda, Koh, ed. 1974. Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-English Dictionary. Tokyo: Kenkyusha, Monier-Williams, Sir Monier. Press, 1899. A Sanskrit-English Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Nelson, Andrew. 1974. Japanese-English Character Dictionary. Rutland, VT: Charles Tuttle, Schiffer, Wilhelm, and Yoshiro Tamura. 1975. A revised version of  by Bunno Kato and William Soothill.The Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful LawThe Threefold Lotus Sutra. New York: Weatherhill,

(1930)

Schumann, H. W. The Historical Buddha. New York: Arkana, 1989.

Spahn, Mark, and Wolfgang Hadamitzky. Nichigai Asssociates, 1989. Japanese Character Dictionary. Tokyo:

 

Index

A

Ajase. Aizenmyōō  151Āgama(s)  181, 193, 194, 200, 202, 211,Aikuōzan (Abundant Treasures  286, 397, 398, 408Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣa-śāstraAbhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaAbhidharma  189, 214, 240, 258, 309214See, See255Ajātaśatrusee alsoAśoka, KingMount Aikuō)  252241        240 Aikuō.

Ajātaśatru  124

arjaka

Aśoka, King  240, 260asuraAśvaghoṣa  236, 239, 240Aśvaka  231Avalokiteśvara (Asaṅga  241Āryadeva. Sutraof the Sounds of the World)  31, 35,lessness; Great Compassion; Regarder(, 52, 56, 121, 188, 283, s)  441108See Kāṇadevasee also(see also GarlandGiver of Fear-376

Avataṃsaka-sūtra37

American Academy of Religions  375Akṣobhya  394Amaterasu  334Ajñāta-Kauṇḍinya  385Ajita (see also Mañjuśrī)  402, 406 Avīci Hell  224, 232, 233barbarian(s)  20, 29BBanko  318, 333)  26, 28, 85, 123

Amitābha  188

Benka  196, 213

arhat(s)  10, 26, 29, 32, 34, 38, 94, 95,anuttara samyaksaṃbodhiAnavatapta  197Ānanda  19, 29, 186, 236, 240, 247, 249,anāgāminAnāthapiṇḍada. 10624038638205257, 89, 90, 107, 128, 164, 168, 169,, 108, 170, 171, 187, 215, 239,, 375, 381, 385, 386, , 263, 264, 277, 297, 341, 382,, 395, 396, 400, 403, 410, , 36838, 106, See215Sudatta23391, 32, 35,412 bhikṣuBhadrapāla  158, 184Bequeathed Records. See IrokuBenevolent King SutraBeijing  310Baso Dōitsu  47, 141, 152, 154, 155,Basozan  338forest  180, 19338104210395183339, 53, 90, 91, 93, 94, 95, 97, 98, 99,(, 212, 241, 381, 385, 386, 394,, 406, 407, , 106, 167, 176, 177, 180, 182,, 359, , 214, 242, 261, 280, 328–29, 338,s) (see also368 410monk)  xvii, 20, 32,351

A Record of the Origins of Things. SeeJibutsugenki

455

bhikṣuṇīBhīṣmagarjitasvararāja. 98210, 99, 106, 166, 167, 170, 171, 186,, 385, 386, 395, 406, 407, (s) (see also nun)  91, 93, 94, 95,See King of410

Blue Mountains  217–19Blue Cliff Record. See HekiganrokuBi, Bizuda (Bielefeldt, Carl  234Majestic Voice; Kū-ōSeesee alsoVairocanaGensha Shibi)  49, 55

Birushana.

Bodhidharma  4, 11, 12, 24, 28, 49, 55,bodhiBō, Minister  16--10321330935128177317, 38, 69, 83, 90, 95, 107, 109, 114,xviii, 3, 8, 10, 11, 15, 23, 25, 32, 33,, 138, 146, 147, 153, 160, 163, 171,, 178, 192, 200, 204, 245, 272, 303,, 364, 365, 399, 400, , 123, 124, 154, 183, 185, 191,, 214, 237, 257, 258, 261, 283,, 336, 354, 367, 17187   368410 171

--powers  speech  128, mind  65, 97, 114, 116, 166, effect  398 138

bodhisattva(s)  11, 25, 27, 35, 38, 39, 56,bodhimaṇḍaBodhiruci  116precepts  175, 176, 19290105123186246278310396, 91, 93, 94, 95, 97, 98, 99, 104,, 106, 108, 109, 110, 116, 121,, 132, 154, 169, 172, 182, 184,, 188, 189, 204, 208, 212, 215,, 248, 255, 257, 265, 266, 277,, 280, 281, 284, 285, 302, 304,, 311, 315, 383, 386, 389, 394,, 399, 400, 402, 403, 406, 407,, 411, (s)  33, 34, 124, 167, 169,406412

mahāsattva409–10400, 402,

way  177, 263, 268, 273, 355, 392,397, 399, 403, 404 body(ies), of the Buddha, buddha(s),bodhieight-foot golden  143, 144, 145Tathā gata  56, 62, 84, 109, 110, 131,140401tree  6, 85, 332, 164, 174, 190, 205, 273, 283,, 405

Brahmā 141, 174, 175, 178, 191, 210Brahma-pāriṣadya heaven  192Brahmā heaven  177, 398Bōgenrei  320, 334Book of Filial Piety. See Kōkyōsixteen-foot golden  68, 72, 143, 144,145, 146, 151, 153, 297, 309

brahman(s)  11, 28, 116, 190, 239, 241,Bu, Emperor (r. 502–549)  116, 191, 242Brahma-purohita heaven  192242, 410 Bu, Emperor (r. 841–846)  295Bu, Emperor (r. 561–578)  242see also Gautama; Śākyamuni)

Buddha (124xv, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 20, 22, 24, 25, 26,8328, 85, 86, 87, 99, 100, 103, 105, 106,, 30, 32, 33, 38, 39, 56, 60, 71, 81,, 109, 115, 116, 117, 118, 121, 123,

108

167186193202230264273305367389, 135, 154, 159, 161, 165, 166,, 169, 170, 173–74, 175, 176, 179,, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192,, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201,, 207, 208, 209, 213, 222, 229,, 234, 239, 240, 246, 247, 257,, 266, 268, 269, 270, 271, 272,, 278, 280, 281, 283, 285, 287,, 309, 329, 336, 338, 342, 344,, 381, 382, 384, 385, 386, 387,

brightness  114, 167, 209body (affirmation  154, 188, 28740256205, 390, 393, 394, 395, 396, 397,, 404, 405, 406, 407, 408, , 84, 110, 131, 140, 144, 164,see also, 273, 283, body, of the Buddha)309   411 disciple(s)  10, 15, 39, 85, 87, 96, 99,Dharma (death   29, 184, 186, 239, 39815420638611198, 12, 14, 90, 99, 128, 159, 160,, 158, 160, 176, 178, 190, 198,, 207, 210, 239, 240, 287, 367,, 199, see also306 Buddha-Dharma)  9,

influence  6, 7, 158, 166image  72, 151robe (see also kaṣāya; robe)

lineage  4, 84land (kaṣāya,158182see also, 160, 166, 172, 176, 177, 181,, 195–96, 197, 199, buddha land)  81, 269203–212

mind  5, 84, 115, 164, 167, 205, 209mind–seal  13, 24marrow  167, 209

order  29, 98, 99, 124, 199, 231name  5, 63

-seal  16,

thirty-two marks (state  10, 17, 83, 185, 196, 209, 224,successor(s)  247, 248, 257, 354teaching(s)  21, 22, 71, 100, 137, 187,preaching  15, 42, 76, 142, 154, 166,posture  xvi, 5, 10, 365past life, lives  154, 186, 189, 193, 233marks)  121, 278224245240, , 246, 247, 397, 403, 28424 see also thirty-two404

truth  9, 17, 41, 42, 44, 60, 82, 91, 107,115206301, 116, 117, 133, 165, 179, 203,, 209, 220, 224, 246, 247, 298,

wisdom  265, 266, 267, 270, 271, 280,Way  18, 49, 118wide and long tongue  110, 121281365, 386, , 302, 304, 307, 315, 321, 326,, 387, 391, 402 395 buddha(s)  3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 17,6518, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 72, 75, 82, 83,, 19, 23, 26, 34, 38, 41, 51, 52, 59,

11690133159168185199256208244270287307326348387407, 93, 94, 99, 100, 101, 106, 113, 114,, 117, 118, 123, 127, 128, 129, 130,, 137, 139, 141, 146, 153, 154, 157,, 160, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167,, 169, 172, 174, 176, 177, 178, 179,, 188, 189, 190, 195, 196, 197, 198,, 200, 201, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207,, 212, 213, 219, 229, 233, 235, 238,, 257, 263, 264, 265, 266, 267, 268,, 245–46, 247, 248, 249, 254, 255,, 272, 274, 277, 279, 281, 282, 283,, 295, 297, 298, 300, 301, 305, 306,, 310, 311, 314, 315, 316, 321, 325,, 327, 329, 330, 339, 343, 345, 347,, 356, 364, 365, 382, 383, 385, 386,, 388, 389, 392, 394, 397, 394, 400,, 408

body  174, 190, 401, 404, 409-action(s), deed, behavior  82, 84, 348,356, 411

eternal  33, 51, 62, 68, 77, 91, 93, 113,127227274, 143, 165, 172, 186, 217, 225,, 238, 242, 251, 255, 271, 273,

samādhipast  117, 188, 199, 235, 311seven ancient (of the ten directions  263, 264, 300, 401of the three times  35, 98, 132, 135, 140,-kaṣāya,image  63, 323, 387five  9, 26mind  68, 300, 16915819825343–26, 184, 214, 239, 257, 261, , 175, 177, 180, 181, 300, , 200, 206, 207, 208, , 159, 166, 169, 175, 196, 197,, 286, 291, 300, 307, 317, 329,, 346robe(s) (see also 8, 9 see also367  Seven Buddhas)kaṣāya;209172robe)371 buddha(s) (thirty-two marks (state  6, 8, 9, 21, 26, 41, 118, 164, 189,204, 205, 211, 233, 246, continuedsee also)       thirty-two273 Buddhabhadra  87, 88-transformed  398wisdom, wisdom of  7, 15, 187, 273,384marks)  188, 385, 401

Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha (Buddha-Dharma  4–5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12,Buddhacaritabuddha-bhagavat(s)  34Three Treasures)  xv, 32, 104, 164, 168134194116155, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 25,, 42, 44, 76, 81, 82, 83, 84, 92, 93,, 96, 97, 99, 111, 113, 114, 115,, 133, 134, 135, 136, 141, 144,, 175, 181, 182, 196, 197, 199,, 206, 207, 208, 209, 212, 218,, 283, 285, 290, 301, 302, 303,, 305, 306, 307, 394, , 159, 160, 162, 164, 166, 170,240                 411see also

172203255304

buddhahood  105, 130, 207, 257Buddha hall  86, 351, 352, 375, 377 buddha land(s)  22, 98, 197, 223, 263,Buddhamitra  124, 236264, 272, 383, 387, 407 buddha-nature  10, 67, 223Buddhanandhi  236

buddha-tathāgata(s) (Buddhasiṃla  241Buddhism  xv, xvi, 23, 31, 39, 41, 65, 71,375121, 6, 14, 94, 164, 202, , 85, 94, 103, 106, 107, 109, 113,, 184, 191, 198, 199, 202, 203,, 210, 214, 217, 223, 224, 229,, 242, 243, 244, 245, 248, 255,, 284, 295, 301, 313, 341, 343,, , 122, 127, 128, 134, 143, 154,358 see also386Tathāgata)

157209230259356

esoteric  26, 28Hinayana  29, 87, 88, 108Vajrayana  26Mahayana  25, 108, 241Theravāda  40

Buddhist(s)  xv, xvi, 6, 9, 11, 12, 15, 16,25108145202241289, 27, 31, 38, 45, 47, 73, 75, 76, 87,, 109, 121, 123, 127, 134, 135, 139,, 151, 155, 169, 171, 184, 186, 188,, 206, 207, 230, 231, 232, 235, 240,, 242, 245, 247, 255, 259, 264, 284,, 299, 302, 313, see also pātra314)  64, 157, 258

bowl (four groups of  106, 108intellectual (see also śrāvaka method  25, 279master(s)  29, 104, 121, 152, 243, 257,learning  26, 247313188, , 355189      )  123,

monastery(ies)  375monk(s)  30, 38, 56, , 104, 106, 121,order  63, 98, 108, 124, 183, 235, 239patriarch(s)  xvi, 10, 12, 13, 16, 22, 28,3493162204220232252293328348151, 59, 62, 68, 75, 77, 82, 83, 84,, 109, 118, 129, 130, 158, 160,, 163, 176, 181, 182, 202, 203,, 205, 208, 209, 210, 218, 219,, 221, 223, 224, 225, 226, 229,, 235, 239, 246, 248, 249, 250,, 253, 254, 255, 256, 267, 290,, 296, 301, 302, 306, 309, 323,, 329, 330, 331, 337, 341, 342,, 352, 353, 356, 371–, 186, 192, 296, 331, 72354

practice  10, 139, 151, 282, 332, 338,practical (philosophy, theory  xv, 71, 154, 313,341188367, 367see also bodhisattva)  123, sensory (process  282, 283robe (precepts  110, 175, 210, 211preaching  25, 38, 258practitioner(s)  39, 56, 139, 355106see also kaṣāya; , 157, 177, 190, see also pratyekabuddha242robe)  29, 86,)

tradition  85, 214, 235temple(s), monasteries  27, 106, 124,sutra(s)  108, 152, 182, 184, 188, 204,teaching(s)  39, 47, 56, 139, 188, 193,183282123212341, , 214, 217, 223, 245, 258, 331,, 353, 188 356

Bukka. Buddhist Patriarch (view  139, 143, 207, 263, 332wisdom  277, 281, 282, 283truth  16, 129, 208, 217, 245, 301, 341,223Bodhi dharma)  16, 28, 76, 217, 220,403, 238, 242, See Engo Kokugon289see also Buddha;

Bukkōku Temple  214Bukkō Nyoman  133, 141, 359

Butsuin Ryōgen  110, 121, 359Busshō Tokkō  252, 259, 359Butōzan (Buryō 295Bushu district  328Bunshiburning house, parable of  267, 268–69,Bunka era  xvii281, 282, 283, 343, 389, 223see also, 232 Mount Butō) 111390

C

cart(s), three  266, 281, 282, 389Cambodia  357goat  281, 389deer  281, 389 Chanqing Daan. Chang  143Chanda  231Changsha Jingcen. Changqing Daan. white ox  266, 281, 282, 343, 355, 389SeeSeeFukushu DaianChōrei ShutakuChōsha Keishin

See

Chekiang province  4, 141, 260, 338Chigen  182, 212Chikan (see alsosee also

Chimon Kōso  311China  xvi, 4, 5, 11, 13, 14, 16, 17, 19, 20,Child of the Himalayas (Chikō (6122Himālaya) 193, 331, 63, 64, 65, 71, 86, 94, 95, 96, 106,, 23, 24, 26, 28, 29, 41, 55, 56, 59,, 122, 124, 133, 151, 152, 153, 154,, 157, 158, 162, 163, 164, 172, 175,, 182, 183, 184, 189, 191, 193, 194,, 199, 205, 206, 211, 212, 213, 221,, 233, 239, 242, 244, 245, 248, 254,, 257, 158, 258, 259, 260, 261, 264,, 273, 275, 279, 281, 295, 301, 331,, 333, 334, 336, 338, 356, 357, 367,Wisdom-Brightness)  192Setchō Chikan)  238, 244see also

Chinese  xviii, 24, 29, 71, 91, 103, 121,language  xvii, xviii, xix, xx, 27, 37,book(s), commentary(ies), literature,12115518119525832612723225626733236812238189240331xix, 105, 123, 142, 186, 189, 191,sutra(s), text(s), translation(s)  xviii,, 333, 335, 337, , 261, 295, 314, 318–19, 321, 322,, 152, 157, 187, 191, 193, 233,, 39, 47, 48, 71, 87, 88, 105, 107,, 124, 141, 152, 153, 184, 187,, 190, 191, 192, 216, 230, 239,, 241, 244, 259, 278, 285, 310,, 335, 336, 337, 354, 367, , 295, 334see also359Hōtei)  332381

230

Chinzei  45Chinshū Fuke (

Chōka Dōrin  127, 133, 141, 359Chitsu  243Chiyu  252, 253Chishu district  230see also Fukushu Daian)

Chōkei Eryō  141, 155, 285Chōkei Daian (355, 359 Chōrei Shutaku  73, 359Chōkeji  345

conduct  16, 28, 65, 117, 137, 138, 157,Collection of Essentials for ContinuationCollection of Concerns in Learning theChūsō, Emperor  157, 183, 195Chuanzi Decheng. Chōsui Shisen  113, 123Chūagongyō. See Middle Āgama SutraChōro Sōsaku  27, 86Chōsha Keishin  112, 122, 232, 359Chōshazan  122four forms of  11, 12, 38, 367164of the Torch. See RentōeyōTruth. See Gakudō yōjin shū, 302, 303, 305, 307, (see also maṇiSee Sensu Tokujō) 231382 cintā maṇi

Confucius  125Constellation King  408Confucian, Confucianism  103, 106, 125,past good  159, 163, 164, 181, 196,ten kinds of bad  39three forms of  xvi, 5, 25184211, 215

D

DaibikusanzenyuigikyōDaibaizan  253, 254, 261Daibai Hōjō  253, 254, 261, 338, 359Daian (Dahui Zonggao. Three Thousand Dignified Forms forOrdained Monkssee also Fukushu Daian)  345See)  Daie Sōkō85(see also Sutra of Daibyakuhō Mountain (Tendōzan)  4, 24see also105Hyakujō Ekai)  201, 214, 142, 189see also

Daichi (Daichidoron

Daien. 317

Daie (Daie Sōkō  259, 311, 332, 359Daichū era  295DaihannyakyōDaihōshakkyōDaii Daien (38, see also, 39See332Isan Reiyūsee alsoNangaku Ejō)  75, 85,(190–91see also Heart SutraIsan Reiyū), 232            )

Daijōgishō

Daizui Hōshin  346, 355, 359Daishō (Daini Sanzō  300Daii Dōshin  141, 184, 242, 359, 372Daikan Enō (Daiizan   112, 122DaijōhonshōshinchikankyōDaijaku (Daiman Kōnin  85, 105, 183, 184, 186,71111–112Daijaku)  148, 15412123185215280317353192, 111, 122, 300, , 24, 27, 28, 29, 71, 85, 105, 122,, 215, 242, 257, 279, 332, 359, , 141, 154, 157, 160, 176, 183,, 281, 283, 285, 295, 309, 316,, 331, 332, 333, 335, 337, 342,, 354, 359, 367, 368, , 186, 189, 192, 195, 200, 214,, 242, 257, 261, 264, 265, 279,see alsosee alsosee alsoSee, 122, 184see alsoTaisōDaibaizan)  260Nan’yō Echū)  67, 68,Baso Dōitsu; Kōzei253309Sixth Patriarch)  5,372192                       372

Daizong. Daizan (

Dajian Huineng. Daizuizan  345  See

Danxia Zichun. Damei Fachang. Daman Hongren. SeeSeeSeeTanka ShijunDaibai HōjōDaikan EnōDaiman Kōnin demon(s) (Dayi Daoxin. Dayang Jingxuan. Daoism, Daoist(s)  196, 232, 233, 333,334      SeeSeeTaiso EkaDaii DōshinSee Taiyō Kyōgen )  25, 47,

Dazu Huike. see also asura; yakṣa

179214

devaDescartes, René  289DentōrokuDen  250–51Denpōin Temple  32950104128, 51, 53, 57, 71, 89, 90, 96, 98, 100,, 107, 108, 115, 116, 123, 124,, 188, 193, 201, 202, 205, 209,, 220, 221, 231, 280, 325, , 140, 144, 164, 168, 177, 178,(see also Keitokudentōroku296 See Tokusan Senkan389 )

203, 214,

Deshan Xuanjian.

Devadatta  116, 124, 273, 287, 398, 399,411(s) ((s)  209, see also god)  25, 108, 395

dhāraṇīdharmaDharma (samādhi-6814734204295384, 72, 76, 104, 128, 130, 132, 135,, 35, 37, 38, 41, 42, 43, 44, 47, 66,, 149, 153, 163, 166, 185, 193,, 222, 227, 244, 264, 265, 280,, 297, 301, 307, 345, 354, 383,, 399, (s)  xvii, 6, 7, 15, 17, 23, 28, 32,see also205408, 215215Buddha-Dharma;

Dharma-eye treasury)  xv, xvii, xx, 3,Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; right–5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14 15, 18,, 23, 26, 29, 41, 42, 43, 50, 52, 53,

419, 75, 76, 77, 83, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93,, 95, 96, 97, 99, 100, 107, 108, 110,, 112, 113, 114, 115, 121, 123,, 127, 128, 129, 132, 133, 134,, 140, 141, 142, 146, 152, 157,, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164,, 167, 169, 171, 172, 174, 178, 6894111124138158166

201217244252269316356388400182, 185, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199,, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 212,, 232, 233, 240, 241, 242, 243,, 245, 247, 248, 249, 250, 251,, 253, 255, 256, 259, 263, 267,, 273, 287, 291, 295, 302, 310,, 329, 338, 342, 343, 344, 348,, 358, 382, 384, 385, 386, 387,, 389, 391, 392, 394, 397, 399,

gate(s)  12, 118, 264, 300, 327, 364descendant(s)  148, 161, 166body  131, 140children  162, 172form  83, 410, 401, 402, 404, 405, 406, 409,, 411 98

-

order  406name(s)  49, 55, 251, 259, 260, 345of nine divisions  387latter  18, 29, 159, 164, 175, 184, 198,imitative  18, 29, 158, 184, 407205, 250

right  4, 11, 12, 18, 20, 21, 29, 77, 95,practice(s)  75, 132, 197robe  78, 110, 176, 177, 251225113181, 114, 115, 128, 158, 159, 162,, 184, 197, 198, 201, 202, 207,, 291, 364, 382, 407

teacher(s)  9, 184, 248, 290, 382, 383,succession, successor  110, 204,396247–48, 249, 250, 251, 255, 256 treasury  97, 165, 199, 208transmission  13, 22, 163, 165, 204,title(s)  259, 260208, 212, 213, 256, 261, 275, 296 world(s), world of  xv, 5, 6, 15, 100,wheel  6, 10, 25, 32, 38, 42, 83, 135,225118269–70, 218, 223, 224, 226, 232,, 401, 273, 326 Dharma Flower (see also

Dharma King (Dharma hall  93, 250, 251, 342, 351,192352Dharma)  264, 265, 267, 270, 280, 226, , 375, 391376see also Buddha)  179,Flower of

Diamond SutraDiamond Buddha. dhyānaDhītika  236Dharma-nature  23, 222393(, 394, 397, 398, , see also(402see alsopractice, ascetic)  49, 55,289meditation)  11, 27, 38,See, 290, 295, 297, 298,Vajrasattva401 dhūta239

Dīpaṃkara  121309, 350, 351, 355

Dōgen (Dōan Kanshi  243, 359, 372Dōan Dōhi  243, 359, 372Dōgen (compiler of the 214 see also Eihei Dōgen)  xv, xvi,Keitokudentō roku)

6228xvii, xviii, xix, xx, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27,, 63, 65, 71, 75, 85, 86, 87, 89, 103,, 30, 31, 37, 38, 39, 41, 49, 57, 59,, 106, 107, 109, 121, 122, 123,

143124105, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 157,, 127, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141,, 185, 187, 190, 195, 212, 213,

183215

252–54262286311337238, 313, 331, 333, 334, 335, 336,, 263, 275, 279, 282, 284, 285,, 287, 289, 297, 303, 309, 310,, 217, 229, 230, 231, 233, 235,, 239, 242, 244, 245, 248–49, 251,, 255, 256, 257, 259, 260, 261,

Dokufuzan  295Dōin  295Dōkai (Dōhi (Dōgo Enchi  233357see also, 338, 341, 353, 354, 355, 356,, 367, 368, 371, see alsoDōan Dōhi)  237Fuyō Dōkai)  238, 251381 Donglin Changzong. Dongshan Liangjie. Dormitory of Quiescence  252, 260Donjō (Dōrin (135see alsosee alsosee alsoUngo Dōyō)  237Chōka Dōrin)  133–34,Ungan Donjō)  237Daii Dōshin)  158, 237SeeSeeTōzan Ryōkai)  52, 57, 67, 92,Shōkaku Jōsō

Dōshin (Dōyō (duṣkṛtaDragon King  165, 197, 231, 399Dragon Sea  21dragon(s) (94197227365168, 108, 109, 113, 123, 152, 159, 163,see also, 169, 178, 180, 184, 186, 188,, 198, 201, 209, 222, 224, 225,, 232, 241, 292, 296, 324, 364,, 369, 381, 395, 399, 400, 82see also nāga, 87                                   410

E

E (Eastern Han dynasty. East China Sea  24, 141, 258see also Yōgi Hōe)  252, 260See Later Han

Eastern Jin dynasty  88dynasty see also China)  5, 8, 15,

Eastern Lands (East Mountain  218, 219, 220, 221, 23016209, 24, 49, 55, 160, 166, 195, 199,, 248, 249, 365

Edo era  189Echū (Echizen  256see also Nan’yō Echū)  14, 67 eighteen realms  32, 37eight destinations  125, 229, 335see also Fuyō eight kinds of beings  98, 108Eighteenth Patriarch (Dōkai)  259see also Dōgen)  260, 372

Ejō (Eisai  4, 24Eiheiji  xvii, 260Eihei era, period  160, 199Eihei Dōgen (see also Koun Ejō)  53, 149

Ekishū 345elementsEkaku. Eka (five  224, 232, 318, 320four  69, 94, 106, 129, 139, 224see alsoSee Rōya EkakuTaiso Eka)  4, 237

three  318six  38, 224

esoteric Buddhism  26, 28Enō (year of)  70, 84, 101, 119, 136Enkan (Engo Kokugon  142, 259, 311, 317, 332,Enen (En (Eminent Conduct  407359see alsosee alsoSee see alsosee alsoFukushu DaianGoso Hōen; Jimyō Soen)  252Daikan Enō)  237, 246Sanshō Enen)  323Ryōzan Enkan)  104, 237

Enju.

Enō (

Esshū 53Etsu district  9, 34, 131, 248Etatsu  274

expedience, expediency, expedient means,Ever Zealous  406methods  220, 267, 269, 281, 284, 329,343, 384, 388, 396, 403, 404, 411

F

Facilities at Major Buddhist Monasteriesin the Southern Song

Fame Seeker  383See Bō, MinisterSee  375

Fichte, Johann Gottlieb  289Fenyang Shanzao. Feng. Fengxue Yanzhao. Fayan Wenyi. Far East  334Fang Xuanling. Fang. See Hyō, MinisterSeesee alsoHōgen Bun’ekiSeeSeeBōgenreiFun’yō ZenshōFuketsu EnshōDaiman Kōnin)

Fifth Patriarch (

First Council  239208, 332

five aggregates  31, 35, 69, 94, 106, 129,First Patriarch (24139257, 116, 124, 157, 172, 183, 242, 254,, , 344, 258 354see also Bodhidharma)

Foguang Ruman. five sects  200, 249Flower of Dharma (Flower-Light  389Five Records of the Torch. See Gotōrokufive peaks  320, 3349, 263, 264, 266, 267–68, 270–75,See, 285, 343, 383, HōtatsuSeesee also Lotus SutraBukkō Nyoman408    )

282 Foda.

four continents  108, 189, 213, 382, 407Founding Patriarch (Formosa Strait  259dharma)  77, 157, 195dhyāna heavens  39, 192see alsosee alsoDaikan Enō)Bodhi -343

Founding Patriarch (12, 92, 208, 242, 273, 317, 342,

four great rivers  186, 320, 334four elements  69, 94, 106, 129, 139, 224four four groups of followers  94, 98, 106,four lands  269, 284188, 394, 401

four oceans, seas  17, 320, 334four modes of birth  114, 123Four Noble Truths  xvi, xvii, 37, 234

Fourth Patriarch (fourth effect (Fourth Council  24095, 98, 106, 208, see alsosee also215arhat)  20, 26, 29,Daii Dōshin)

Fozhao Daguang. Four Universal Vows  107four views  230, 231Foyin Liaoyuan. 141, 158            SeeSeeButsuin RyōgenBusshō Tokkō

Fukaku. Fugen. See SeeUniversal VirtueŌryū Enan Fukanzazengi279, 286, 309, 356, 363–65, 367, (“Popular Edition”)  30, 363,21, 23, 27, 30, 56, 63, 229,386

ShinpitsubonRufubon367367 (“Original Edition”)  30,

Fukushu Daian (Fuketsu Enshō 155, 252, 260, 359Fukien  259Fukui prefecture  xvii, 40, 57, 262see also Chōkei Daian)

Fukushū province  253355, 359

Fun’yō Zenshō 121, 122, 252, 260, 359Furong Daokai. See

Fuyōzan (Fuyō Dōkai  229, 243, 259, 359, 372FuyōkyōFutōrokuFushu kuhanhō251214 (190see alsosee also Kataifutōroku357Mount Fuyō)  243,Fuyō Dōkai )  203,

Fuzhou province  49Fuzan Hōen  243

G

gandharvaGanen  125Gan. Gakudō yōjin shūGandhāra  240, 241See Nansen Fugan(s)  108, 188, 395, 26, 123           410

Ganges River  7, 158, 159, 196, 198,

Garland SutraGaoan Daiyu. Ganzan  253397, 409 See9, 26, 28, 76, 81, 85, 87,Kōan Daigu

395, 86

garuḍagasshōgate(s)  4, 7, 12, 16, 110, 118, 121, 146,123364(s)  108, 168, 178, 184, 188, 192,410, 187, 357 Gisei (Giver of Fearlessness (Gayata  237Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzōGenroku era  3Gensha Shibi  49–50, 51, 53, 55, 56, 57,Geyāśata  236, 314, 315, 316, 331Gichō  320, 334Genshazan  49Gensō, Emperor  295, 310German idealists  289Genshi  253, 359Gautama (universal  268authentic  3, 7, 8kiteśvara)  410258318–19335xv, xvii, 109, 123, 257, 368see also, 303, 305, 306, 309, 310, 311,, 337, 338, see also, 321, 322–23, 326–28, 333,Tōsu Gisei)  238359Buddha; Śākyamuni)see alsoxvii, 239Avalo -

god(s)  5, 7, 16, 17, 20, 25, 27, 33, 39, 43,9947, 108, 115, 116, 117, 123, 140, 141,, 57, 71, 77, 90, 93, 95, 96, 97, 98,, 161, 163, 165, 168, 169, 175,, 177, 178, 180, 181, 182, 188,, 202, 205, 207, 210, 212, 215,

158176201220

Gozu Hōyū  184, 359Gon (Goshōji  254GotōrokuGoso Hōen  48, 258, 259, 332, 359Golden Light Sutragoddess(es)  99, 169, 231Gohon (Godai Impō 230320see also, 221, 225, 269, 302, 307, 314,, 325, 393, 395, 400, 405, 409, see also214261Engo Kokugon)  252Tōzan Ryōkai)  346, 355350, 351, 357     410

Gotōegen

Gṛdhrakūṭa (Gozu Mountain, Gozusan  158, 184Vulture Peak)  24see also Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa; Great Compassion (Great Community (kiteśvara)  167, 169ghika)  240  see alsosee alsoMahā saṃ -Avalo -

Great Vehicle (Great Saint (Great Hall  254Great Eloquence  397see alsosee alsoBuddha)  219, 230Mahayana)  8, 9,

Great Wisdom Sutra. See Mahāprajñā -pāramitā-sūtra18382, 98, 162, 165, 175, 179, 273, 305,, 383, 387

See

Gyōshi (see also Seigen Gyōshi)  5, 237Gutei  368Guotai Hongdao. Guishan Lingyou. Guanxi Zhixian. Guangdong  265, 281see also Nan’in Egyō)  252SeeSeeKankei ShikanKokutai KōtōIsan Reiyū

Gyō (

H

Haku Kyoi  127, 133–34, 141Hakkun Shutan. Haihui Shoudan. SeeSeeKaie ShutanKaie Shutan

Han dynasty  152Hangyō Kōzen  xvii, 3Haku Shōgun  134Hakuyō Hōjun  63Hall of Serene Light  252, 260Hakulenayasas  237

Heart SutraHangzhou province  133, 375, 379Hangzhou Bay  141SeeSeePuṇyataraHōtei

Happy Buddha. Hannyatara. 25, 31, 35, 37, 38, 39, 47,

Heaven of Thoughtlessness  224286

HigekyōHekiganrokuHeiden district  253Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich  xv, 289187, 188, 259, 311, 214 336 Himālaya (see also

Hinokuma Shrine  320, 335Hinayana (Himalayas  186, 193, 24187Himalayas)  280, 88, 98, 108, 162, 214, see also Small Vehicle)  29,Child of the241

Hōgen Bun’eki  18–19, 29, 214, 249,Hōgen sect  5, 24, 29, 258, 279, 299, 309Hōgyō era  238, 253History of the Three Elements and FiveElements. See Sangoryakuki258, 309, 359

Hōshin (

householder(s)  94, 106, 175, 176, 192,Huanglong Huinan. Hōyū (Huangbo Xiyun. Hōtetsu (Hosho  314Hōtatsu  265–66, 267, 281, 342–43, 353,HōkyōzanmaiHōjō (Hokuzankeitokuryōonji  375, 379Hōgyōji  275Hōju  104Hōnei  254Hōtei (Hōseizan  243Honjō  28HonshōkyōHopeh province  310Hōrinji  157, 195, 265410354see alsosee alsosee also, 359see alsosee also189243Daibai Hōjō) 253Chinshū Fuke)  332, 356Gozu Hōyū) 158, 184Daizui Hōshin)  345, 355SeeMayoku Hōtetsu)  44SeeŌbaku KiunŌryū Enan

Hyō, Minister  17Hyakujō Ekai 86, 105, 122, 183, 201,Hunan province  155214, 243, 261, 338, 355

I

Ibu district  252

Imperial Court  320Iichi 248–49, 360Ihaku  214Igyō sect  5, 24, 122, 258, 280Igen (see also Yakusan Igen)  237

India, Indian  xvi, 11, 19, 20, 24, 28, 29,Imperial Palace  33547124186241302, 55, 63, 65, 75, 83, 85, 95, 103,, 154, 157, 158, 165, 183, 185,, 187, 188, 189, 195, 199, 240,, 242, 257, 258, 260, 264, 301,, 310, 321, 331, 336, 344, 354

Infinite Thought  410Indra (legends, mythology  108, 140, 191cosmology  85, 232, 27839, 90, 108, 116, see also Śakra-devānām-indra) 33,307

Īśvara  409IrokuIsan Reiyū  73, 105, 112, 122, 183, 214,Issaiji. Ise, Grand Shrines, Inner Shrine  320, 334Isō, Emperor  333Inscription on Believing Mind. See Shin-243jinmei311, 261, 295, 311, See Viśvabhū             360

J

Japanese  xviii, 26, 106, 107, 182, 191,Japan  24, 26, 28, 30, 59, 63, 86, 94, 98,Jambudvīpa  77, 85, 264, 278, 407language  xvii, xviii, xix, 27, 29, 39,2511802563329963187295367, 106, 114, 151, 152, 163, 167, 175,, 261, 320, , 189, 191, 210, 230, 238, 239,, 259, 261, 277, 279, 284, 320,, 334, 356, , 85, 86, 103, 105, 107, 152, 185,, 188, 190, 216, 244, 261, 279,, 309, 310, 332, 334, 335, 336,, 371, 373357381 Jewel Treasury (Jeta, Prince  367Jetavana Park  363, 367see also Ratnagarbha)

Jiangxi district, province  141, 338167, 169  See Kanchi Sōsan JibutsugenkiJianzhi Sengcan.

Jimyō Soen (121, 252, 260, see also334 360Sekisō Soen)  110,

Jūjuritsu JōkanseiyōJōmyō. Jōshū Jūshin  91, 104, 183, 303, 305,Jōshō. Jōsō (Jō Zenji. Jō  158, 184Jinshū  208, 215, 332, 367Jōkan Era Treatise on the Essence of310Government. See Jōkanseiyosee alsoSee, 345, 354, SeeSee(see also Precepts in Ten PartsFuyō DōkaiVimalakīrti334Tendō NyojōShōkaku Jōsō)  109, 110360        )

Junsō, Emperor  16, 2887

Jyōjiji  244

K

Ka. See

Kajō era  182, 193, 212, 250, 251, 252Kaie Shutan  252, 259, 303, 306, 310,Kahō  226, 233Kai (Kagen era  275360see alsoŚikhin393Fuyō Dōkai)  217 kalaviṅka

kalpaKālodāyin  231209(s)  9, 26, 66, 69, 90, 109, 147, 204,, 214, 255, 267, 273, 274, 323,, 343, 344, 393, 394, 399, 401,, 403, 404, 405, 168, 394, 404, 405, 407 407

324

bhadra-asaṃkheya402 257

successive  178, 324, 336sixty minor  273, 382of resplendence  246, 255, 261inkdrop  273of emptiness  217, 229

Kāṇadeva  124, 189, 236, 241of wisdom, of the wise  246, 255, 261

Kanchi Sōsan  242, 331, 360, 367, 372Kanbun era  3Kanakamuni  25, 235, 255, 261284

Kangen era  34, 53, 149, 256Kanfugenbosatsugyōhōkyō

Kankei Shikan  104–105, 260, 360, 368Kaniṣka  240Kanjizai. See Avalokiteśvara

Kannondōrikōshōgokokuji  62Kanki  22Kannondōri-in Temple  34

Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji  53, 59, 70, 84,101

Kant, Immanuel  289Kansu province  233Kanshi (Kannon-in Temple  75, 345256, 119, 182, 195, 212, 227, 238,, 275, 293, see also Dōan Kanshi)  237330

Kapilavastu  241Kantsū era  49 karma, karmic  56, 118, 131, 159, 177,Kapimala  189, 236, 241222, 225 Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtra. See HigekyōKaroku era  21, 30(see also robe)  20, 29, 78, 80, 86,

kaṣāya 214105188201–207, 215, 216, 247, 251, 348, 368, , 157, 158–72, 174–82, 185, 186,, 189, 190, 192, 194, 196, 197–98,, 208–209, 210–212, 213, 373 nine-stripe, of nine stripes  78, 210, 373merit(s) of  157, 163, 169, 179, 198,five-stripe  210199, 201, 204, 214 Kashmir  124, 241seven-stripe, of seven stripes  78, 210of sixty stripes  162, 174See Kashmir

Kaśmira. Kassan  252

Kato, Bunno  381Katei era  53Kauśika (Katei River, Valley  226, 233Kegonkyō Kassan Zenne 104, 233Katai era  214Kāśyapa  25, 160, 170, 171, 174, 184,Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch.28See Kataifutōroku236, 85, 247, 249, 255, 256, 257, see also(see also Garland Sutra(see also FutōrokuIndra)  33, 39 )261  )214  26,

Kataifutōroku

Kegon sect  26, 123Keigenfu  182, 212Keitoku era  214Keitokudentōroku296, 310, 311, 339, 356, 28, 105, 151, 214,358

Keitokuji  259Keitoku Era Record of the Transmissionof the Torch. See Keitokudentōroku

Keitokuzenji  244Ken  355Keiun  182,  212Kenchō era  45

Kenen (Kenchū-seikoku era  214see also Yellow Emperor)  319,

Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-EnglishDictionary334   187 Kidō Collection. See KidōshūKennin Temple  4244

kiṃnaraKinei, Emperor  281KidōshūKii-no-kuni  320, 335(s)  108, 168, 188, 395, 410

King of Majestic Voice (King of Love. King of Emptiness (See Aizenmyōōsee alsosee alsoKū-ō)  218

Kinmei, Emperor  21Kinkazan  328229, 407See Kraku cchanda     Kū-ō)

kōanKisō, Emperor 243, 332Kishō (Kisen (Kippōji, Kippō Temple  34, 53, 256, 262Kinzan Kokuitsu  141, 252Kinsennin. see also(s)  41, 72, 230, 259, 311, see alsosee alsoDaie Sōkō)  252Sekitō Kisen)  237Shōken Kishō)  148336

Kō (

Kōan Daigu  92, 105, 360Kōdō (see also

KKōdō Mountain, Kōdōzan  226, 233,Kōma. Kokutai Kōtō  338, 360Kōke Sonshō  252, 260, 360Kokutai-in Temple  328Kōkaku (Kojikiōfukuji  248319342, , 347, 352, 107184334see alsoKoreaYakusan Igen)  147, 153,Ungo Dōyō)  348, 355353

Kōkyō See

Kōnantōro (Kōmei, Emperor  160, 199see also Guangdong; Shōshū

Kōrai (Konponissaiubu hyaku ichi katsumaKonkōmyōsaishōōkyō. See Golden LightKōnin (Kongōkyō. See Diamond SutraKongōhannyaharamitsukyō. See Dia-Sutramond Sutradistrict)  281 see alsosee alsoSee(see also Golden LightKorea)  182, 216357KanakamuniDaiman Kōnin)  237189

Konkōmyōkyō Konjikisen. Sutra)  140,

Korea, Korean  182, 193, 212, 216, 320,Kośala  240, 241, 367346

Kōsei  226, 233, 319, 334See

KoshingiKōshō (Kōshō (Kō-shami (Kōshōhōrinji  136, 149, 307, 311, 352Kōsetsu. see alsosee also86see alsoVipaśyinDōgen)  303, 311Rōya Ekaku)  113, 122Śrāmaṇera Kō)  358

Kōtō (Kōsō, Emperor  332Kōshū district  243Kōsoshō  249Kōtei (see alsosee alsoKokutai Kōtō)  328Yellow Emperor)  233

Koun Ejō (

133, 141, 145, 147, 154,

Kōzu  116Kumārajīva  87, 184, 295, 381Kūkai  26Kraku cchanda  25, 235, 255, 261Kukkuṭapāda Mountain  240, 368Kōzei Daijaku (KōtōrokuKotokuzenin Temple  295203, 214(see also Tenshōkōtōrokusee alsosee alsoEjō)  262Baso Dōitsu)328 )

Kumāralabdha  236kum bhāṇḍaKū-ō (see also(s)  168,

Kyōgen Chikan  111, 122, 183, 259, 261,Kyōshin (Kyōgen (338of Majestic Voice)  229, 360, see alsosee also368King of Emptiness; KingTaiyō Kyōgen)  237Unmon Bun’en)  220,188

Kyushu  48Kyōzan Ejaku  73, 92, 105, 183, 253,Kyoto  3, 57, 59, 73, 88, 244, 296, 358Kyōzan (mountain, temple)  92, 93261230, 303, 305–306, 311, 360

L

Lalitavistara-sūtra. See FuyōkyōLake Anavatapta  165, 186

Land of Joy  394See

Later Han dynasty  5, 160, 199, 204Laozi  184Langye Huijiao.      Rōya Ekaku lay  121, 338, 351, 360disciple  45, 133, 367bodhisattva  175see also upāsaka)  11,

160213

laypeople, layperson  16, 20, 61, 71, 96,laywoman, laywomen (layman, laymen (16105, 29, 49, 55, 91, 106, 107, 110, 111,, 165, 184, 188, 196, 197, 208, 210,, 214, 234, , 158, 175, 176, 193, 201, 211, 250     see also upāsikā250       220)

lineage(s)  4, 10, 15, 26, 28, 84, 91, 141,Liangshan Yuanguan. Liang dynasty  116, 162, 175, 185, 242,Li. Li  143Sōtō  279Dōgen  24, 229five  4, 5, 19Hōgen  249, 279, 309Rinzai  4, 91, 242, 251, 252, 25415820528033616See, 91, 106, 107, 188, 210, , 159, 160, 183, 198, 200, 204,, 206, 243, 249, 254, 261, 279,, Ri, Minister384     See Ryōzan Enkan

Unmon  249, 279, 309See

Longya Judun. Long River  45, 48Longmen Fayan. lion seat  397, 401Linji Yixuan. Lingyun Zhiqin. SeeSeeRinzai GigenSeeReiun ShigonRyūmon ButsugenRyūtan Sōshin

Longtan Chongxin. See Ryūge Kodon

Lotus Sutra56183278287, 63, 72, 104, 106, 153, 154, 175,, 184, 185, 233, 244, 263, 265, 277,, 279, 280, 281, 283, 284, 285, 286,, 315, 351, 353, 355, 368–69, 381,xviii, xx, 23, 25, 26, 27, 38,

Anrakugyō396–412Practice”) chapter  27, 124, 350,(“Peaceful and Joyful

Daibadatta287400–402, 398–400(Dhāraṇī(“Devadatta”) chapter) chapter  410–(“Encourage11        -

DaraniFugen-bosatsu-kanpotsument of Bodhisattva Universal

Virtue”) chapter  278, 412

HiyuGohyaku-deshi-jukiFunbetsu-kudokuFive Hundred Disciples”) chapterMerits) chapter  406–407, 394–95 (“Discriminatin of(“Affirmation of

187

Hōben384–88140398–90(“A Parable”) chapter  281,, 142, 265, 281, 286, 287, 368,((“Expedient Means”) chapter“A Teacher of the Dharma”)

Hōsshi

Hōsshi-kudoku Teacher of the Dharma”) chapterchapter  123, 395–97(“The Merits of a

407

Jōfugyō-bosatsuJoDespise”) chapter  229, 407381–84(“Introductory”) chapter  142,((“Springing Out from“Bodhisattva Never

Jū-chi-yūshutsu 402–403the Earth”) chapter  124, 285,(“Affirmation

Ju-gaku-mugaku-nin-kiof Students and People Beyond

JukiStudy”) chapter  395(“Affirmation”) chapter  279, 392 Lotus Sutra Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumonKan-ji sal Gate of Bodhisattva Regarder ofchapter  400(“Exhortation to Hold Firm”(continued)     (“The Univer)     -

Ken-hōtōKejō-yuStupa”) chapter  286, 397–98chapter  392–9437the Sounds of the World”) chapter, 56, 121, 282–83, 350, 409–(“Parable of the Magic City”(“Seeing the Treasure(“Bodhisattva Won10- )

Myo-on-bosatsu

Myō-shōgun-ō-honjiderful Sound”) chapter  408–409

Nyorai-jinrikiKing Resplendent”) chapter  411–12(“The Story of Nyorai-juryōof the Tathāgata”) chapter  407–408(“The Mystical Power

Shingetime”) chapter  280, 403–405(“The Tathāgata’s Life-

Yaku-ō-bosatsu-honjiBodhisattva Medicine King”) chap-chapter  104, 185, 368, 390–91(“Belief and Understanding”(“The Story of)

Yakusō-yuchapter  391–92ter  408(“The Commission”) chapter(“Parable of the Herbs”)

Zuiki-kudokuZoku-ruiAcceptance”) chapter  213, 406408Ro    (“The Merits of Joyful

Luetchford, Michael and Yoko  xxLucknow  367Lu. See

Lushan  109Luoyang  124, 309

M

Madhyamāgama. See Middle Āgama

Madhyamaka school  241Madhyamaka-kārikāSutra        241

Magadha  30, 240, 314Magu Baoche. Mahā-brahman heaven  192See Mayoku Hōtetsu

Mahā kāśya pa  4, 11, 12, 24, 29, 30, 105,123249, 154, 160, 200, 236, 239, 240,, 257, 279, 280, 309, 344, 368, 104, 193, 233,392

Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtramahāprajñāpāramitā280pāramitā)  31, 35 (see also prajñā -(see

Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstraMahāprajñāpāramitāhṛdaya-sūtraMahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtraalso Heart Sutra)  31, 35 xix, 39142105, , 189,189

Mahāprajñā pāra mitopadeśa

Mahāsaṃghika PreceptsMahāratnakūṭa-sutra. See Dai hō sha k kyōsōgiritsu241 )  83, 85 (see also Maka mahāsattvaMahāsaṃghika school  88, 240400, 402, (see alsos)  33, 34, 39, 124, 167, 169,406       Great Vehicle)  25,

174, 190, 264, 279, 382, 383,

Mañjuśrī (mandala  26MakasōgiritsuMakashikanhogyōdenguketsumahoragaMaheśvara  409Maitreya (Mahayana (Majjhima-nikāya. See Middle ĀgamaPreceptsSutra98, 108, 162, 240, (see alsos)  108, 168, 188, )flowers  405  85, 191, 192Ajita)  52, 56, 134,241) 222395191, 231406

Makashikan

(see also Mahāsaṃghika88

Mannenji  253mandāravamaṇi (see also cintā maṇisee also Ajita) 124, 134, 263,399

264, 277, 279, 356, 368, 382, mantra, mantric  16, 28, 35, 248 Māra-pāpīyas  116Manura  237mappō. See Dharma, latter

Massan Ryōnen  91–92, 105, 360Marx, Karl  xvMaster Dogen’s Shobogenzo Mayokuzan  44Mayoku Hōtetsu (Maudgal yāyana  174, 190, 191See Baso Dōitsusee also Hōtetsu)  360xx meditation (Medicine King  395, 396Mazu Daoyi. see also dhyāna

merit(s)  7, 9, 115, 157, 158, 159, 163,four states of  34164182219, 169, 171, 172, 175, 179, 181,, 188. 191, 192, 204, 205, 212,, 399, 406–407     )  27, 32, 38

ten excellent  177, 179of the five sacred  168, 169, 188, 214169199kaṣāya,, 171, 177, 178, 179, 182, 198,, 201, 204, 205, 207, robe  157, 159, 163,212

Method of Taking Meals. See Fushu ku -han hōSee

Miaoxin. Micchaka  236, 240Myōshin

Monier Monier-Williams, Sir  xvii, 239mind-seal  13, 24, 298, 329, 363, 367Milky Way. Middle Āgama Sutramiddle way  xvSeeSeeSeeKōmeiLong RiverMañjuśrīsee also bhikṣu179                                                          )

Mingdi.

monk(s), monkhood (Monjushiri. 477796113160177xvii, xix, 11, 13, 18, 20, 29, 30, 38, 44,, 49, 50, 51, 55, 56, 61, 63, 64, 67,, 78, 79, 82, 86, 87, 91, 92–93, 94,, 97, 104, 105, 106, 107, 111, 112,, 121, 122, 124, 151, 153, 158,, 162, 163, 165, 166, 172, 175,, 178, 181, 182, 186, 188, 189, 190210230–31, 192, 193, 196, 199, 201, 208,, 252, 253, 254, 256, 258, 259,, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 220,, 261, 265, 281, 284, 287, 293,, 296, 301, 302, 303–304, 307,, 311, 317, 318, 325, 328, 331,, 333, 337, 342, 343, 346, 347,, 234, 240, 241, 242, 243, 249,

251260295309332348

mountain  291head  63, 249, 258, 348, 349, 350, 355,hall  61 64, 348, 376attendant  34, 240, 253, 376368377, 349, 350, 351, 352, 354, 367,, 376, 377

Mount Butō (Mount Fuyō (Mount Aikuō (Moshan Liaoran. Mount Chatha  278Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa (venerable  33, 39, 173, 190, 234, 317,318    see alsosee alsosee alsoSeesee also Massan RyōnenButōzan)  122Fuyōzan)  229Aikuōzan)  260Gṛdhrakūṭa)

Mount Hiei  24, 284381, 406

Mount Tendō (Mount Taiyō (Mount Nan  260Mount Nansen  230Mount Ōryū  121Mount Sumeru  85, 108, 213, 220, 230Mount Hoku  260Mount Taihaku  260Mount Kin  260see alsosee alsoTaiyōzan)  229Tendōzan)  260Tendaizan)  261

Mount Tendai (

Musai Ryōha  252, 253, 259, 360MyōhōrengekyōMusai (263, 280, see alsosee also381see alsoSekitō Kisen)  147, 154(see also Lotus SutraSetchō Jūken)  306,)

Myōkaku (311

Myōshin  92–93, 360mystic, mystical  5, 6, 7, 35, 103, 105,Myōzen  4, 23–24118310, 171, 190, 197, 215, 252, 254,, 337, 341, 398, 411

Mystic Light  383powers  34, 40, 170, 178, 179, 305, 310,365, 400, 404, 407, 408, 411, 412

N

Nāgārjuna  170, 236nāgaNadai  241(s) (see also dragon)  241, 395

Nanda  231Nangaku Ejō  5, 24, 27, 85, 113, 123, 141,Nakamae, Tadashi  xx161279, 335, 337, 338, 339, 360, , 154, 183, 184, 231, 261, 264,, 280, 317, 325, 328–29, 330, 332,368

Nanyue Huairang. Nan’yō Echū  28, 71, 122, 183, 191, 279,Nanyuan Huiyong. Nansen Fugan  104, 122, 183, 220,Nantai River  49Nanquan Puyuan. Nan’in Egyō  252, 260, 360Nangakuzan  75309230–31333, 360, 243, 310, 338, 354, SeeSeeSeeSeeNansen FuganNangaku EjōNan’in EgyōNan’yo EchūNan’yō Echū)360

Nanyang Huizhong.

Nepal  241Nen (National Master (14309see also, 28, 67, 68, 71, 111, 122, 300–307,Shuzan Shōnen)  252see also

Ningbo  194Ninji era  149, 182, 212, 227, 238, 256,Niaowo Daolin. Never Despise  407274, 293, 307, 330, See Chōka Dōrin352 Northern Zhou dynasty  242novice(s)  87, 115, 238, 376nun(s) (non-returner. Niutou Fayong. Nōninjakumoku. non-Buddhism, non-Buddhist(s),  12, 14,Nishijima, Gudo Wafu  xv, xvii, xviii, xx,nirvana  15, 28, 35, 69, 146, 147, 153,fine mind of  11, 265, 280hall  37710623911622116177, 65, 67, 68, 76, 77, 85, 96, 97, 115,, 124, 169, 201, 207, 219, 220,, 177, 186, 188, 189, 201, 210, , 223, 240, 241, 247, 255, 302, , 255, 269, 386, 401, see alsosee also bhikṣuṇīSee anāgāminTendō Nyojō)  4, 238, 260SeeSee39Gozu HōyūŚākyamuni )  92, 93, 105,404    376342

NyojōoshōgorokuNyojō (

O

once-returner. Ōbaku Kiun  71, 92, 104, 105, 145, 152,Old Pure Criteria. See KoshingiOne Hundred and One Customs of theŌbai Mountain, Ōbaizan  157, 165, 183,ponissaiubu hyaku ichi katsuma186183Mūla sarvāsti vādin School. See Kon -, 195, 208, , 220, 231, 260, See sakṛdāgāmin316 360

One Vehicle  264, 266, 269, 386, 387, 399On Experiencing the State. See SandōkaiSee

Ōryū sect  121Ōryū Enan  110, 121, 360Onkō.    Kāśyapa

P

pārājikaPanku. Pāli  137, 193, 258canon, scriptures  71, 186, 239See96Banko, 107 pāramitāexpedience  411dāna 27(s)  27, 31, 11, 411, 27, 411279 dhyāna

of knowing  264kṣāntiprajñāśīlasix  11, 27, 38, 63, 383, 398411272727(, see also prajñāpāramitā411, , 411411 see also prajñā -384 )  27, vīryawisdom-, of wisdom (pāramitā Pārśva  236Past Lives Sutra. See Honshōkyō)  38, 270,

157

pātrapatriarch(s)  4, 5, 8, 11, 12, 14, 16, 51,Patna  240ancestral  109, 127, 158, 161, 342,59157209249259299326365344, 65, 82, 83, 89, 118, 129, 130, 139,(see also, 182, 194, 212, 243, 249, 258, , 160, 163, 166, 179, 200, 208,, 213, 235, 239, 245, 246–47, 248,, 251, 252, 253, 254, 256, 258,, 264, 265, 266, 267, 297, 298,, 307, 314, 316, 317, 321, 325,, 337, 344, 345, 346, 347, 352,, 375, , 347377Buddhist, bowl)  62, 64,344

Buddhist  10, 12, 13, 16, 22, 28, 34, 59,ancient  18, 69, 22962118181209224246255302331371–72, 68, 75, 77, 82, 83, 84, 93, 109,, 130, 158, 160, 162, 163, 176,, 182, 202, 203, 204, 205, 208,, 210, 218, 219, 220, 221, 223,, 225, 226, 229, 232, 235, 239,, 248, 249, 250, 252, 253, 254,, 256, 267, 290, 293, 296, 301,, 306, 309, 323, 328, 329, 330,, 341, 342, 348, 352, 353, 356, lineage of  205, 206fifteenth (eighteenth (first (257see also, 258, see alsosee alsosee alsosee also354see alsoMahākāśyapa)  24, 249,Ānanda)  29, 257, 258Kāṇadeva)  124Nāgārjuna)  189Geyāśata)  314Saṃghanandi) fourteenth (

second (seventeenth (

thirty-second (third (332331see alsosee alsosee alsoŚāṇavāsa)  186Daikan Enō)  157,316Daiman Kōnin)

thirty-third (

twelfth (twentieth (195, 257, 264, 279, see alsosee alsosee alsoAśvaghoṣa)  239Gayata)  239

twenty-seventh (twenty-second (twenty-first (twenty-fourth (twenty-fifth (twenty-eighth (12424, 124, 157, 183, see alsosee alsosee alsosee alsosee alsoVasubandhu)  124248Vaśasuta)  239Bodhidharma)Siṃhabhikṣu)Manura)  239Prajñātara)

venerable  76, 91, 149, 250, 251, 302,303158, 304, 305, 306, 307, 310, , 344see also

power(s)  7, 21, 50, 92, 129, 176, 215,Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch’spiśācaPeshawar  241Platform SutraPatriarch (bodhi-Dharma Treasure. See Rokusodaishi -hō291bōdangyō(, 299, 302, 304, 306, 329, 364, s)  168, 398 188() 67see also Rokusodaishi -Buddha)  16, 17325392 bōdangyō

of confession  117, 118of the of the Buddha-Dharma  116, 134kaṣāya 168, 178, 189, 201 power(s) (of practice  116, 128mystical  171, 179, 305, 310, 365, 400,404, 407, 408, 411, continued)        412 of wisdom  302, 400to know others’ minds  171, 300, 301,ten  398304, 305, 306, See Abundant Treasures310

practice(s)  4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 16,Prabhū taratna. 1765127141166, 19, 21, 25, 28, 41, 43, 51, 60, 61,, 68, 75, 76, 77, 86, 91, 97, 99, 114,, 128, 129, 131, 133, 134, 138,, 142, 144, 147, 161, 162, 165,, 218, 219, 220, 221, 224, 225,, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 181,

217226277

ascetic, of austerity, hard (326316dhūta, 282, 283, 289, 293, 307, 315,, 227, 245, 247, 248, 255, 269,, 318, 320, 321, 323, 324, 325,, 327, 328, 342, 400 see also

Buddhist  10, 56, 139, 151, 282, 332,devotional  132, 140, 197dhāraṇī338, 341, )  55, 239, 209367, 215399

of

instantaneous  8gradual  8, 392Dharma  75, 132, 141, 197

subtle  12, 13power of  116, 128quiet-reflection  16, 28original  7, 76, 132, 141, 263, 268,mantra  16, 28269, 270, 404 practice and experience  6, 12, 13, 17,of zazen  3, 11, 12, 27, 28, 31, 39, 55,of the truth  59, 61, 203total  264, 278183, 355 41231, 44, 69, 75, 145, 219, 220, 222,

prajñāPrajña  8736527, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37, 38, 39, 90,, 305, 341, 342, 345, 363, 364,, , 205, 279, 307, (see also368 (wisdom)  xvii, 4, 6, 21,see also mahāprajñā -, wisdom)  31, 32,313

164

prajñāpāramitāPrajñātara  183, 229, 237, 242, 344, 354pāramitā; pāramitā, 34, 35, 303

33

pratyekabuddhaPrasenajit, King  367154384, 172, 177, 188, 197, 281, 290,, 386, 390, 395, (s)  27, 38, 94, 106, 123,409

precepts  16, 27, 32, 38, 39, 62, 87, 96,107171205239, 110, 122, 132, 163, 166, 170,, 175, 179, 186, 188, 203, 204,, 207, 208, 210, 211, 214, 231,, 242, 258, 260, 309, 315

ten important  100, 108ceremony  108bodhisattva  175, 176, 192

Precepts in Ten Partsuniversal  127, 138, 192two hundred and fifty  8783        (see also Jūjuritsu)

Puṇyatara  87Punarvasu  231Puṇyamitra  183, 237, 354

Puṇyayaśas  236Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteriesalso Zenenshingi

Pure Land sects  140Pure Land  82, 269, 405)  27, 86, 352 (see

Puruṣapura  241Pūrṇa  394

Q

Qingyuan Xingsi. See Seigen Gyōshi

R

Raian Temple  214Rāhula  83, 87Rāhulabhadra  236Rāgarāja. See Aizenmyōō

Rakan Keichin  29, 258, 309Rājagṛha  239, 240, 278, 381

Record of Ancient Matters. See KojikiRatnagarbha  188

Records of the TorchRecord of the Words of Master TendōRecord of the Origin of Things. SeeRecord of Answers to an Emperor. SeeNyojō. See NyojōoshogōrokuJibutsugenkiSōtairoku                               (see also Gotōroku)

Regarder of the Sounds of the World (Records of Transmission of the Torch.alsoSee Dentōroku203 Avalokiteśvara)  409–410       see

Reiun Shigon  112, 122, 141, 155, 183,261, 285, 360

Rekinin  62Reiyō district  295125, 214, 355

Rentōeyō

Ri Junkyoku  214right Dharma-eye treasury  xx, 11, 52,Ri, Minister  1694297, 160, 169, 181, 200, 265, 267, 280,, 306, 327

Rinzai Gigen  71, 91–92, 104–105, 148,154251, 183, 214, 220, 231, 243, 249,, 252, 260, 261, 325, 332, 335, 360

Rinzai lineage, sect  4, 5, 24, 71, 91, 251,252see also, 254, 288, 259, 280,

robe(s) (Ro (86, 94, 106, 110, 157–66, 169–70,see also kaṣāya, 185-86, 187, 190, 191, 192,Daikan Enō)  176)  21, 29, 50, 78,336

172–82

193 saṃghāṭi

nine-stripe  161, 173, 200, 213, 373antarvāsafive-stripe  161, 173, 174, 191249, 195–212, 229, 242, 243, 247,, 251, 254, 258, 291, 344, 373, 167173–74, 373, 173, 174, 188, 191,, 190                          400

125

RongoRōya Ekaku  113, 123, 360Ryogonkyō. See Śūraṃgama-sūtraRokusodaishihōbōdangyōRyōha (Ryōnenryō Dormitory  23Ryōkai (seven-stripe  161, 173, 174, 191uttarasaṃghāṭi260201–202see alsosee alsoMusai Ryōha)  252, 259,Tōzan Ryōkai)  237173, 174, 71190, 332

Ryōzan Enkan  243, 360, 372Ryūju (Ryūge Kodon  30, 118, 125, 360Ryūge Mountain  21, 30Ryūkō era  355Ryūmō (RyRyūsaku  260Ryūshō (Ryū Shūkei  158, 183, 196ūmon Butsugen  250, 258, 360see alsosee alsosee alsoNāgārjuna)  236, 241Nāgārjuna)  236, 241Nāgārjuna)  236, 241

Ryūtan Sōshin  72, 290, 291, 292, 295,Ryūzen  251296, 298, 299, 360

S

Saddhar ma puṇḍarīka-sūtraSacred Monk, image of  348, 349, 350Sāgara  399sahāLotus Sutra; Sutra of the Lotus Flowerof the Wonderful Dharma402world  49, 55, 82, 87, 315, 400,, 406, 410         ()see also  280, 381

Saishōōkyō. See Supreme King SutraSaichō  26 Śakra (Saisui River  334see also

Śakra-devānām-indra (175, 191, 409Śakra-devānām-indra)see also sakṛdāgāminŚakra)  39, 99, 191, 197, 381Indra;

Sanshōin Temple  323Sanshō Enen  260, 324, 325, 335, 336,sangha  xv, 50, 60, 104, 161, 174, 193,SangoryakukiŚāṇavāsa  165–66, 186, 208, 236śamathaSaṃghanandi  236, 315, 316, 331Samantabhadra. Samādhi, the State of a Jewel-Mirror. SeeŚākyamuni  4, 7, 12, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25,Śākya clan  184, 278-of receiving and using the self  3, 5, 8,337287Hōkyōzanmai26157171197236264302303, 32, 34, 70, 84, 90, 97, 98, 137,, 159, 160, 166, 167, 169, 170,, 172, 174, 182, 184, 188, 195,, 198, 200, 201, 202, 212, 226,, 247, 249, 255, 256, 261, 263,, 265, 269, 274, 278, 286, 289,, 306, 351, 383, 397, 399, 408, , , 348, 351, 376, 360(, s)  xvi, xvii, 3, 5, 8, 9, 23, 209,28305–306154, 242, 38333See, 106, See369Universal VirtueSanshō Enen215411 408–409412 samādhi215, 263, 265, 365, 384, (s)  205, 215 dhāraṇī

Sandōkai

Sansheng Huiran.

Sanskrit  xvii, xviii, 23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29,3085124184191232, 31, 37, 38, 39, 47, 55, 63, 64, 73,, 87, 88, 104, 106, 107, 108, 123,, 138, 140, 141, 154, 157, 160,, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190,, 192, 193, 213, 214, 215, 231,, 233, 239, 240, 241, 257, 258, 259284, 277, 278, 279, 280, 281, 283,

Sanskrit-English Dictionary350, 285, 286, 295, 311, 331, 337,, 353, 354, 356, 357, 358, 364,

Sarvāstivāda school  28, 87, 190Śāriputra  34, 35, 39, 77, 85, 190, 287,Sanzō  300–302, 303–307, 309, 310384, 385, 386, 388, 389      xviii, 239381

School of the Elders (Schiffer, Wilhelm  381240, 258 see also Thera vāda) Second Patriarch (Second Council  24024 254see also Taiso Eka)

secular  11, 29, 47, 49, 76, 77, 90, 93, 95,96160, 99, 106, 113, 114, 116, 117, 128,, 49, 55, , 165, 166, 173, 176, 178, 182,, 196, 199, 203, 208, 209, 210,, 219, 223, 225, 230, 300, 319

184

Seigen Gyōshi  5, 24, 145, 152, 154, 161,Seihō  18Seidō Chizō  338Seiryōji  295183264212, 184, 230, 242, 243, 254–55, 261,, 279, 295, 325, 337, 360, see alsosee alsoRyShinketsu Seiryō)  238ūmon Butsugen)  250290, 295, 298372

Seion (Seiryō (

Sekisō Soen (Sekimon-rinkanrokuSeiryū Commentariessee also368Jimyō Soen) 121

Senshi. Senika  14, 28, 65, 67, 68Sekitō Kisen 145, 148, 152, 153, 154,Sekitōsōan-no-uta242, 295, 353, 360, 369, 186242        372

SenjūhyakuenkyōSee

Sensu Tokujō  233, 360Sensō, Emperor  122Tendō Nyojō

Seppō Gison  49–50, 55, 230, 295, 309,310333, 313, 318–19, 320, 321–26, 327,, 335, 336, 337, 338, 360 Seventh Patriarch (Setsukōshō  249Seven Buddhas (Setchō Jūken  303, 306, 311, 361Setchō Chikan  24, 244, 360, 372Seppō Mountain, Seppōzan  49, 323ancient)  9, 25–26, 83, 127, 246, 247,, 254, 257, 264, see alsosee also394buddhas, sevenSeigen

251

shashuShibi county  53Shaolin Temple  xix, 11, 27, 124, 162,Shakamuni. Sha. 183Gyōshi)  24See, 185, 195, 203, 363, 63Gensha ShibiGensha Shibi, 86, 188, 355, See107Śākyamuni357367

Shibi. See

ShibunritsuShikō  252Shin Daichu. see alsoSee

Shinji-shōbōgenzōShingon sect  9, 26, 28ShingiShin (Shinketsu Seiryō  244, 361, 372Shijun (104233335see also, 122, 123, 140, 141, 155, 231,, 243, 283, 285, 296, 332, 333,, 336, 337, 338, 339, 353, 354, (see also see alsosee alsosee also242333Ryūtan Sōshin)  290, ZenenshingiTanka Shijun)  238367Kankei Shikan)  91, 92Jōshū Jūshin)  91, 104,Chōsha Keishin27Seppō Gison)  49, 55,, 47, 55, 57, 73, 85,)  82 355 Shikan (

Shinjinmei

Shinkaku (318, 323,

Shinsai (345, 354see also Daizui Hōshin)  345,

Shisen.

shiso. SeeShishuang Chuyuan. Shintō, Shintōist(s)  10, 26Shinshō (355 Seesuccession, certificate ofTōbaSee Sekitō KisenSee Jimyō Soen

Shitou Xiqian.

Shō (see also

Shōbōgenzōshōbō. See Chapter One, 41119229293Zenshō; Kōke Sonshō)  252, 45, 48, 53, 55, 56, 59, 70, 84, 101,, 136, 138, 142, 149, 181, 212, 227,, 238, 256, 257, 259, 274, 279, 285,, 307, 330, 352, 367, Dharma, rightxv–xx, 3, 22, 23, 24, 34, 38,Fuketsu Enshō; Fun’yoBendōwa xvi, xvii, xviii,381

Chapter Two, 390xix, 24, 25, 31–39, 47, 104, 279–29, 38, 71, 242, 310, 311, 385,, 393, 410Maka-hannya-hara mitsuGenjō-kōan231    4027–48, 72,, 3

Chapter Three,

Chapter Four, 12349–57, 310, 337, 394, , 125, 155, Jū-undō-shikiIkka-no-myōjo40058–6426,

Chapter Five, Chapter Six, 28, 65–73, 125, Soku-shin-ze-butsuSenjō36831075–88, 187,

Chapter Seven, 231, 242, 335, Raihai-tokuzui

Chapter Eight,

Chapter Nine, 121, 192, 310, 337, 368, 400, Keisei-sanshiki 89

Chapter Ten, 127–42109–125, 215, 384, , 338, 368, 395, Shoaku-makusaUji 139388, 143–55, 334,400xviii,29406,–108,

Chapter Thirteen, Chapter Twelve, Chapter Eleven, 195–216157–94331354, , 394382, 213, 214, 233, 240, 241,, 233, Kesa-kudokuDen-e 86, 194,29, 86,

Chapter Fourteen, 243, 259, 334, Busso406406Sansuigyō25, 28, 137,217–34355,

Chapter Fifteen,

Chapter Sixteen, 355184, 235–44, 257, 279, 331, 332, , 368   Shisho 55, 245–62, ShōbōgenzōChapter Seventeen, 353386394403xvii, xix, 27, 141, 142, 230, 263–87,, 354, 381, 382, 383, 384, 385,, 387, 388, 389, 390, 391, 392,, 396, 397, 398, 399, 400, 402,, 404, 405, 407, 408, 409, 410,(continuedHokke-ten-hokke)

Chapter Twenty, Chapter Nineteen, Chapter Eighteen, Latter)367Former)412, 4062828, 107, , 72, 107, 289–KokyōShin-fukatoku (TheShin-fukatoku (The297–311Kankin283, 313–39,96xvii, 63,

Chapter Twenty-one,

Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), 3764, 39, 56, 57, 215, 241, 242, 332,, 242, 341–58 Busshō

Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II), butsu-yuigi335        , 398, 404  Gyō -

Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), 4027, 189, 391, 407, 408, , 38, 106, 153, 154, 387, 385 411Daigo408JinzūBukkyōZazen-47

Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II),

Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), kōjō-no-jishin 242, 286, 368, 155, 239, 369368   InmoButsu-

Chapter Thirty-one (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), zanmai10324027259, 28, 57, 85, 103, 105, 151, 231,, 121, 124, 186, 191, 192, 215,, 242, 244, 261, 283, 309, , 333, 335, 367, 387, 388, 390  GyōjiKai-in-Juki55368391,279,

Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II), 394, 395

Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon

Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), 37, 56, 138, 188, 409  Arakan

Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. II), jushi26, 106, 189, 381, 386, 391Haku-

Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), gakudō287, 383104232, 310, , 407354             KōmyōMuchū-Shinjin-

Chapter Forty (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II), setsumu 232, 390, 401Gabyō 122,

Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III), 296140, , 232, 382 242        TsukiKūge30,

Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III),

Chapter Forty-four (Vol. III), 2728, 122, 229, , 242, 311, 332404       Ko busshinBodai -

Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III), satta-shishōbō 38, 398      Kattō39425,

103, 123, 231, 242, 257, 309,

404yuishin 71, 72, 232, 310, 390, 403,Sesshin-Sangai-

Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), sesshō

Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III), 230, 242, 243    Butsudō

Chapter Fifty (Vol. III), 14224, 71, 214, 242, 258, Shohō-jissō260

Chapter Fifty-one (Vol. III), 396, 232, 382, 383, 384, 387, 388,, 404   Mitsugo

Chapter Fifty-three (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III), seppōxix, 215, 230, 354, 383, 407244, 397124, 243, 388   BukkyōMujōChapter Fifty-five (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-four (Vol. III), 384     DaraniHosshō

Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III), 86215, 191, 400   SenmenZazengi

Chapter Fifty-eight (Vol. III), 286  Baike

Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-three (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-nine (Vol. III), 25924327404233385, 55, 85, 231, 232, 280, 333, , 405, 406, 408, 411, , 283, 284, 391, 396, 398, 401,, 387, 404 Juppō412ShunjūKajōKenbutsuHensanGanzei122402243244, ,

Chapter Sixty-seven (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), 243, 259, 333   Soshi-

Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), 123385sarai-no-ji 154        Hotsu-Udonge

, 154, 257, 261, 280, 309, 355,

Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-nine (Vol. III), shinmujōshinxviii, 106, 107, 124, 241, 405106, 336, 388, Hotsu-bodai -401

Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III),Nyorai-zenshin

Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), ō-zanmai399, 403, 404     56, 141, 283, 396,Zanmai-

Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV), bōrin391jūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō, 395, 399, 408, 25, 38, 24, 242, 244, 381, 259       411   139401Ten-San-, Chapter Seventy-five (Vol. IV), Chapter Seventy-six (Vol. IV), zanmaishugyō 57259, 139, 333, 400   Dai-Jishō-Kokū

Chapter Seventy-seven (Vol. IV),

Chapter Seventy-eight (Vol. IV),Chapter Seventy-nine (Vol. IV), 39Hatsu-u295, 240, 280, , 385 64              285      TashintsūAngo

Chapter Eighty (Vol. IV),

Chapter Eighty-three (Vol. IV), Chapter Eighty-one (Vol. IV), sendaba183, 310 230     Ō-saku-Shukke

Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV), no-gō186, 403241    ShimeSanji-

Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), Chapter Eighty-five (Vol. IV), Chapter Eighty-six (Vol. IV), shōbutsukudoku241 189190, 240, 310, 382, 393, , 387, 397        Shukke-Kie-411

Kuyō-

Chapter Eighty-eight (Vol. IV), sanbō

Chapter Eighty-nine (Vol. IV), inga 139405, 241     Shizen-bikuShinjin-

Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV),

Chapter Ninety-three (Vol. IV), Chapter Ninety-two (Vol. IV), Chapter Ninety-one (Vol. IV), butsu-yo-butsu39, 193, 240, 241232, 384        ShōjiYui-Dōshin28

Chapter Ninety-four (Vol. IV), 108106, 192    Jukai

seventy-five–chapter edition  41, 59ninety-five–chapter edition  xvii, 3, 59,297 Shōjō era  4, 24ShōdōkaShōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese. SeeGen daigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō107, 187, 233, 369

Shōmu, Emperor  176, 191Shojū 214Shōkaku Jōsō 110–111, 121, 361Shoko  123, 369Shoku district  92, 93Shōken Kishō  154, 361Shōken region  148, 155 See Shaolin

Shō River  51, 56Shōrinji, Shōrin Temple. Temple

Shū (Shōtoku, Prince  175–76, 191Shōshitsu Peak  27, 124Shōshū district  265, 342See Shuzan Shōnen

295

Shūitsu (Shūgetsu  249ShugyōhongikyōShoushan Shengnian. see also, 298see alsoTokusan Senkan)  290,Gensha Shibi)  49, 55123

Shukusō, Emperor  157, 175, 183, 191,Shushu district  233195, 301

Shuzan Shōnen  148, 154, 155, 255, 260,Sichuan province  105361 see also Pārśva)  240

Siṃha  237śīlaŚikṣānanda  87Śikhin  25, 235Side Saint ((see also pāramitā; precepts)  27, 38

Sixth Patriarch (six six states of existence, rebirth  6, 53, 57,Siṃhabhikṣu  1246619189pāramitā, 24, 71, 75, 122, 123, 124, 157,, 71, , 208, 246, 257, 261, 279, 316, 114s. See pāramitāsee also Daikan Enō)  5,(s), six 331 Small Vehicle (see also

Sōkaku (123, 223, 305, see also 306       Hinayana)  97, Sōji162

Sōkei (179183317, 206, 207, 208, 220, , 332, , 208, 246, 254, 255, 267, 273,see alsosee also343Daikan Enō)  157, 172,Nan’yō Echū)  68, 92Tendō Sōkaku)  165,238

Sōkei Mountain, Sōkeizan  157, 158,Sōkei (

Songshan Mountains (Songs from Sekitō’s Thatched Hut. See“Song of Experiencing the Truth.” Song dynasty (Sokkō  18–19, 29Sekitōsoan-no-utaShōdōka76196dynasty)  4, 5, 13, 17, 22, 49, 68, 71,230275200160, 93, 94, 97, 109, 162, 181, 182, 185,, 203, 205, 211, 212, 214, 220, 221,, 238, 243, 248, 252, 254, 256, 260,, 281, 291, 332, , 203, 242, 261, 265, 332, , 162, 172, 183, 185, 195, 196,see alsosee also355Southern SongSuzan342See

Soothill, William  381Mountains)  11, 27, 124, 183, 242see also, 334TōbaKanchi Sosan)  140, 237

Sōtō sect  5, 24, 154, 258, 279So Tōba. SōshiSōsan (Soshoku. Sōtairoku233SeeSee259Tōba                                    see also Song

Southern Song dynasty (

śrāvakaśramaṇa śrāmaṇeraŚrāmaṇera Kō (106177393dynasty)  332, 355, 375, 124, 132, 154, 169, 172, 177,, 178, 192, 212, 256, , (394s)  xvii, 26, 27, 38, 97, 99, 100,(see also(s) (see alsosee alsomonk)  22, 62, 87,novice)  87, 358,Kō-shami)  352275 188220, 189, 202, 205, 206, 207, 215,

Śrīmālā Sutra, Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanāda-srotāpannaSri Lanka  71, 240stage(s)  6, 13, 105, 152, 234, 273, 307Śrāvastī  240, 241, 367fifty-two  105, 215, 257, 311four, of myōkakufour stages of  38, 106, 215sūtra390, 223, 266, 281, 290, 384, 385,, 395, 396, 400, 406, 175śrāvaka10538, 191, 106, , 215, 257, s  38, 106, 215215       311409

tōkakuthree clever  91, 93, 94, 98, 105, 204,ten sacred  91, 93, 94, 98, 105, 204, 208,ten, of belief  105, 215, 311208215, 255, 257, 302, 304, 311, , 215, 255, 302, 304, 311, 105, 215, 257, 311             315315

Star Constellation King Flower  408Stanford University  234

Subhūti  33, 39stupa(s)  196, 260, 272, 273, 285, 286,stream-enterer. Stone Woman  217, 219treasure, of seven treasures  272, 273,378396, 387, 397 see also See srotāpannatransmission) 51,

succession(s) (certificate of  245, 247–49, 250,154249261251–52, 160, 195, 204, 245, 246, 247–48,, 250, 251, 252, 253, 255–56, 257,, 253, 254

Sun Goddess. Śukra  166, 186Sumeru Peak  394Sūgaku Peak  157, 158Sui dynasty  162, 175, 185, 232Sudatta  367 SeeSeeVairocanaAmaterasu

Sun Buddha.

Śūnyatā school  28śūnyatāSun Moon Light  382, 38328, 37, 285

Supreme King SutraŚūraṃgama-sūtraSupplementary Record of the Torch. SeeLight SutraZokutōroku)  351, 123(see also Golden357

sutra(s)  xviii, xix, 4, 5, 8, 18, 31, 37, 38,50154184212246295341349376397, 76, 85, 108, 113, 123, 128, 152,, 160, 162, 169, 175, 179, 182,, 188, 189, 191, 203, 204, 208,, 214, 216, 217, 223, 239, 240,, 258, 265, 266, 267, 273, 290,, 299, 309, 315, 316, 319, 331,, 342, 343, 345, 346, 347, 348,, 350, 351, 353, 354, 356, 357,, 383, 387, 393, 394, 395, 396,, 398, 400, 401, 406, 408, 412

Sutra of the Flower of DharmaSutra of Reflection on the Practice ofreading  5, 8, 61, 63, 245, 265, 305,Āgama  181, 193, 194, 202, 211, 214,Lotus Sutra397Virtue. See Kanfugen bosatsug Dharma by Bodhisattva Universal315350242, 406, 408, , 341–42, 343, 346, 347, 348,, 351, 352, 354, 355, 356, )  26, 267, 342–43, 396,412       (see alsoyo ho kyō376

Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonder-ful Dharma

Sutra of Three Thousand DignifiedSutra-reading Monk (Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonder-ful Law, TheForms for Ordained Monks263, 265, 381, 383, 394, 395, (see also Lotus Sutra381 see also Hōtatsu)75399, 82)

Suvarṇaprabhāsa-sūtra. See Golden267Light Sutra, 343 Suvarṇaprabhāsottamarāja-sūtra. SeeGolden Light Sutra; Supreme King

Suzan Mountains (Mountains)  116, 124SutraSee Shukusōsee also Songshan

Suzong.

T

Taisui Fazhen. Taiso Eka  24, 55, 103, 121, 123, 242,Taisō, Emperor  16, 28, 157, 175, 183,Taishitsu Peak  27, 124257191, 261, 361, , 195, 319–20, See372Daizui Hōshin334

Taiyōzan (Taiyō Kyōgen  243, 257, 361, 372see also

Tan (

Tanka Shijun  243–44, 361, 372Tang dynasty  13, 14, 28, 49, 67, 71, 91,Tamura, Yoshiro  381tāla122195325243tree  411see also, 133, 157, 162, 183, 185, 191,, 196, 203, 206, 265, 295, 301,, 334 Kaie Shutan)  252, 306Mount Taiyō)  217,

Tan River  51, 56tathāgata(s) (Tankazan  243see also

Tendai Chigi  26, 191, 260Tekisan. Tathāgata  xvii, 8, 11, 21, 83, 95, 98, 115,1351661842643907, 23, 34 , 148, 158, 160, 161, 162, 164,, 169, 172, 175, 176, 178, 181,, 203, 205, 206, 211, 225, 249,, 265, 273, 285, 383, 384, 386,, 395, 396, 403, 404, 406, See Yafu Dōsenbuddha-tathāgata)412

Tendai sect  24, 26, 28, 191, 260, 261, 284Tendai Fugan  261see also Mount Tendai) 253,

Tendaizan (254

Tendō Sōkaku (Tendō Nyojō (30260, 85, 103, 123, 139, 238, 244, 259,, 346, 361, see alsosee also372 Nyojō)  24, 27,Sōkaku) 244,

Tend361ō Temple  248, 249, 251, 252, 254,, 372

Tenshō era  214Tendōzan (Tengai  314Tennō Dōgo  295Tenpuku era  34, 4525524, 244, 251, 259, 260, see also Mount Tendō)  23,346

Third Patriarch (Theravāda, Theravādin(s)  40, 240, 258Tenshōkōtōroku Tenshō Era Record of the Widely Extend-316ing Torch. See Tenshōkōtōroku, 331    (see alsosee also KōtōrokuKanchi Sōsan))  214

three kinds of training  11, 39three kinds of burning pain, heat  159,three carts, parable of (three baskets. thirty-two marks  121, 188, 278184three)  266, 281, 282, 389, 198     See Tripiṭakasee also284, 285, carts,381

Threefold Lotus Sutra

three worlds (three (miserable) states, of existence  6, 25three properties  128, 131, 140Three Treasures (three poisons  115, 123three mirrors  319–20, 334, 335triple)  66, 71Dharma, and Sangha)  82, 104, 108,, 167, 188, see alsosee also405worlds, three,Buddha,

164

Tiantong Rujing. Tianjin, Tianjin Bridge  301, 302, 310SeeSeeTendō Nyojō

Tōba  109, 110, 121Tiantong Zongjue.         Tendō Sōkaku Tongan Guanzhi.

transmission (Tōzan Ryōkai (Tōsu Gisei  229, 243, 257, 259, 361, 372Tōsai  355Touzi Yiqing. Tokyo  335To Moku  230Tongan Daopi. Tokusan Senkan  55, 72, 289, 290, 295,Tokkō (Toku  140Tokujō (20211214361333, 13, 22, 24, 26, 59, 94, 95, 100,, 115, 123, 127, 157, 158, 160,, 165, 172, 181, 195, 199, 200,, 243, 249, 254, 261, 346, 355,, 367, , see also361see also372see alsoSeeSeesee alsoBusshō Tokkō)  252, 260Sensu Tokujō)  226, 233SeeTōsu GiseiDōan DōhiDōan Kanshisuccession)  9, 10,Ryōkai)  30, 125,

113163

213257, 203, 204, 206, 208, 210, 212,, 215, 235, 245, 247, 250, 256,

Tripiṭaka  124, 189, 193, 199, 214, 240,Tuṣita Heaven  310one-to-one  3, 11, 12, 94, 167, 209, 245,face-to-face  158, 160, 161, 172, 199,authentic  4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 16, 44, 76, 84,248309246298157169199–200209306, 258, 301, 302, 304, 306, 309, , 259, 261, 275, 292, 296, 299,, 159, 160, 162, 163, 164, 166,, 172, 181, 182, 195, 197, 198,, 210, 211, 212, 242, 254, 297,, 344, 203–204, 205, 207, 208,310

twelve entrances  32, 37twelve causal conditions, twelvefoldtwelve divisions of the teachings  147–48,cycle  10, 27, 393154

U

uḍum baraUngan Donjō  243, 355, 361, 372Universal Light  394Ungo Dōyō 57, 103, 125, 243, 355, 356,Uji district  53, 70, 84, 238, 243, 293,Ungozan  243, 348Universal Guide to the Standard Prac-352309361tice of Zazen. See Fukanzazengi, , , 355386372flower  154, 247, 254, 261,

Universal Virtue  264, 278, 412Universal Surpassing Wisdom  393

Unmon Bun’en  214, 220, 230, 234, 249,UnmonkōrokuUnmon sect  5, 24, 230, 258, 279, 299,Unmonzan  249Upananda  231Upagupta  236Upāli  173–74, 190309309, 311, , (311s) (see also361234 layman)  98, 99, 106,410

upāsaka107, 167, 385, 395, 406, 407,

Uzuran  314, 331Utpalavarṇā  170, 171, 189106, 107, 167, 85, 395, 406, 407, (s) (see also laywoman)  98, 99,410 upāsikā

V

Vajrasattva  9, 26vajraVajracchedikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra. SeeVaiśravaṇa  409Vairocana  9, 26, 85, 269, 284, 376Diamond Sutra410

Vasubandhu  124, 237, 241Vaśasuta  237Vajrayana  26

vehicle(s) (Vasumitra  236two  68, 115, 273, 302, 304, 305five  10, 27four  124three  10, 27, 147, 154, 168, 201, 266,363Vehicle; Small Vehicle)  154, 267,281, 390, 390see also Great Vehicle; One

Vimalakīrti Room  254Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtra. See VimalakīrtiVimalakīrti  67, 71, 338Vietnam  357Sutra       71, 184, 348

Vimalakīrti Sutra

Vipaśyin  25, 235, 257Vinaya in Four Divisions. See Shibun-Vinaya  87, 88, 169, 188, 189, 190, 214,ritsu239, 240, 28258 vipaśyanā

Vulture Peak (von Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm  289Viśvabhū  25, 235, 25711, 22, 24, 264, 265, 269, 272–73,, 280, 285, 286, 404, see also Gṛdhrakūṭa)  4, 8,405

278

W

Wanshi Shōgaku  243Wakayama prefecture  335Waisui  River  334Wai River  92353

Wanshijuko

Way, the  18, 32, 49, 107, 118, 319Wei dynasty  116See

Western Heavens (Weizheng. Weiyi. 15160209, 16, 24, 50, 55, 83, 85, 115, 124,, 162, 166, 172, 195, 199, 206,, 248, 249, 300, 302, 306, 310, SeeIichiGichōsee also India)  5, 8,365 wisdom (wheel-turning king(s)  99, 133, 196, 197,West River  301, 302Western philosophy  xv21331246282353, 32, 33, 35, 38, 39, 164, 169, 177,, , 264, 265, 266, 277, 279, 281,, 283, 302, 313, 315, 316, 345,, 354, 384, 400, 407, 408, 393see also prajñā)  20, 21, 24, 27,411

Buddha, buddha-, of the buddhas  7,15270, 187, 246, 263, 265, 266, 267,

inferior  8, 187complete, perfect  16, 23386of  255, 261, 271, 273, 280, 281, 384, 385,, 401, 402

Wisdom Accumulation  399--kalpaseal  pāramitā, pāramitā408     see alsoof  270, 384Chikō)

Wonder Sound  408world(s)  7, 9, 11, 17, 20, 25, 29, 34, 43,Wisdom-Brightness (17747100132179, 49, 63, 69, 82, 90, 91, 92, 97, 98,, 229, 255, 263, 264, 265, 267, 271,, 104, 109, 115, 116, 128, 129, 131,, 146, 147, 153, 162, 168, 169, 170,, 190, 196, 197, 202, 210, 218, 223,, 178

345317272226, 404, , 320, 325, 326, 337, 341, 343, 344,, 273, 280, 283, 285, 310, 313, 315, of aggregates  344, 345, 354403, 354, 386, 387, 388, 391, 400, 402,407

Buddha’s, of the buddhas 100, 101, 162of demons  25, 100Dharma, of the Dharma  xv, 5, 6, 15,100 of gods  25external  7, 39, 42, 118, 221, 289, 301,325269–70, 118, 218, 223, 224, 232,, 271, 273, 326 great-thousandfold, thousandfold,196three-thousandfold  20, 59, 63, 158,, 205, 271, 326, 392, 399, 402, human, of human beings  25, 55, 69,87232403, 96, 99, 128, 175, 189, 196, 226,, 248, 299, 302, 314 material, physical  106, 232literary  109, 134of the immaterial  71of hungry ghosts  25

sahāof matter  40, 71, 174, 175, 191, 192,23241049, 82, 87, 315, 400, 402, 406, spirit  14secular  29, 47, 76, 90, 93, 113, 128,173, 210, 225

of volition  71, 107, 175, 191, 192, 215three, triple  25, 66, 69, 71, 72, 95, 98,99, 269, 280, 283, 297, 301, 390, see also Buddha)404

Wuzu Fayan. Wuji Liaopai. Wu dynasty  152Wu, Emperor (worldly  17, 20, 60, 95, 114, 116World of the Bright Banner  174, 190–91World-honored One (33177397, 76, 164, 167, 168, 169, 173, 174,, 190, 382, 384, 386, 394, 395,, 403, 411Seesee alsoGoso HōenMusai RyōhaBu)  191, 336

See

X

Xuefeng Yicun. Xuedou Zhijian. Xuedou Chongxian. Xuanyuan. Xuansha Shibei. Xinghua Congjiang. Xiangyan Zhixian. See KenenSeeSeeSeeSeeSeppō GisonSeeSeeSetchō ChikanGensha ShibiKyōgen ChikanSetchō JūkenKōke Sonshō

Y

Yafu Dōsen  347, 355, 361Yangzi River  334Yang, Emperor  175, 191Yangqi Fanghui. Yafuzan  355Yangshan Huiji. yakṣaYakusan Igen (Yakusan Mountain  226, 342, 347, 352147–48353(s) , 355, 358, 361, 368, (see also, 151, 153, 233, 242, 243, 342,see alsoSeeSeedemon)  108, 395, 410see alsoKyōzan EjakuYōgi HōeKōdō)  52,372Yōshū)  244

Yamashiro-no-kuni (

Yaśo dharā  87Yefu Daochuan. Yellow Emperor (233, 319, 334Seesee alsoYafu DōsenKōtei)  226,

Yogācāra school  241Yōgi Hōe  252, 259, 260Yellow River  334Yellow Sea  258Yexian Guisheng. yin and yang 10, 26, 319, 320, See Shōken Kishō333

Yunyan Tansheng. Yunmen Wenyan. Yueshan Weiyan. Yuanwu Keqin. Yōshu 53, 70, 84, 238, 293, 310, 352Yōka Genkaku  107, 187, 233, 369Yō Kōshu 45Yōmei, Emperor  21Yoshida district  53, 256Yōgizan  259, 260Yōshū  244Yuancai. See GenshiSeeSeeEngo KokugonUngo DōyōYakusan IgenUnmon Bun’enUngan Donjō

Yunju Daoying. SeeSeeSee

Z

zazen  xviii, 3, 6, 7–8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 16,17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 25, 28, 31, 39, zazen (55184279367, 56, 61, 87, 107, 124, 139, 141, 183,, 193, 215, 229, 231, 234, 240, 242,, 281, 282, 286, 329, 355, 364, 365,, continued369 ) sect (hall(s)  13, 59, 63, 64, 86, 260, 277,chair  345, 346341see also, 351, 356, 357, 376, Zen, sect)  27377

Zen  16, 60, 105, 220, 274concentration (monastery(ies)  4, 13kōanmaster(s)  xix, 18, 19, 110, 135259, 310see also zazen)  364, 368

Zu. ZokutōrokuZokudentōrokuZengen. zōbō. SeeZhaozhou Congshen. Zenkō. Zhuangzi  184, 233Zhongzong. Zengaku-daijitenZenenshingiZhenxie Qingliao. Zhen dynasty  162, 185sect(s)  11, 26, 141SeeSeeTo MokuSeeDharma, imitativeMyōzenSee203Subhūti27, 63, Chūsō79214239SeeSeeShinketsu SeiryōJōshū Jūshin

BDK English Tripiṭaka(First Series)

Abbreviations

                                                                                                                                                                           Eng.:Skt.:Ch.:Jp.:    Japanese    Published title   Chinese   Sanskrit

Title                                                                                                  Taishō No. Ch.   Chang ahan jing (Skt.   Dīrghāgama 長阿含經)                                                                 1 Skt.   MadhyamāgamaCh.   Zhong ahan jing (中阿含經)                                                                  26

Ch.   Dasheng bensheng xindi guan jing (大乘本生心地觀經)                     159

Ch.   Fo suoxing zan (Skt.   Buddhacarita 佛所行讃)                                                                                                                                                                             192

Eng.  Ch.   Zabao zang jing (The Storehouse of Sundry Valuables雜寶藏經)                                                                 (1994)      203 Ch.   Faju piyu jing (Eng.  The Scriptural Text: Verses of the Doctrine, with Parables法句譬喩經)                                                      (1999)      211

Skt.   Aṣṭasāhasrikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtraCh.   Xiaopin banruo boluomi jing (小品般若波羅蜜經)                              227

Ch.   Jingang banruo boluomi jing (Skt.   Vajracchedikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra金剛般若波羅蜜經)                              235

Ch.   Daluo jingang bukong zhenshi sanmoye jing                                     243Skt.   Adhyardhaśatikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra         (大樂金剛不空眞實三麼耶經) Ch.   Renwang banruo boluomi jing (Skt.   *Kāruṇikārājā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra仁王般若波羅蜜經)                           245

487

Ch.   Banruo boluomiduo xing jing (Skt.   Prajñāpāramitāhṛdaya-sūtra 般若波羅蜜多心經)                             251

Skt.   Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraEng.  Ch.   Miaofa lianhua jing (The Lotus Sutra (Revised Second Edition, 妙法蓮華經)                                                       2007)                                                                                                              262

Ch.   Wuliangyi jing (無量義經)                                                                   276 Ch.   Guan Puxian pusa xingfa jing (觀普賢菩薩行法經)                             277

Ch.   Dafangguang fo huayan jing (Skt.   Avataṃsaka-sūtra   大方廣佛華嚴經)                                  279

Skt.   Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanāda-sūtraCh.   Shengman shizihou yisheng defang bianfang guang jing                   353Eng.           (The Sutra of Queen Śrīmālā of the Lion’s Roar勝鬘師子吼一乘大方便方廣經)           (2004)

Ch.   Wuliangshou jing (Skt.   SukhāvatīvyūhaEng.           Revised Second Edition, 2003)The Larger Sutra on Amitāyus無量壽經)                                                              (in The Three Pure Land Sutras,                                                                   360

Eng.  Skt.   Amitāyurdhyāna-sūtraCh.   Guan wuliangshou fo jing (         (in The Sutra on Contemplation of AmitāyusThe Three Pure Land Sutras,觀無量壽佛經Revised Second Edition, 2003))                                          365

Ch.   Amituo jing (Skt.   SukhāvatīvyūhaEng.           Revised Second Edition, 2003)The Smaller Sutra on Amitāyus阿彌陀經)                                                                       (in The Three Pure Land Sutras,                                                                   366

Skt.   Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtraCh.   Da banniepan jing (大般涅槃經)                                                          374

Ch.   Fochuibo niepan lüoshuo jiaojie jing (Eng.  The Bequeathed Teaching Sutra (in Apocryphal Scriptures,佛垂般涅槃略説教誡經2005))          389

Ch.   Dizang pusa benyuan jing (Skt.   *Kṣitigarbhapraṇidhāna-sūtra地藏菩薩本願經)                                      412

Skt.   Pratyutpanna-buddhasaṃmukhāvasthita-samādhi-sūtraEng.  Ch.   Banzhou sanmei jing (The Pratyutpanna Samādhi Sutra般舟三昧經)(1998)                                                     418 Title                                                                                                  Taishō No.

Ch.   Yaoshi liuli guang rulai benyuan gongde jing                                     450Skt.   Bhaiṣajyaguru-vaiḍūrya-prabhāsa-pūrvapraṇidhāna-viśeṣavistara         (藥師琉璃光如來本願功徳經)

Ch.   Mile xiasheng chengfo jing (Skt.   *Maitreyavyākaraṇa 彌勒下生成佛經)                                    454

Skt.   *MañjuśrīparipṛcchāCh.   Wenshushili wen jing (文殊師利問經)                                                 468 Skt.   Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtraEng.  Ch.   Weimojie suoshuo jing   (The Vimalakīrti Sutra (2004)維摩詰所説經)                                             475

Ch.   Yueshangnü jing (Skt.   Candrottarādārikā-paripṛcchā月上女經)                                                                480

Ch.   Zuochan sanmei jing (坐禪三昧經)                                                     614 Ch.   Damoduoluo chan jing (達磨多羅禪經)                                               618

Skt.   Samādhirāja-candrapradīpa-sūtraCh.   Yuedeng sanmei jing (月燈三昧經)                                                     639

Ch.   Shoulengyan sanmei jing (Skt.   Śūraṅgamasamādhi-sūtraEng.  The Śūraṅgama Samādhi Sutra首楞嚴三昧經(1998) )                                           642

Skt.   Suvarṇaprabhāsa-sūtraCh.   Jinguang ming zuishengwang jing (金光明最勝王經)                         665

Skt.   Laṅkāvatāra-sūtraCh.   Dasheng rulengqie jing (入楞伽經)                                                     672

Eng.  Skt.   Saṃdhinirmocana-sūtraThe Scripture on the Explication of Underlying Meaning解深密經)                                                                  (2000)      676 Ch.   Jie shenmi jing (

Ch.   Yulanpen jing (Skt.   *Ullambana-sūtraThe Ullambana Sutra盂蘭盆經(in ) Apocryphal Scriptures,                                                                    2005)                                                                                                              685

Eng. 

Ch.   Sishierzhang jing (Eng.  The Sutra of Forty-two Sections四十二章經)                                                           (in Apocryphal Scriptures, 2005)      784 Ch.   Dafangguang yuanjue xiuduoluo liaoyi jing                                       842Eng.            (The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經)                                                                         (in Apocryphal Scriptures, 2005) Skt.   Mahāvairocanābhisambodhi-vikurvitādhiṣṭhāna-vaipulyasūtrendra-Eng.  Ch.   Da Biluzhena chengfo shenbian jiachi jing                                         848         rājanāma-dharmaparyāya         (The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra大毘盧遮那成佛神變加持經) (2005)

Skt.   Sarvatathāgata-tattvasaṃgraha-mahāyānābhisamaya-mahākalparājaEng.  Ch.   Jinggangding yiqie rulai zhenshi she dasheng xianzheng dajiao         wang jing (The Adamantine Pinnacle Sutra金剛頂一切如來眞實攝大乘現證大教王經(in Two Esoteric Sutras,)                        2001)                     865

Eng.  Skt.   Susiddhikara-mahātantra-sādhanopāyika-paṭalaCh.   Suxidi jieluo jing (The Susiddhikara Sutra蘇悉地羯囉經(in Two Esoteric Sutras,)                                                        2001)                                                                                                              893

Skt.   *Mātaṅgī-sūtraCh.   Modengqie jing (摩登伽經)                                                               1300

Skt.   *Mahāsāṃghika-vinayaCh.   Mohe sengqi lü (摩訶僧祇律)                                                            1425

Skt.   *Dharmaguptaka-vinayaCh.   Sifen lü (四分律)                                                                                1428

Pāli   SamantapāsādikāCh.   Shanjianlü piposha (善見律毘婆沙)                                                   1462 Skt.   *Brahmajāla-sūtraCh.   Fanwang jing (梵網經)                                                                      1484

Ch.   Youposaijie jing (Skt.   Upāsakaśīla-sūtraEng.  The Sutra on Upāsaka Precepts優婆塞戒經)                                                           (1994)                                                                                                          1488

Skt.   Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-upadeśaCh.   Miaofa lianhua jing youbotishe (妙法蓮華經憂波提舍)                     1519

Ch.   Shizha biposha lun (Skt.   *Daśabhūmika-vibhāṣā十住毘婆沙論)                                                   1521 Title                                                                                                  Taishō No.

Ch.   Fodijing lun (Skt.   *Buddhabhūmisūtra-śāstraEng.  The Interpretation of the Buddha Land佛地經論)                                                                     (2002)                                                                                                          1530

Skt.   Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaCh.   Apidamojushe lun (阿毘達磨倶舍論)                                                1558

Skt.   Madhyamaka-śāstraCh.   Zhonglun (中論)                                                                                1564 Skt.   Yogācārabhūmi-śāstraCh.   Yüqie shidilun (瑜伽師地論)                                                             1579

Eng.  Ch.   Cheng weishi lun (         (in Demonstration of Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,成唯識論)                                                             1999)                                                                                                            1585

Skt.   TriṃśikāEng.  Ch.   Weishi sanshilun song (         (in The Thirty Verses on Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,唯識三十論頌)                                              1999)                                                                                                            1586

Eng.  Skt.   ViṃśatikāCh.   Weishi ershi lun (         (in The Treatise in Twenty Verses on Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,唯識二十論)                                                           1999)                                                                                                            1590

Eng.  Ch.   She dasheng lun (Skt.   MahāyānasaṃgrahaThe Summary of the Great Vehicle攝大乘論)                                                              (Revised Second Edition, 2003) 1593

Ch.   Bian zhongbian lun (Skt.   Madhyāntavibhāga 辯中邊論)                                                         1600

Skt.   MahāyānasūtrālaṃkāraCh.   Dasheng zhuangyanjing lun (大乘莊嚴經論)                                     1604

Skt.   KarmasiddhiprakaraṇaCh.   Dasheng chengye lun (大乘成業論)                                                   1609

Ch.   Jiujing yisheng baoxing lun (Skt.   Ratnagotravibhāga-mahāyānottaratantra-śāstra究竟一乘寳性論)                                  1611

Ch.   Yinming ruzheng li lun (Skt.   Nyāyapraveśa      因明入正理論)                                            1630 Ch.   Dasheng ji pusa xuelun (Skt.   Śikṣāsamuccaya 大乘集菩薩學論)                                        1636

Skt.   VajrasūcīCh.   Jingangzhen lun (金剛針論)                                                               1642

Ch.   Zhang suozhi lun (Eng.  The Treatise on the Elucidation of the Knowable彰所知論)                                                             (2004)                                                                                                           1645

Skt.   BodhicaryāvatāraCh.   Putixing jing   (菩提行經)                                                                  1662

Ch.   Jingangding yuqie zhongfa anouduoluo sanmiao sanputi xin lun    1665         (金剛頂瑜伽中發阿耨多羅三藐三菩提心論)

Ch.   Dasheng qixin lun (Skt.   *Mahāyānaśraddhotpāda-śāstraEng.  The Awakening of Faith大乘起信論(2005))                                                        1666

Ch.   Shimoheyan lun (釋摩訶衍論)                                                           1668

Ch.   Naxian biqiu jing (Pāli   Milindapañha 那先比丘經)                                                         1670

Ch.   Banruo boluomiduo xin jing yuzan (Eng.           (A Comprehensive Commentary on the Heart SutraPrajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya-sūtra) (2001)般若波羅蜜多心經幽賛)           1710

Ch.   Miaofalianhua jing xuanyi (妙法蓮華經玄義)                                   1716 Ch.   Guan wuliangshou fo jing shu (觀無量壽佛經疏)                              1753 Ch.   Sanlun xuanyi (三論玄義)                                                                  1852 Ch.   Dasheng xuan lun (大乘玄論)                                                            1853 Ch.   Zhao lun (肇論)                                                                                  1858

Ch.   Huayan yisheng jiaoyi fenqi zhang (華嚴一乘教義分齊章)               1866

Ch.   Yuanren lun (原人論)                                                                         1886 Ch.   Mohe zhiguan (摩訶止觀)                                                                  1911

Ch.   Xiuxi zhiguan zuochan fayao (修習止觀坐禪法要)                           1915

Ch.   Tiantai sijiao yi (天台四教儀)                                                            1931

Ch.   Guoqing bai lu (國清百録)                                                                 1934

Ch.   Zhenzhou Linji Huizhao chanshi wulu (Eng.  The Recorded Sayings of Linji (in Three Chan Classics,鎭州臨濟慧照禪師語録1999))     1985

Ch.   Foguo Yuanwu chanshi biyan lu (Eng.  The Blue Cliff Record (1998) 佛果圜悟禪師碧巖録)                   2003

Ch.   Wumen guan (Eng.  Wumen’s Gate無門關(in Three Chan Classics,)                                                                       1999)                                                                                                             2005

Eng.  Ch.   Liuzu dashi fabao tan jing (The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch六祖大師法寶壇經(2000))                                2008

Eng.  Ch.   Xinxin ming (The Faith-Mind Maxim信心銘)                                                                        (in Three Chan Classics, 1999)                                                                    2010

Ch.   Huangboshan Duanji chanshi chuanxin fayao                     

Eng.           (Essentials of the Transmission of Mind黄檗山斷際禪師傳心法要)                                                                        (in Zen Texts, 2005)                                                                                    2012A

Ch.   Yongjia Zhengdao ge (永嘉證道歌)                                                   2014

Ch.   Chixiu Baizhang qinggui (Eng.  The Baizhang Zen Monastic Regulations勅修百丈清規)(2007)                                         2025

Eng.  Skt.   SamayabhedoparacanacakraCh.   Yibuzonglun lun (The Cycle of the Formation of the Schismatic Doctrines異部宗輪論)                                                          (2004)                                                                                                            2031

Eng.  Skt.   AśokāvadānaCh.   Ayuwang jing (The Biographical Scripture of King Aśoka阿育王經)                                                                  (1993)                                                                                                            2043

Ch.   Maming pusa zhuan (Eng.           (in The Life of Aśvaghoṣa BodhisattvaLives of Great Monks and Nuns,馬鳴菩薩傳)                                                     2002)                                                                                                             2046

Ch.   Longshu pusa zhuan (Eng.           (in The Life of Nāgārjuna BodhisattvaLives of Great Monks and Nuns,龍樹菩薩傳)                                                    2002)                                                                                                             2047

Ch.   Posoupandou fashi zhuan (Eng.           (in Biography of Dharma Master VasubandhuLives of Great Monks and Nuns,婆藪槃豆法師傳2002) )                                     2049 Ch.   Datang Daciensi Zanzang fashi zhuan (Eng.           Monastery of the Great Tang DynastyA Biography of the Tripiṭaka Master of the Great Ci’en(1995)大唐大慈恩寺三藏法師傳)   2053

Ch.   Gaoseng zhuan (高僧傳)                                                                    2059

Ch.   Biqiuni zhuan (Eng.           (in Biographies of Buddhist NunsLives of Great Monks and Nuns,比丘尼傳)                                                                  2002)                                                                                                             2063

Eng.  Ch.   Gaoseng Faxian zhuan (         (in The Journey of the Eminent Monk FaxianLives of Great Monks and Nuns,高僧法顯傳)2002)                                                 2085

Ch.   Datang xiyu ji (Eng.  The Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions大唐西域記)                                                              (1996)              2087

Ch.   Youfangjichao: Tangdaheshangdongzheng zhuan                      2089-(7)         (遊方記抄: 唐大和上東征傳)

Ch.   Hongming ji (弘明集)                                                                        2102 Ch.   Fayuan zhulin (法苑珠林)                                                                  2122

Ch.   Nanhai jigui neifa zhuan (Eng.  Buddhist Monastic Traditions of Southern Asia南海寄歸内法傳)                                      (2000)   2125

Ch.   Fanyu zaming (梵語雑名)                                                                  2135 Jp.     Shōmangyō gisho (勝鬘經義疏)                                                        2185 Jp.     Yuimakyō gisho (維摩經義疏)                                                           2186 Jp.     Hokke gisho (法華義疏)                                                                    2187 Jp.     Hannya shingyō hiken (般若心經秘鍵)                                             2203

Jp.     Daijō hossō kenjin shō (大乘法相研神章)                                         2309 Jp.     Kanjin kakumu shō (觀心覺夢鈔)                                                      2312

Eng.  Jp.     Risshū kōyō (The Essentials of the Vinaya Tradition律宗綱要)                                                                     (1995)                                                                                                            2348

Jp.     Tendai hokke shūgi shū (Eng.  The Collected Teachings of the Tendai Lotus School天台法華宗義集)                                        (1995)                                                                                                                       2366

Jp.     Kenkairon (顯戒論)                                                                           2376 Jp.     Sange gakushō shiki   (山家學生式)                                                  2377

Jp.     Hizōhōyaku (Eng.  The Precious Key to the Secret Treasury秘藏寶鑰)                                                                     (in Shingon Texts, 2004)                                                                               2426

Eng.  Jp.     Benkenmitsu nikyō ron   (         TeachingsOn the Differences between the Exoteric and Esoteric(in Shingon Texts辨顯密二教論, 2004)             )                                          2427

Jp.     Sokushin jōbutsu gi (Eng.           (in The Meaning of Becoming a Buddha in This Very BodyShingon Texts, 2004)即身成佛義)                                                     2428

Jp.     Shōji jissōgi (Eng.  The Meanings of Sound, Sign, and Reality聲字實相義)                                                                 (in Shingon Texts, 2004) 2429 Jp.     Unjigi (Eng.  The Meanings of the Word Hūṃ吽字義)                                                                                  (in Shingon Texts, 2004) 2430 Eng.  Jp.     Gorin kuji myōhimitsu shaku (         and the Nine SyllablesThe Illuminating Secret Commentary on the Five Cakras(in Shingon Texts五輪九字明秘密釋, 2004) )                           2514

Jp.     Mitsugonin hotsuro sange mon (Eng.  The Mitsugonin Confession (in Shingon Texts,密嚴院發露懺悔文2004))                         2527

Eng.  Jp.     Kōzen gokoku ron (         (in A Treatise on Letting Zen Flourish to Protect the StateZen Texts, 2005)興禪護國論)                                                       2543

Jp.     Fukan zazengi (Eng.           (in A Universal Recommendation for True ZazenZen Texts, 2005)普勧坐禪儀                                                                                   )                                                              2580

Eng.  Jp.     Shōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury正法眼藏)                                                                     (Volume I, 2007)                                                                                          2582

Eng.  Jp.     Zazen yōjin ki (Advice on the Practice of Zazen坐禪用心記)                                                              (in Zen Texts, 2005)                                                                                      2586

Eng.  Jp.     Senchaku hongan nenbutsu shū (         on the Nembutsu Chosen in the Original VowSenchaku Hongan Nembutsu Shū: A Collection of Passages選擇本願念佛集(1997))                            2608 Jp.     Kenjōdo shinjitsu kyōgyō shōmon rui (Eng.           EnlightenmentKyōgyōshinshō: On Teaching, Practice, Faith, and(2003)       顯淨土眞實教行証文類)       2646

Jp.     Tannishō (Eng.  Tannishō: Passages Deploring Deviations of Faith歎異抄)                                                                              (1996)                                                                                                            2661

Eng.  Jp.     Rennyo shōnin ofumi (Rennyo Shōnin Ofumi: The Letters of Rennyo蓮如上人御文)                                               (1996)                                                                                                            2668

Jp.     Ōjōyōshū (往生要集)                                                                         2682

Jp.     Risshō ankokur on (Eng.           of the Orthodox Teaching and the Peace of the Nation         (in Risshōankokuron or The Treatise on the EstablishmentTwo Nichiren Texts,立正安國論2003)                                              )                                                       2688

Eng.  Jp.     Kaimokushō (Kaimokushō or Liberation from Blindness開目抄)                                                                        (2000)                                                                                                            2689

Eng.  Jp.     Kanjin honzon shō (         (in          by Introspecting Our Minds for the First Time at the         Beginning of the Fifth of the Five Five Hundred-year AgesKanjinhonzonshō or The Most Venerable One RevealedTwo Nichiren Texts,觀心本尊抄2003)                                                                             )                                                       2692

Ch.   Fumu enzhong jing   (Eng.           (in The Sutra on the Profundity of Filial LoveApocryphal Scriptures,父母恩重經2005) )                                                    2887

Jp.     Hasshūkōyō (Eng.  The Essentials of the Eight Traditions八宗綱要)                                                      extracanonical(1994)

Jp.     Sangō shīki (三教指帰)                                                       extracanonical

Eng.  Jp.     Mappō tōmyō ki (The Candle of the Latter Dharma末法燈明記)                                           extracanonical(1994)

Jp.     Jūshichijō kenpō (十七條憲法)                                           extracanonical

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SHOBOGENZO THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY VOLUME II

dBET PDF Version © 2017

All Rights Reserved

In January 1982, Dr. Numata Yehan, the founder of Bukkyo Dendo Kyokai (Society for the Promotion of Buddhism), decided to begin the monumental task of translating the complete Taisho edition of the Chinese Tripitaka (Buddhist canon) into the English language. Under his leadership, a special preparatory committee was organized in April 1982. By July of the same year, the Translation Committee of the English Tripitaka was officially convened.

The initial Committee consisted of the following members: (late) Hanayama Shoyu (Chairperson), (late) Bando Shojun, Ishigami Zenno, (late) Kamata Shigeo, Kanaoka Shuyu, Mayeda Sengaku, Nara Yasuaki, (late) Sayeki Shinko, (late) Shioiri Ryotatsu, Tamaru Noriyoshi, (late) TAMURA Kwansei. Uryuzu Ryushin, and Yuyama Akira. Assistant members of the Committee were as follows: Kanazawa Atsushi, Watanabe Shogo, Rolf Giebel of New Zealand, and Rudy Smet of Belgium.

After holding planning meetings on a monthly basis, the Committee selected one hundred thirty-nine texts for the First Series of translations, an estimated one hundred printed volumes in all. The texts selected are not necessarily limited to those originally written in India but also include works written or composed in China and Japan. While the publication of the First Series proceeds, the texts for the Second Series will be selected from among the remaining works; this process will continue until all the texts, in Japanese as well as in Chinese, have been published.

Frankly speaking, it will take perhaps one hundred years or more to accomplish the English translation of the complete Chinese and Japanese texts, for they consist of thousands of works. Nevertheless, as Dr. Numata wished, it is the sincere hope of the Committee that this project will continue unto completion, even after all its present members have passed away.

Dr. Numata passed away on May 5, 1994, at the age of ninety-seven, entrusting his son, Mr. Numata Toshihide, with the continuation and completion of the Translation Project. The Committee also lost its able and devoted Chairperson,

Professor Hanayama Shoyu, on June 16, 1995, at the age of sixty-three. After these severe blows, the Committee elected me, then Vice President of Musashino Women’s College, to be the Chair in October 1995. The Committee has renewed its determination to carry out the noble intention of Dr. Numata, under the leadership of Mr. Numata Toshihide.

The present members of the Committee are Mayeda Sengaku (Chairperson). Ishigami Zenno, Ichishima Shoshin, Kanaoka Shuyu, Nara Yasuaki, Tamaru Noriyoshi, Kenneth K. Tanaka, Uryuzu Ryushin, Yuyama Akira, Watanabe Shogo, and assistant member Yonezawa Yoshiyasu.

The Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research was established in November 1984, in Berkeley, California, U.S.A., to assist in the publication of the BDK English Tripitaka First Series. The Publication Committee was organized at the Numata Center in December 1991. Since then the publication of all the volumes has been and will continue to be conducted under the supervision of this Committee in close cooperation with the Editorial Committee in Tokyo.

Mayeda Sengaku

Chairperson

Editorial Committee of

the BDK English Tripitaka

On behalf of the Publication Committee, I am happy to present this contribution to the BDK English Tripitaka Series. The initial translation and editing of the Buddhist scripture found here were performed under the direction of the Editorial Committee in Tokyo, Japan, chaired by Professor Sengaku Mayeda, Professor Emeritus of Musashino University. The Publication Committee members then put this volume through a rigorous succession of editorial and bookmaking efforts.

Both the Editorial Committee in Tokyo and the Publication Committee in Berkeley are dedicated to the production of clear, readable English texts of the Buddhist canon. The members of both committees and associated staff work to honor the deep faith, spirit, and concern of the late Reverend Dr. Yehan Numata. who founded the BDK English Tripitaka Series in order to disseminate Buddhist teachings throughout the world.

The long-term goal of our project is the translation and publication of the one hundred-volume Taisho edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon, plus a few influential extracanonical Japanese Buddhist texts. The list of texts selected for the First Series of this translation project is given at the end of each volume.

As Chair of the Publication Committee, I am deeply honored to serve in the post formerly held by the late Dr. Philip B. Yampolsky, who was so good to me during his lifetime; the esteemed Dr. Kenneth K. Inada, who has had such a great impact on Buddhist studies in the United States; and the beloved late Dr. Francis H. Cook, a dear friend and colleague.

In conclusion, let me thank the members of the Publication Committee for the efforts they have undertaken in preparing this volume for publication: Senior Editor Marianne Dresser, Dr. Hudaya Kandahjaya, Dr. Eisho Nasu, Reverend Kiyoshi Yamashita, and Reverend Brian Nagata, President of the Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research.

John R. McRae Chairperson Publication Committee

Note on the BDK English Tripitaka Series Reprint Edition

After due consideration, the Editorial Committee of the BDK English Tripitaka Series chose to reprint the translation of Dogen5Shobogenzo by Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross (originally published under the title Master Dogen s Shobogenzo, Books 1-4, by Windbell Publications, 1994-1999) in order to make more widely available this exemplary translation of this important text. Volume

I of this edition of Shobogenzo: The True Dharma-eye Treasury was published in November 2007. The remaining volumes III and IV will be published in sequence in 2008.

Aside from the minor stylistic changes and the romanization of all Chinese and Japanese characters in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripitaka Series, this edition reproduces as closely as possible the original translation.

Contents

A Message on the Publication of the English Tripitaka

NUMATA Yehan    v

Editorial Foreword    Mayeda Sengaku    vii

Publisher’s Foreword    John R. McRae    ix

Note on the BDK English Tripitaka    Series Reprint Edition    xi

Translators’ Introduction    Gudo Wafu Nishijima

and Chodo Cross    xv

Shobogenzo: The True Dharma-eye Treasury, Volume II

Chapter Twenty-two. Bussho: The    Buddha-nature    3

Chapter Twenty-three. Gyobutsu-yuigi: The Dignified Behavior

of Acting Buddha    43

Chapter Twenty-four. Bukkyo: The Buddha’s Teaching    69

Chapter Twenty-five. Jinzu: Mystical Power    87

Chapter Twenty-six. Daigo: Great Realization    103

Chapter Twenty-seven. Zazenshin: A Needle for Zazen    115

Chapter Twenty-eight. Butsu-kojo-no-ji: The Matter of the Ascendant

State of Buddha    135

Chapter Twenty-nine. Inmo: It    151

Chapter Thirty. Gyoji: [Pure] Conduct and Observance [of Precepts]    163

Chapter Thirty-one. Kai-in-zanmai: Samadhi, State Like the Sea    229

Chapter Thirty-two. Juki: Affirmation    243

Chapter Thirty-three. Kannon: Avalokitesvara    261

Chapter Thirty-four. Arakan: The Arhat    273

Chapter Thirty-five. Hakujushi: Cedar Trees    283

Chapter Thirty-six. Komyo: Brightness    293

Chapter Thirty-seven. Shinjin-gakudo: Learning the Truth with

Body and Mind    305

Chapter Thirty-eight. Muchu-setsumu: Preaching a Dream in a Dream 319 Chapter Thirty-nine. Dotoku: Expressing the Truth    333

Chapter Forty. Gabyo: A Picture of a Rice Cake    343

Chapter Forty-one. Zenki: All Functions    355

Appendix. Chinese Masters    361

Glossary of Sanskrit Terms    365

Bibliography    371

Index    379

A List of the Volumes of the BDK English Tripitaka (First Series)

407

Translators’ Introduction

Preface by Gudo Wafu Nishijima

The Shobogenzo was written by Dogen in the thirteenth century. I think that reading the Shobogenzo is the best way to come to an exact understanding of Buddhist theory, for Dogen was outstanding in his ability to understand and explain Buddhism rationally.

Of course, Dogen did not depart from traditional Buddhist thought. However at the same time, his thought as expressed in the Shobogenzo follows his own unique method of presentation. If we understand this method, the Shobogenzo would not be difficult to read. But unless we understand his method of thinking. it would be impossible for us to understand what Dogen is trying to say in the Shobogenzo.

Buddhists revere the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Buddha means Gautama Buddha. Sangha means those people who pursue Gautama Buddha’s truth. Dharma means reality. Dogen’s unique method of thought was his way of explaining the Dharma.

Basically, he looks at a problem from two sides, and then tries to synthesize the two viewpoints into a middle way. This method has similarities with the dialectic method in Western philosophy, particularly as used by Hegel and Marx. Hegel’s dialectic, however, is based on belief in spirit, and Marx’s dialectic is based on belief in matter. Dogen, through the Buddhist dialectic, wants to lead us away from thoughts based on belief in spirit and matter.

Dogen recognized the existence of something that is different from thought; that is, reality in action. Action is completely different from intellectual thought and completely different from the perceptions of our senses. So Dogen’s method of thinking is based on action and, because of that, it has some unique characteristics.

First, Dogen recognized that things we usually separate in our minds are, in action, one reality. To express this oneness of subject and object Dogen says, for example:

If a human being, even for a single moment, manifests the Buddha’s posture in the three forms of conduct, while [that person] sits up straight in samadhi, the entire world of Dharma assumes the Buddha’s posture and the whole of space becomes the state of realization.

This sentence, taken from the Bendowa chapter (Chapter One), is not illogical but it reflects a new kind of logic.

Secondly, Dogen recognized that in action, the only time that really exists is the moment of the present, and the only place that really exists is this place. So the present moment and this place^the here and now—are very important concepts in Dogen’s philosophy of action.

The philosophy of action is not unique to Dogen; this idea was also the center of Gautama Buddha’s thought. All the Buddhist patriarchs of ancient India and China relied upon this theory and realized Buddhism itself. They also recognized the oneness of reality, the importance of the present moment, and the importance of this place.

But explanations of reality are only explanations. In the Shobogenzo, after he had explained a problem on the basis of action, Dogen wanted to point the reader into the realm of action itself. To do this, he sometimes used poems, he sometimes used old Buddhist stories that suggest reality, and he sometimes used symbolic expressions.

So the chapters of the Shobogenzo usually follow a four-phased pattern. First Dogen picks up and outlines a Buddhist idea. In the second phase, he examines the idea very objectively or concretely, in order to defeat idealistic or intellectual interpretations of it. In the third phase, Dogen’s expression becomes even more concrete, practical, and realistic, relying on the philosophy of action. And in the fourth phase, Dogen tries to suggest reality with words. Ultimately, these trials are only trials. But we can feel something that can be called reality in his sincere trials when we reach the end of each chapter.

I think this four-phased pattern is related with the Four Noble Truths preached by Gautama Buddha in his first lecture. By realizing Dogen’s method of thinking, we can come to realize the true meaning of Gautama Buddha’s Four Noble Truths. This is why we persevere in studying the Shobogenzo.

Notes on the Translation by Chodo Cross Source Text

The source text for Chapters Twenty-two to Forty-one is contained in volumes four to six of Nishijima Roshi’s twelve-volume Gendaigo-yaku-shobogenzd (Shobogenzo in Modern Japanese). The Gendaigo-yaku-shobogenzo contains Dogen’s original text, notes on the text, and the text rendered into modern Japanese. Reference numbers enclosed in brackets at the beginning of some paragraphs of this translation refer to corresponding page numbers in the Gendaigo-yaku-shobogenzo, and much of the material reproduced in the notes comes from the Gendaigo-yaku-shobogenzo.

The Gendaigo-yaku-shobogenzo is based upon the ninety-five-chapter edition of the Shobogenzo, which was arranged in chronological order by Master Hangyo Kozen sometime between 1688 and 1703. The ninety-five-chapter edition is the most comprehensive single edition, including important chapters such as Bendowa (Chapter One, Vol. I) and Hokke-ten-hokke (Chapter Seventeen, Vol. I) that do not appear in other editions. Furthermore, it was the first edition to be printed with woodblocks, in the Bunka era (1804-1818), and so the content was fixed at that time. The original woodblocks are still preserved at Eiheiji, the temple in Fukui prefecture that Dogen founded.

Sanskrit Terms

As a rule, Sanskrit words such as samadhi (the balanced state), prajM (real wisdom), and bhiksu (monk), which Dogen reproduces phonetically with Chinese characters, read in Japanese as zanmai, hannya, and biku, have been retained in Sanskrit form.

In addition, some Chinese characters representing the meaning of Sanskrit terms that will already be familiar to readers (or which will become familiar in the course of reading the Shobogenzo) have been returned to Sanskrit. Examples are ho (“reality,” “law,” “method,” “things and phenomena”), usually translated as “Dharma” or “dharmas”; nyorai (“Thus-come”), always translated as “Tatha-gata”; and shomon (“voice-hearer”), always translated as “sravaka.,’

The Glossary of Sanskrit Terms includes all Sanskrit terms appearing in this volume not included in the Glossary of Sanskrit Terms in Volume I.

Chinese Proper Nouns

In general Chinese proper nouns have been romanized according to their Japanese pronunciation—as Dogen would have pronounced them for a Japanese audience. Thus, we have let the romanization of all names of Chinese masters follow the Japanese pronunciation, while also adding an appendix showing the Chinese romanization of Chinese masters’ names.

Chinese Text

Dogen wrote the Shobogenzo in Japanese, that is to say, using a combination of Chinese characters (squared ideograms usually consisting of many strokes) and the Japanese phonetic alphabet which is more abbreviated. Chinese of course is written in Chinese characters only. Therefore when Dogen quotes a passage, or borrows a phrase, from a Chinese text—as he very often does—it is readily apparent to the eye as a string of Chinese ideograms uninterrupted by Japanese squiggles. We attempted to mirror this effect, to some degree, by using italics for such passages and phrases. (Editorial Note: In this BDK English Tripitaka Series edition, all such passages appear in quotemarks. Also, in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripitaka Series, all Chinese characters have been omitted in this reprint edition. Interested readers may consult the original Windbell Publications edition, Master Dogen s Shobogenzo, Books 14.)

The Meaning of Shobogenzo, “True Dharma-eye Treasury”

Sho means “right” or “true.” Ho, “law,” represents the Sanskrit “Dharma.” All of us belong to something that, prior to our naming it or thinking about it, is already there. And it already belongs to us. “Dharma” is one name for what is already there.

Hogen, “Dharma-eye,” represents the direct experience of what is already there. Because the Dharma is prior to thinking, it must be directly experienced by a faculty that is other than thinking. Gen, “eye,” represents this direct experience that is other than thinking.

Shobogen, “true Dharma-eye,” therefore describes the right experience of what is already there.

Zo, “storehouse” or ‘"treasury,,,suggests something that contains and preserves the right experience of what is already there. Thus, Nishijima Roshi has interpreted Shobogenzo, “true Dharma-eye treasury,” as an expression of zazen itself.

Any virtue that this translation has stems entirely from the profoundly philosophical mind, the imperturbable balance, and the irrepressible optimisim and energy of Nishijima Roshi.

shobogenzo

the true dharma-eye treasury

VOLUME II by

Dogen

[Chapter Twenty-two]

Bussho The Buddha-nature

91c7

Translator Note: Butsu means buddha and sho means nature, so bussho means buddha-nature. The Chinese characters read in Japanese as bussho represent the meaning of the Sanskrit word buddhatva, or buddha-nature; this was usually understood as the potential we have to attain the truth, or as something which we have inherently and which grows naturally day by day. But Master Dogen was not satisfied by such interpretations. In his view, the buddha-nature is neither a potential nor a natural attribute, but a state or condition of body and mind at a present moment. Therefore, he saw the buddha-nature neither as something that we might realize in the future, nor as something that we have inherently in our body and mind. From this standpoint, Master Dogen affirmed and at the same time denied the proposition “We all have the buddha-nature.,’ He also affirmed and at the same time denied the proposition “We all don t have the buddha-nature.,’ At first sight, these views appear contradictory, but through his dialectic explanation of the buddha-nature in this chapter, Master Dogen succeeded in interpreting the concept of the buddha-nature from the standpoint of action or reality.

[4] Sakyamuni Buddha says:

All living beings totally have1 the buddha-nature:

The Tathagata abides [in them] constantly, without changing at all.2

This is the turning of the Dharma wheel, as a lion’s roar, of our Great Master Sakyamuni. At the same time it is the brains and eyes of all the buddhas and all the patriarchs. It has been learned in practice for two thousand one hundred and ninety years (it now being the second year of the Japanese era of Ninji),3 through barely fifty generations of rightful successors (until the late Master Tendo Nyojo).4 Twenty-eight patriarchs in India5 have dwelled in it and maintained it from one generation to the next. Twenty-three patriarchs in China6

have dwelled in it and maintained it from one age to the next. The Buddhist patriarchs in the ten directions have each dwelled in it and maintained it. What is the point of the World-honored One’s words that “All living beings totally exist as the buddha-nature”? It is the words “This is something ineffable coming like this”7 turning the Dharma wheel. Those called “living beings,” or called “the sentient,” or called “all forms of life,” or called “all creatures,” are living beings and are all forms of existence. In short, “total existence” is “the buddha-nature,” and the perfect totality of “total existence” is called “living beings.” At just this moment, the inside and outside of living beings are the “total existence” of “the buddha-nature.” The state is more than only the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow that are transmitted one-to-one, because “you have got” my skin, flesh, bones, and marrow.8 Remember, the “existence” [described] now, which is “totally possessed” by “the buddha-nature,” is beyond the “existence” of existence and nonexistence. “Total existence” is the Buddha’s words, the Buddha’s tongue, the Buddhist patriarchs’ eyes, and the nostrils of a patch-robed monk. The words “total existence” are utterly beyond beginning existence, 92a beyond original existence, beyond fine existence, and so on. How much less could they describe conditioned existence or illusory existence? They are not connected with “mind and circumstances” or with “essence and form” and the like. This being so, object-and-subject as “living beings-and-total existence” is completely beyond ability based on karmic accumulation, beyond the random occurrence of circumstances, beyond accordance with the Dharma, and beyond mystical powers and practice and experience. If the total existence of living beings were [ability] based on karmic accumulation, were the random occurrence of circumstances, were accordance with the Dharma, and so on, then the saints’ experience of the truth, the buddhas’ state of bodhi, and the Buddhist patriarchs’ eyes would also be ability based on karmic accumulation, the occurrence of circumstances, and accordance with the Dharma. That is not so. The whole universe is utterly without objective molecules: here and now there is no second person at all. [At the same time] “No person has ever recognized the direct cutting of the root”; for “When does the busy movement of karmic consciousness ever cease?”9 [Total existence] is beyond existence that arises through random circumstances; for “The entire universe has never been hidden.”10 “The entire universe has never been hidden” does not necessarily mean that the substantial world is existence itself. [At the same time] “The entire universe is my

possession” is the wrong view of non-Buddhists. [Total existence] is beyond originally existing existence; for “it pervades the eternal past and pervades the eternal present.” It is beyond newly appearing existence; for “it does not accept a single molecule.” It is beyond separate instances of existence; for it is inclusive perception. It is beyond the “existence” of “beginningless existence”; for “it is something ineffable coming like this.” It is beyond the “existence” of “newly arising existence”; for “the everyday mind is the truth.”11 Remember, in the midst of total existence it is difficult for living beings to meet easy convenience.

When understanding of total existence is like this, total existence is the state of penetrating to the substance and getting free.

[10] Hearing the word “buddha-nature,” many students have misunderstood it to be like the “self” described by the non-Buddhist Senika.12 This is because they do not meet people, they do not meet themselves, and they do not meet with a teacher. They vacantly consider mind, will, or conscious-ness^which is the movement of wind and fire13^to be the buddha-nature’s enlightened knowing and enlightened understanding. Who has ever said that enlightened knowing and enlightened understanding are present in the buddha-nature? Those who realize enlightenment, those who know, are buddhas, but the buddha-nature is beyond enlightened knowing and enlightened understanding. Moreover, in describing the buddhas as “hose who realize and those 92b who know,” we are not describing the wrong views randomly expressed by those others as realization and knowing. And we are not describing the movement of wind and fire as realization and knowing.14 One or two concrete manifestations of a buddha or concrete manifestations of a patriarch are just realization and knowing. For many ages venerable predecessors have been to India and back and have instructed human beings and gods. From the Han to the Song dynasties they have been as [numerous as] rice plants, flax plants. bamboo, and reeds, but many of them have considered the movement of wind and fire to be the knowing and realization of the buddha-nature. It is pitiful that, because their pursuit of the truth became further and further removed, they are guilty of this error. Later students and beginners in Buddhism today should not be like that. We learn realization and knowing, but realization and knowing are beyond movement. We learn movement, but movement is not “the state like this.”15 If we are able to understand real movement, we will be able to understand real knowing and understanding. Buddha and nature have

arrived at that place and have arrived at this place.16 The buddha-nature is always total existence, for total existence is the buddha-nature. Total existence is not smashed into hundreds of bits and pieces, and total existence is not a single rail of iron. Because it is the holding up of a fist, it is beyond large and small. What already has been called “the buddha-nature” should not be equated with “saints” and should not be equated with “the buddha-nature.” [But] there is one group that thinks as follows: “The buddha-nature is like the seed of a plant or a tree. As the rain of Dharma waters it again and again, its buds and sprouts begin to grow. Then twigs, leaves, flowers, and fruit abound, and the fruit once more bears seeds.” Views like this are the sentimental thinking of the common person. If we do hold such views, we should investigate that seeds, and flowers and fruits, are all separate instances of the naked mind.17 In fruits there are seeds. The seeds, though unseen, produce roots, stalks, and so on. Though they do not gather anything to themselves, they grow into a 92c profusion of twigs, branches, and trunks. They are beyond discussion of inside and outside; and in time, past and present, they are not void.18 Thus, even if we rely on the view of the common person, roots, stalks, branches, and leaves may all be the buddha-nature that is born with them, which dies with them, and which is just the same as their total existence.

[14] The Buddha says.

Wanting to know the meaning of the buddha-nature,

We should just reflect19 real time, causes and circumstances.

When the time has come,

The buddha-nature is manifest before us.20

This “wanting to know the meaning of the buddha-nature” does not only mean knowing. It means wanting to practice it, wanting to experience it, wanting to preach it, and wanting to forget it. Such preaching, practicing, experiencing, forgetting, misunderstanding, not misunderstanding, and so on are all “the causes and circumstances of real time.” To reflect “the causes and circumstances of real time” is to reflect using “the causes and circumstances of real time”; it is mutual reflection through a whisk, a staff, and so on. On the basis of “imperfect wisdom,” “faultless wisdom,” or the wisdom of “original awakening,” “fresh awakening,” “free awakening,” “right awakening,” and so on, [“the causes and circumstances of real time”] can never

be reflected. “Just reflecting” is not connected with the subject that reflects or the object of reflection and it should not be equated with right reflection, wrong reflection, and the like: it is “just reflection” here and now. Because it is “just reflection” here and now it is beyond subjective reflection and it is beyond objective reflection. It is the oneness of “real time and causes and circumstances” itself; it is transcendence of “causes and circumstances”; it is the buddha-nature itself—the buddha-nature rid of its own substance; it is Buddha as Buddha himself; and it is the natural function as the natural function itself. People in many ages from the ancient past to the present have thought that the words “when the time has come. . .” are about waiting for a time in the future when the buddha-nature might be manifest before us.

[They think that,] continuing their practice with this attitude, they will naturally meet the time when the buddha-nature is manifest before them. They say that, because the time has not come, even if they visit a teacher and ask for Dharma, and even if they pursue the truth and make effort, [the buddha-nature] is not manifest before them. Taking such a view they vainly return to the world of crimson dust21 and vacantly stare at the Milky Way. People 93a like this may be a variety of naturalistic non-Buddhists. The words “Wanting to know the meaning of the buddha-nature” mean, for example, “Really knowing the meaning of the buddha-nature just here and now.”22 “Should just reflect real time, causes and circumstances” means “Know causes and circumstances as real time, just here and now!” If you want to know this “buddha-nature,” remember, “causes and circumstances as real time” are just it. “When the time has come” means “The time has come already! What could there be to doubt?” Even if there is a time of doubt, I leave it as it is—— it is the buddha-nature returning to me. Remember, “the time having come” describes not spending any time in vain through the twelve hours: “when it has come” is like saying “it has come already.” And because “the time has come,” “buddha-nature” does not arrive. Thus, now that the time has come, this is just the manifestation before us of the buddha-nature, whose truth, in other words, is self-evident. In summary, there has never been any time that was not time having come, nor any buddha-nature that was not the buddha-nature manifesting itself before us.

[19] The twelfth patriarch, Venerable Asvaghosa, in preaching the ocean of buddha-nature to the thirteenth patriarch,23 says,

The mountains, rivers, and the earth,

All relying on it, are constructed.

Samadhi and the six powers Depending upon it, manifest themselves.24

So these mountains, rivers, and earth are all the ocean of buddha-nature. As to the meaning of “All relying on it, are constructed,” just the moment of construction itself is the mountains, rivers, and earth. He has actually said “All are constructed relying on it”; remember, the concrete form of the ocean of buddha-nature is like this: it should never be related with inside, outside, and middle. This being so, to look at mountains and rivers is to look at the buddha-nature. And to look at the buddha-nature is to look at a donkey’s jaw or a horse’s nose. We understand, and we transcend the understanding, that “all rely” means total reliance, and reliance on the total.25 '“Samadhi and the six powers manifest themselves depending upon this.” Remember, the man-93b ifestation, the coming into the present, of the various states of samadhi, is in the same state of “all relying on the buddha-nature.” The “dependence upon this,” and the nondependence upon this, of all six powers, are both in the state of “all relying on the buddha-nature.” “The six mystical powers” are not merely the six mystical powers mentioned in the Agama sutras.26 “Six” describes “three and three before and three and three behind”27 as the six mys-tical-power paramitas?% So do not investigate the six mystical powers as “Clear, clear are the hundred things; clear, clear is the will of the Buddhist patriarchs.”29 Even if the six mystical powers hold us back, they are still governed by the ocean of buddha-nature.

[22] The Fifth Patriarch, Zen Master Daiman,30 is a man from Obai in the Kishu district.31 Born without a father, he attains the truth as a child. Thereafter he becomes “the one who practices the truth by planting pine trees.” Originally he plants pine trees on Seizan in the Kishu district. The Fourth Patriarch happens to visit there, and he tells the practitioner, “I would like to transmit the Dharma to you. But you are already too old. If you return [to this world] I will wait for you.” Master [Daiman] agrees. At last he is conceived in the womb of a daughter of the Shu family, who, the story goes, abandons [the baby] in the dirty water of a harbor. A mystical being protects him, and no harm comes to him for seven days. Then [the family] retrieves [the baby] and looks after him. When the boy reaches seven years of age, on

a street in Obai he meets the Fourth Patriarch, Zen Master Daii.32 The patriarch sees that, though only a small child, the master has an exceptionally shaped skull, and he is no ordinary child. When the patriarch meets him, he asks, “What is your name?”

The master answers, “I have a name, but it is not an ordinary name.” The patriarch says, “What name is it?”

The master answers, “It is buddha-nature.”

The patriarch says, “You are without the buddha-nature.”

The master replies, “The buddha-nature is emptiness, so we call it being without.”

The [Fourth] Patriarch recognizes that he is a vessel of the Dharma and makes him into an attendant monk. Later [the Fourth Patriarch] transmits to him the right-Dharma-eye treasury. [The Fifth Patriarch] lives on the East Mountain of Obai, mightily promoting the profound customs.

[25] Thus, when we thoroughly investigate the words of these ancestral masters, there is meaning in the Fourth Patriarch’s saying “What is your name?”33 In the past there were people [described as] “A person of ‘What’ country” and there were names [described as] “a ‘What’ name”[one person] was stating to another, “Your name is ‘What’ !”34 It was like saying, for example, “I am like that, and you are also like that.”35

The Fifth Patriarch says, “I have a name, but it is not an ordinary name.” In other words, “Existence is the name”36—not an ordinary name, for an ordinary name is not right for “existence here and now.”37

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In the Fourth Patriarch’s words, “What name is it?”,38 “What” means “This,” and he has dealt with “This” as “What,” which is a name. The realization of “What” is based on “This,” and the realization of “This” is the function of “What.” The “name” is “This,” and is “What.” We make it into mugwort tea, make it into green tea, and make it into everyday tea and meals.

The Fifth Patriarch says, “It is buddha-nature.” The point here is that “This” is “the buddha-nature.” Because it is “What,” it is in the state of “buddha.” How could the investigation of “This” have been limited to naming it “What”? Even when “This” is not right,39 it is already “the buddha-nature.” Thus, “This” is “What,” and it is “buddha”; and at the same time, when it has become free and has been bared, it is always a “name.” Just such a name is Shu. But it is not received from a father, it is not received from a grandfather,

and it is not the duplication of a mother’s family name. How could it be equated with a bystander?40

The Fourth Patriarch says, “You are without the buddha-nature.” These words proclaim that “You are not just anyone, and I leave [your name] up to you, but, being without, you are the buddha-nature! ”41 Remember the following, and learn it: At what moment of the present can we be “without” “the buddha-nature”? Is it that at the start of Buddhist life42 we are “without” “the buddha-nature”? Is it that in the ascendant state of Buddha we are “without” “the buddha-nature”? Do not shut out clarification of the seven directions, and do not grope for attainment of the eight directions! “Being without the buddha-nature” can be learned, for example, as a moment of samddhi. We should ask, and should assert, whether when the buddha-nature becomes buddha it is “without the buddha-nature,” and when the buddha-nature first establishes the mind it is “without the buddha-nature.” We should make outdoor pillars ask, we should ask outdoor pillars, and we should make the buddha-nature ask this question. Thus, the words “being without the buddha-nature” can be heard 94a coming from the distant room of the Fourth Patriarch. They are seen and heard in Obai, they are spread throughout Joshu district, and they are exalted on Daii [Mountain].43 We must unfailingly apply ourselves to the words “being without the buddha-nature.” Do not be hesitant. Though we should trace an outline of “being without the buddha-nature,” it has the standard that is “What,” the real time that is “You,” the devotion to the moment that is “This,” and the name, common to all, that is “Shu”: it is direct pursuit itself.

The Fifth Patriarch says, “The buddha-nature is emptiness,44 so we call it being without.”45 This clearly expresses that “emptiness” is not nonexistence.46 To express that the buddha-nature is emptiness, we do not say it is half a pound and we do not say it is eight ounces, but we use the words “being without.” We do not call it “emptiness” because it is void, and we do not call it “being without” because it does not exist; because the buddha-nature is emptiness, we call it “being without.”47 So real instances of “being without” are the standard for expressing “emptiness,” and “emptiness” has the power to express “being without.” This emptiness is beyond the emptiness of “matter is just emptiness.”48 [At the same time,] “matter is just emptiness” describes neither matter being forcibly made into emptiness nor emptiness being divided up to produce matter. It may describe emptiness in which emptiness is just

emptiness. “Emptiness in which emptiness is just emptiness” describes “one stone in space.”49 This being so, the Fourth Patriarch and the Fifth Patriarch pose questions and make assertions about the buddha-nature being without, about the buddha-nature as emptiness, and about the buddha-nature as existence.

[31]    When the Sixth Patriarch in China, Zen Master Daikan of Sokeizan,50 first visited Obaizan, the Fifth Patriarch,51 the story goes, asks him, “Where are you from?”

The Sixth Patriarch says, “I am a man from south of the Peaks.”52 The Fifth Patriarch says, “What do you want to get by coming here?”

The Sixth Patriarch says, “I want to become buddha.”

The Fifth Patriarch says, “A man from south of the Peaks is without the buddha-nature. How can you expect to become buddha?”53

[32]    These words “A man from south of the Peaks is without the buddha-nature” do not mean that a man from south of the Peaks does not have the buddha-nature, and do not mean that a man from south of the Peaks has the buddha-nature. They mean that the man from south of the Peaks, being without, 94b is the buddha-nature. “How can you expect to become buddha?” means “What kind of becoming buddha are you expecting?” Generally, the past masters who have clarified the truth of the buddha-nature are few. It is beyond the various teachings of the Agama sutras and it cannot be known by teachers of sutras and commentaries: it is transmitted one-to-one by none other than the descendants

of the Buddhist Patriarch. The truth of the buddha-nature is that we are not equipped with the buddha-nature before we realize the state of buddha; we are equipped with it following realization of the state of buddha. The buddha-nature and realization of buddha inevitably experience the same state together.

We should thoroughly investigate and consider this truth. We should consider it and learn it in practice for thirty years or twenty years. It is not understood by [bodhisattvas] in the ten sacred stages or the three clever stages. To say “living beings have the buddha-nature,” or “living beings are without the buddha-nature,” is this truth. To learn in practice that [the buddha-nature] is something that is present following realization of buddha, is accurate and true. [Teaching] that is not learned like this is not the Buddha-Dharma. Without being learned like this, the Buddha-Dharma could not have reached us today. Without clarifying this truth we neither clarify, nor see and hear, the realization

of buddha. This is why the Fifth Patriarch, in teaching the other, tells him, “People54 from south of the Peaks, being without, are the buddha-nature.”55 When we first meet Buddha and hear the Dharma, [the teaching] that is difficult to get and difficult to hear is “Living beings, being without, are the buddha-nature.” In “sometimes following [good] counselors and sometimes following the sutras,” what we should be glad to hear is “Living beings, being without, are the buddha-nature.” Those who are not satisfied in seeing, hearing, realizing, and knowing that “All living beings, being without, are the buddha-nature,” have never seen, heard, realized, or known the buddha-nature. When the Sixth Patriarch earnestly seeks to become buddha, the Fifth Patriarch is able to make the Sixth Patriarch become buddha~without any other expression and without any other skillful means~just by saying “A man from south of the Peaks, being without, is the buddha-nature.” Remember, saying and hearing the words 94c “being without the buddha-nature” is the direct path to becoming buddha. In sum, just at the moment of “being without the buddha-nature,” we become buddha at once. Those who have neither seen and heard nor expressed “being without the buddha-nature” have not become buddha.

[35] The Sixth Patriarch says,56 “People have south and north, but the buddha-nature is without south and north.” We should take this expression and make effort to get inside the words. We should reflect on the words “south and north” with naked mind. The words of the Sixth Patriarch’s expression of the truth have meaning in them: they include a point of view that “People become buddha, but the buddha-nature cannot become buddha”—does the Sixth Patriarch recognize this or not? Receiving a fraction of the superlative power of restriction57 present in the expression of the truth “being without the buddha-nature,” as expressed by the Fourth Patriarch and the Fifth Patriarch, Kasyapa Buddha and Sakyamuni Buddha and other buddhas possess the ability, in becoming buddha and in preaching Dharma, to express “totally having the buddha-nature.” How could the “having” of “totally having” not receive the Dharma from the “being without” in which there is no “being without”? So the words “being without the buddha-nature” can be heard coming from the distant rooms of the Fourth Patriarch and the Fifth Patriarch. At this time, if the Sixth Patriarch were a person of the fact, he would strive to consider these words “being without the buddha-nature.” Setting aside for a while the “being without” of “having and being without,” he should ask,

“Just what is the buddha-nature?” He should inquire, “What concrete thing is the buddha-nature?” People today also, when they have heard of the buddha-nature, do not ask further, “What is the buddha-nature?” They seem only to discuss the meaning of the buddha-nature’s existence, nonexistence, and so on. This is too hasty. In sum, the “being without” that belongs to various denials of existence should be studied under the “being without” of “being without the buddha-nature.” We should sift through two times and three times, for long ages, the Sixth Patriarch’s words, “People have south and north, but the buddha-nature is without south and north.” Power may be present just in the sieve.58 We should quietly take up and let go of the Sixth Patriarch’s words 95a “People have south and north, but the buddha-nature is without south and north.” Stupid people think, “The human world has south and north because it is hindered by physical substance, whereas the buddha-nature, being void and dissolute, is beyond discussion of south and north.” Those who guess that the Sixth Patriarch said this may be powerless dimwits. Casting aside this wrong understanding, we should directly proceed with diligent practice.

[38] The Sixth Patriarch preaches to disciple Gyosho,59 “That without constancy is the buddha-nature. That which has constancy is the mind that divides all dharmas into good and bad.”60

“That without constancy”61 expressed by the Sixth Patriarch is beyond the supposition of non-Buddhists, the two vehicles, and the like. Founding patriarchs and latest offshoots among non-Buddhists and the two vehicles are without constancy, though they cannot perfectly realize it. Thus, when “that without constancy” itself preaches, practices, and experiences “that without constancy,” all may be “that without constancy.” If people can now be saved by the manifestation of our own body, we manifest at once our own body and preach for them the Dharma.62 This is the buddha-nature. Further, it may be sometimes the manifestation of a long Dharma body and sometimes the manifestation of a short Dharma body. Everyday63 saints are “that without constancy” and everyday commoners are “that without constancy.” The idea that everyday commoners and saints cannot be the buddha-nature may be a stupid view of small thinking and a narrow view of the intellect. “Buddha” is a bit of body, and “nature” is a bit of action.64 On this basis, the Sixth Patriarch says “That without constancy is the buddha-nature.” “The constant” is the unchanging. The meaning of “the unchanging” is as follows: even though we

turn it into the separating subject and transform it into the separated object, because it is not necessarily connected with the traces of leaving and coming, it is “the constant.”65 In sum, “that without constancy” of grass, trees, and forests is just the buddha-nature. And “that without constancy” of the body-and-mind of a human being is the buddha-nature itself. National lands and mountains and rivers are “that without constancy” because they are the buddha-nature. The truth of anuttara samyaksabodhi, because it is the buddha-95b nature, is “that without constancy.” The great state ofparinirvana, because it is “that without constancy,” is the buddha-nature. The various people of small views of the two vehicles, together with scholars of the Tripitaka who teach sutras and commentaries and the like, might be astonished, doubting, and afraid at these words of the Sixth Patriarch. If they are astonished or doubting, they are demons and non-Buddhists.

[42] The fourteenth patriarch, the Venerable Ryuju, called Nagarjuna66 in Sanskrit, and called either Ryuju, Ryusho, or Ryumo in Chinese,67 is a man from western India, and he goes to southern India. Most people of that nation believe in karma for happiness. The Venerable One preaches for them the subtle Dharma. Those who hear him say to each other, “The most important thing in the human world is that people possess karma for happiness. Yet he talks idly of the buddha-nature. Who can see such a thing?”

The Venerable One says, “If you want to realize the buddha-nature, you must first get rid of selfish pride.”

The people say, “Is the buddha-nature big or is it small?”

The Venerable One says, “The buddha-nature is not big and not small, it is not wide and not narrow, it is without happiness and without rewards, it does not die and it is not born.”

When they hear these excellent principles, they all turn from their original mind. Then the Venerable One, from his seat, manifests his free body, which seems like the perfect circle of a full moon. All those gathered only hear the sound of Dharma; they do not see the master’s form. In that assembly is a rich man’s son, Kanadeva.68 He says to the assembly, “Do you know what this form is or not?”

Those in the assembly say, “The present [form] is something our eyes have never before seen, our ears have never before heard, our minds have never before known, and our bodies have never before experienced.”

Kanadeva says, “Here the Venerable One is manifesting the form of the buddha-nature to show it to us. How do we know this? It may be presumed that the formless state of samddhi69 in shape resembles the full moon. The meaning of the buddha-nature is evident and it is transparently clear.” After these words, the circle disappears at once, and [the master] is sitting on his seat. Then he preaches the following verse:

[My] body manifests the roundness of the moon,

By this means demonstrating the physique of the buddhas.

The preaching of Dharma has no set form.

The real function is beyond sounds and sights.

[45] Remember, the true real function is beyond the momentary manifestation of sounds and sights, and the real preaching of Dharma has no set form. The Venerable One has preached the buddha-nature for others far and wide, innumerable times, and now we have quoted just one such example. “If you want to realize70 the buddha-nature, you must first get rid of selfish pride.” We should intuit and affirm the point of this preaching without fail. It is not that there is no realization; realization is just “getting rid of selfish pride.” “Selfishness” is not of only one kind. “Pride” too has many varieties. Methods of “getting rid” also may be of myriad diversity, but they are all “realization of the buddha-nature,” which we should learn as realization through the eyeballs and seeing71 with the eyes. Do not associate the words “buddha-nature is not big and not small. . .” with those of the common person or the two vehicles. To have thought, one-sidedly and stubbornly, that the buddha-nature must be wide and great, is to have been harboring a wrong idea. We should consider, as we hear it now, the truth which is restricted just in the moment of the present by the expression “Beyond big and beyond small.” For we are able to utilize [this] hearing as consideration. Now let us listen to the poem preached by the Venerable One, in which he says, “My body manifests the roundness of the moon,/By this means demonstrating the physique of the buddhas.” Because his “manifestation of a body” has already “by concrete means demonstrated the physique of the buddhas,” it is “the roundness of the moon.” So we should learn all length, shortness, squareness, and roundness as this “manifestation of a body.”72 Those who have become more and more unfamiliar with “body” and with its “manifestation” are not

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only ignorant of “the roundness of the moon,” but are also other than “the physique of the buddhas.” Stupid people think that what the Venerable One calls “the roundness of the moon” is the manifestation of a fantastically transformed body. This is the wrong idea of types who have not received the transmission of the Buddha’s truth. At what place and at what moment might there be another manifestation of a different body? Remember, at this time the Venerable One is simply seated upon his high seat. The manner in which his body manifests itself is just the same as in the case of any person seated here now. This body is just “the roundness of the moon” manifesting itself. “The body manifesting itself” is beyond square and round, beyond existence and nonexistence, beyond invisibility and visibility, and beyond the eighty-four thousand skandhas: it is just the body manifesting itself. “The roundness of the moon” describes the moon of “This place is the place where something ineffable exists; explain it as fine or explain it as coarse!”73 Because this body 96a manifesting itself “first must have got rid of selfish pride,” it is not that of Nagarjuna: it is “the physique of the buddhas.” And because it “demonstrates by concrete means”74 it lays bare “the physique of the buddhas.” That being so, the periphery of “buddhas” is irrelevant. Though the buddha-nature has “transparent clarity” which “in shape resembles the full moon,” there is no arranging of a round moon form.75 Furthermore, “the real function” is beyond sounds and sights. “The body manifesting itself” also is beyond the visual body and beyond the world of aggregation. Its appearance is the same as that of the world of aggregates, but it is “demonstration by concrete means”; it is “the physique of the buddhas.” Such is the aggregation of Dharma preaching, which “has no set form.” When that which “has no set form” further becomes “the formless state of samadhi,” it is a “body manifesting itself.” The reason that although the whole assembly is now watching the distant form of the round moon, “the eyes have never before seen it,” is that it is the totality of Dharma preaching transforming the moment, and it is “the manifestation of a free body” being “beyond sounds and sights.” “Momentary disappearance”76 and momentary appearance are the stepping forward and stepping back of a circle.77 “Then, from his seat, he manifests his free body,” just at which moment, “all those gathered only hear the sound of Dharma; they do not see the master’s form.” The Venerable One’s rightful successor, Venerable Kanadeva, clearly “knows this” as the form of the full moon, he

“knows this” as the roundness of the moon, he “knows this” as the body manifesting itself, he “knows this” as the nature of the buddhas, and he knows this as the physique of the buddhas. Though there are many who have entered [the master’s] room and had their pots filled, there may be none to equal Kanadeva. Kanadeva is a venerable one [worthy] of a half-seat,78 and is a guiding master to the order, a complete authority in an auxiliary seat.79 His having received the authentic transmission of the right-Dharma-eye treasury, the supreme and great Dharma, is similar to the case of Venerable Maha-kasyapa who was the chief seat on Vulture Peak. Nagarjuna had many disciples before his conversion, when he belonged to the teachings of non-Buddhism, but he has bid them all farewell. Having become a Buddhist patriarch, Nagarjuna authentically transmits the great Dharma-eye treasury to Kanadeva as the one rightful successor to be given the Dharma: this is the one-to-one transmission of the Buddha’s supreme truth. Nevertheless, wrong groups of usurpers often boast, “We also are the heirs to the Dharma of the great Nagarjuna.” They make commentaries and put together interpretations, often having feigned the hand of Nagarjuna himself. [These works] are not the works of Nagarjuna. Groups discarded long ago [by Master Nagarjuna] disturb and confuse human beings and gods. Disciples of the Buddha should solely recognize that [teachings] not transmitted by Kanadeva are not the truth of Nagarjuna. This is right belief and the right conclusion. But many accept what they know to be fake. The stupidity of living beings who insult the great prajna is pitiful and sad.

[52] Venerable Kanadeva, the story goes, indicating Venerable Nagar-juna’s body manifesting itself, tells the assembly, “Here the Venerable One is manifesting the form of the buddha-nature to show it to us. How do we know this? It may be presumed that the formless state of samadhi in shape resembles the full moon. The meaning of the buddha-nature is evident and it is transparently clear.” Among the skinbags of the past and present who have seen and heard the Buddha-Dharma that has now spread through the heavens above, through the human world, and through the great thousand Dharma worlds, who has said that a body manifesting its form is the buddha-nature? Through the great thousand Dharma worlds, only Venerable Kanadeva has said so. The others only say that the buddha-nature is not seen by the eyes, not heard by the ears, not known by the mind, and so on. They do not

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know that the body manifesting itself is the buddha-nature, therefore they do not say so. The ancestral master does not begrudge them [the teaching], but their eyes and ears are shut and so they cannot see or hear it. Never having established body-knowing, they cannot make out [the teaching]. As they watch from afar “the formless state of samadhi” whose “shape resembles the full moon,” and as they do prostrations to it, it is “something their eyes have never before seen.” “The meaning of the buddha-nature is evident and it is transparently clear.” So the state in which the body manifesting itself preaches the buddha-nature is “transparently clear” and is “evident.” And the state in which the preaching of the buddha-nature is a body manifesting itself is “demonstration, by concrete means,” of “the physique of the buddhas.” 96c Where could there be one buddha or two buddhas who failed to realize as “the buddha-physique” this “demonstration by concrete means”?80 “The buddha-physique” is “a body manifesting itself.” The buddha-nature exists as “a body manifesting itself.” Even the thinking of a buddha or the thinking of a patriarch, which expresses and understands [the buddha-nature] as the four elements and the five aggregates, is also moments of “a body manifesting itself.” [Master Nagarjuna] has spoken of “the physique of the buddhas”: the world of aggregation is a state like this, and all virtues are this virtue. The buddha-virtue is to master this state of “a body manifesting itself,” and to bag it conclusively.81 The going and coming of all the countless and boundless virtues are individual moments of this “body manifesting itself.” But since the time of Naga^una and Kanadeva, master and disciple, the many people who have done Buddhist practice through all directions of the three countries82 in former ages and in later ages have never said anything to equal Nagarjuna and Kanadeva. How many sutra teachers, commentary teachers, and the like have blundered past the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs? Since long ago in the great kingdom of Song, whenever [people] have tried to depict this story, it has been impossible for them to depict it with body, to depict it with mind, to depict it in space, or to depict it on a wall. Vainly painting it with brushes, they have drawn above the Dharma seat a circle like a round mirror, and have seen this as the present “body of Nagarjuna manifesting the roundness of the moon.” While the frosts and flowers of several hundred years have appeared and fallen, [their pictures] have been trying to form splinters of metal in people’s eyes, but no one has called them mistaken. It is pitiful.

Myriad matters have been bungled like this. If anyone understands that “the body manifesting the roundness of the moon” is a circle, that is a genuine case of a painted rice cake.83 If we made fun of such a person, we might die of laughter. It is regrettable that among laypeople and monks throughout the great kingdom of Song, not even one has heard and understood the words of Nagarjuna or penetrated and realized the words of Kanadeva. How much less could they be directly familiar with the state of “the body manifesting itself”? They are blind to the round moon, and they have lacked the state of the full moon. This is due to negligence in emulating the ancients, and deficiency in venerating the ancients. Past buddhas and recent buddhas must just experience the real state of “the body manifesting itself,” and never savor a pictured rice cake. Remember, in the depiction of the image of “the body manifesting the roundness of the moon,” there must be the body manifesting its form upon the Dharma seat. [Depiction of] raising of the eyebrows and winking of an eye should be straight and direct. The skin, flesh, bones, and marrow that are the right-Dharma-eye treasury must inevitably be sitting in the mountain-still state. The face breaking into a smile should be conveyed, because it makes buddhas and makes patriarchs.84 If these pictures are different from the form of the moon, then they lack “the shape of reality,”85 they do not “preach Dharma,” they are without “sounds and sights,” and they have no “real function.” If we seek the state of “a body manifesting itself” we should picture “the roundness of the moon,” and when we picture “the roundness of the moon” we should indeed picture “the roundness of the moon,” because “a body manifesting itself” is “the roundness of the moon.” When we picture “the roundness of the moon” we should picture the form of “the full moon,” and we should manifest the form of “the full moon.”86 However, [people] do not depict “a body manifesting itself,” do not depict “the round moon,” do not depict “the form of the Ml moon,” do not picture “the physique of the buddhas,” do not physically realize “demonstration by concrete means,” and do not picture the preaching of Dharma. They vainly picture a painted rice cake. What function does [such a picture] have? Putting on the eyes at once and looking at it, who could directly arrive at the present and be satisfied and without hunger? The moon is a round shape, and round is the state of “the body manifesting itself.” In learning roundness, do not learn it as [the roundness of] a coin, and do not liken it to [the roundness] of a rice cake.

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“The body manifesting itself” is “the roundness of the moon,” and “the shape of reality” is the full moon’s shape. We should study a coin and a rice cake as round.87

[58] Traveling as a cloud in former days, I went to the great kingdom of Song. It is around the autumn of the sixteenth year of Kajo88 when I arrive at Kori Zen Temple on Aikuozan.89 On the wall of the west corridor I see paintings of the transformed figures of the thirty-three patriarchs of India and China. At this time I have no clear view [about them]. Later, during the summer retreat in the first year of Hogyo,901 go there again, and while walking down the corridor with Guest Supervisor91 Jokei from west Shoku,921 ask the guest 97b supervisor, “Just what kind of transformation is this?” The guest supervisor says, “It is Nagarjuna’s body manifesting the form of the round moon.” In saying this he has no nostrils in his complexion and no words in his voice. I say, “This really seems to be a picture of a rice cake!” At this the guest supervisor laughs loudly, but there is no sword in his laughter to break the painted cake. Thereafter the guest supervisor and I discuss [the picture] several times, while visiting the sarfra hall93 and the six beautiful places in the temple, but he is not even capable of doubt. Most other monks who happen to comment on it also completely miss the point. I say, “I shall try to ask the abbot.” At the time the abbot is Master Daiko.94 The guest supervisor says, “He has no nostrils. He will not be able to answer. How could he know?” So I refrain from asking the veteran Ko. Although brother Kei speaks like this, he too is unable to understand. Other skinbags who hear our talk also have nothing to say. Former and recent heads of the dining table are not perplexed to see [the picture] and they do not correct it. They probably could not even paint it themselves. The Dharma, in general, cannot be depicted. If we are going to depict it, we should depict it directly. Yet no one has ever painted “the roundness of the moon” as “a body manifesting itself.” In sum, because [people] do not wake up from views and opinions that the buddha-nature is related with the thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization [described] now, they seem— in regard to the words “having the buddha-nature” and in regard to the words “being without the buddha-nature”—to have lost the boundary of clear understanding. Few even learn that they should speak the words. Remember, this state of neglect comes from their having stopped making effort. Among heads of the table in many districts there are some who die without once in their life

voicing the expression of the truth “the buddha-nature.” Some say that those who listen to teachings discuss the buddha-nature, but patch-robed monks who practice Zen should not speak of it. People like this really are animals. Who are the band of demons that seeks to infiltrate and to defile the truth of our buddha-tathagata? Is there any such thing as “listening to teachings” in the Buddha’s truth? Is there any such thing as “practicing Zen” in the Buddha’s truth? Remember that in the Buddha’s truth there has never been any such thing as “listening to teachings” or “practicing Zen.”

[62] National Master Saian95 from the Enkan district of Koshu96 is a venerable patriarch in Baso’s lineage. One day he preaches to the assembly, “All living beings have the buddha-nature! ”97

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These words “all living beings” should be investigated at once. The actions, ways, circumstances, and personalities of “all living beings” are not only one, and their views are miscellaneous. “Common people,” “non-Buddhists,” “he three vehicles,” “the five vehicles,” and so on may be concrete individuals. The meaning of “all living beings,” as described now in Buddhism, is that all those that have mind are “living beings,” for minds are just “living beings.” Those without mind may also be “living beings,” for “living beings” are just mind.98 So minds all are “living beings,” and “living beings” all “have the buddha-nature.”99 Grass, trees, and national lands are mind itself; because they are mind, they are “living beings,” and because they are “living beings” they “have the buddha-nature.” The sun, the moon, and the stars are mind itself; because they are mind, they are “living beings,” and because they are “living beings” they “have the buddha-nature.” The “having buddha-nature” of which the National Master speaks is like this. If it is not like this, it is not the “having buddha-nature” of which we speak in Buddhism. The point expressed now by the National Master is only that “all living beings have the buddha-nature.” Those who are utterly different from “living beings”100 might be beyond “having the buddha-nature.” So now let us ask the National Master: “Do all buddhas have the buddha-nature, or not?” We should question him and test him like this. We should research that he does not say “All living beings are the buddha-nature itself,” but says “All living beings have the buddha-nature.” He needs to get rid of the have in “have the buddha-nature.” Getting rid is the single track of iron, and the single track of iron is the way of the birds.101 Then the nature of all buddhas possesses living beings. This principle

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not only elucidates “living beings” but also elucidates “the buddha-nature.” The National Master is not struck by realization of [this] understanding while he is expressing the truth, but that is not to deny that he will be struck by the realization in time. Neither is his expression of the truth today without meaning. Moreover, we do not always understand ourselves the truths with which we are equipped, but the four elements and the five aggregates are present nonetheless, and skin, flesh, bones, and marrow are present nonetheless. This being so, there are cases in which expressions are expressed by a whole life, and there are individual moments of life which are dependent upon their expression.

[66] Zen Master Daien102 of Daiizan one day preaches to the assembly, “All living beings are without the buddha-nature.”103

Among the human beings and gods who hear this, there are those of great makings who rejoice, and there is no absence of people who are astonished and doubtful. The words preached by Sakyamuni are, “All living beings totally have the buddha-nature.” The words preached by Daii are, “All living beings are without the buddha-nature.” There may be a great difference between the meaning of “have” and “are without” as words, and some might doubt which expression of the truth is accurate and which not. But only “All living beings are without the buddha-nature” is the senior in Buddhism. Although Enkan’s words about “having the buddha-nature” seem to stretch out a hand together with the eternal buddha, the situation may be a staff being carried on the shoulders of two people. Now Daii is not like that: the situation may be the staff swallowing the two people. Moreover, the National Master is Baso’s disciple, and Daii is Baso’s grandson-disciple. Yet the Dharma grandson is a veteran of the truth of his grandfather master, and the Dharma son is a youngster in the truth of his father master. The conclusion that Daii expresses now is that he has seen “All living beings are without the buddha-98b nature” as the conclusion. He is never describing a nebulous state that is wide of the mark: he possesses the state in which he is receiving and retaining like this a concrete sutra within his own house. We should grope on further: How could all living beings be the buddha-nature? How could they have the buddha-nature? If any have the buddha-nature they might be a band of demons. Bringing a demon’s sheet, they would like to lay it over all living beings. Because the buddha-nature is just the buddha-nature, living beings are just

living beings. Living beings are not originally endowed with the buddha-nature. Even if they want to be endowed, the point is that the buddha-nature cannot start coming to them. Do not say that Mr. Zhang drinks sake and Mr.

Li gets drunk.104 If [a being] were to have “the buddha-nature” it would never be a living being.105 And [a state] in which “living beings” are present is ultimately other than the buddha-nature.106 For this reason, Hyakujo107 says, “To preach that living beings have the buddha-nature is to insult Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. And to preach that living beings are without the buddha-nature is also to insult Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.” So to say “have the buddha-nature” and to say “are without the buddha-nature” both become an insult.

Even if they become an insult, we should not refrain from saying them. Now I would like to ask you, Daii and Hyakujo, “I do not deny that it is an insult, but have you been able to explain the buddha-nature or not?” If they are able to explain, [the explanation] will restrict the explanation itself. If there is an act of explaining, it will experience the same state as the act of hearing. Further, I would like to say to Daii, “Although you have expressed the truth that All living beings are without the buddha-nature,’ you have not said that All the buddha-nature is without living beings,’ and you have not said that All the buddha-nature is without the buddha-nature.’ Still more, you have never seen even in a dream that all buddhas are without the buddha-nature.

Let us see you try [again].”

[71] Zen Master Daichi of Hyakujozan preaches to the assembly, “Buddha is the supreme vehicle. It is the highest wisdom. The truth of this [state of] buddha establishes the person. This buddha has the buddha-nature. It is a 98c guiding teacher. It has command of the style of behavior that is free of hindrances. It is unhindered wisdom. Hence it is able to utilize cause-and-effect, and it is free in happiness and wisdom. It becomes the carriage that carries cause-and-effect. In life it is not subject to detention by life. In death it is not subject to detention by death.108 In the five aggregates it is like a gate opening: unhindered by the five aggregates, it departs and stays freely, and leaves and enters without difficulty. If the state can be like this—regardless of relative rank, superiority or inferiority, for even the body of an ant can be like this— then this is totally the pure and fine land, and is the unthinkable.”109

These then are the words of Hyakujo. “The five aggregates” are the immortal body of the present. The moment of the present is “a gate opening.”

“It is beyond being hindered by the five aggregates.” When we utilize life, we are not detained by life. When we utilize death, we are not hindered by death. Do not be unduly in love with life, and do not be unreasonably afraid of death. They are just the place where the buddha-nature exists, and those who are disturbed or offended [at this] are non-Buddhists. To affirm [the buddha-nature] as the miscellaneous circumstances manifest before us is “to command the style of behavior that is free of hindrances.” Such is “this buddha,” which is “the supreme vehicle.” The place where this “this buddha” exists is “the pure and fine land” itself.

[73] Obaku110 is sitting in Nansen’s111 tea room. Nansen asks Obaku, “If we equally practice balance and wisdom, we clearly realize the buddha-nature: How about this theory?”

Obaku says, “Through the twelve hours,112 without relying on a single thing, we have got it already.”

Nansen says, “That is not the patriarch’s113 own viewpoint, is it?” Obaku says, “I would not be so bold [as to say so].”

Nansen says, “For the present, I will waive the cost of your soy and water, but what person can I get to return to me the cost of your straw san-dals?”114

Obaku then desists.115

The point of this “equal practice of balance and wisdom” is not that as long as the practice of balance does not hinder the practice of wisdom there is clear realization of the buddha-nature in their equal practice.116 [The point is that] in the state of clearly realizing the buddha-nature there is practice, which is the equal practice of balance and wisdom.117 [Nansen] says, “How about this theory?” This may be the same as saying, for example, “Clearly 99a realizing the buddha-nature is the action of Who?”118 To say “The buddha-nature’s practice of equality119 clearly realizes the buddha-nature: How about this theory?” would also be an expression of the truth. Obaku says, “The twelve hours do not rely on a single thing.” The point here is that although “the reality of the twelve hours”120 is located in “the reality of the twelve hours,” it is “beyond reliance.” Because the state of “not relying on a single thing” is “the reality of the twelve hours,” the buddha-nature is clearly realized. As the arrival of what moment, and as the existence of what national land, should we see this “reality of the twelve hours”? Must “the twelve hours”

mentioned now be “the twelve hours” of the human world? Do “the twelve hours” exist in far distant places? Have “the twelve hours” of a world of white silver just come to us temporarily? Whether they are of this land or whether they are of other worlds, they are “beyond reliance.” They are “the reality of the twelve hours” already, and [so] they may be “beyond reliance.”

Saying “That is not the patriarch’s own viewpoint, is it?” is like saying “You do not say that this is [your] viewpoint, do you?”121 Though [Nansen] says “Is it the patriarch’s own viewpoint?” [Obaku] cannot turn his head [to Nansen] and say “It is mine,” because, while it is exactly befitting to himself, it is not Obaku’s, Obaku is not always only himself, and “the patriarch’s viewpoint” is the state of “being disclosed in complete clarity.”122 Obaku says, “I would not be so bold.” In the land of Song when you are asked about an ability that you possess, you say these words “I would not be so bold” to suggest that the ability is [your own] ability. So the expression “I would not be so bold” is not a lack of confidence. We should not suppose that this expression means what it says. Though the patriarch’s viewpoint is the patriarch himself, though the patriarch’s viewpoint is Obaku himself, in expressing himself he should not be so bold. The state may be a water buffalo coming up and mooing. To speak in this state is speech. We should also try to express, in other speech that is speech, the principle that [Obaku] expresses. Nansen 99b says, “For the present, I will waive the cost of your soy and water, but what person can I get to return to me the cost of your straw sandals?” In other words, “Let us set aside for a while the cost of your broth, but who can I get to return to me the cost of your straw sandals?”123 We should exhaust life after life investigating the intention of these words. We should apply the mind and diligently research why he is not concerned for the present about the cost of soy and water.124 Why is he concerned about the cost of straw sandals, [as if to say,] “In your years and months of wayfaring, how many straw sandals have you trod through?” Now [Obaku] might say, “I have never put on my sandals without repaying the cost!” Or he might say, “Two or three pairs.” These could be his expressions of the truth, and these could be his intentions. [But] “Obaku then desists.” This is desisting. It is neither to stop because of not being affirmed [oneself] nor to stop because of not affirming [the other]: a monk of true colors is not like that. Remember, there are words in desisting, as there are swords in laughter. [Obaku’s state] is the

buddha-nature clearly realizing satisfaction with morning gruel and satisfaction with midday rice.

[79] Quoting this story, Isan125 asks Kyozan,126 “Obaku is not able to hold his own against Nansen, is he?”

Kyozan says, “That is not so. We should know that Obaku has the resourcefulness to trap a tiger.”

Isan says, “The disciple’s viewpoint has become as excellent as this!” Daii’s words mean, “Was Obaku, in former days, unable to stand up to Nansen?” Kyozan says that Obaku has the resourcefulness to trap a tiger. Being already able to trap a tiger, he might stroke the tiger’s head.127 To trap a tiger and to stroke a tiger are to go among alien beings.128 Is to clearly realize the buddha-nature to open an eye? Or is the buddha-nature’s clear realization the loss of an eye? Speak at once! Speak at once! “The buddha-nature’s viewpoint has become as excellent as this!” For this reason, half things and complete things are “beyond reliance,” a hundred thousand things 99c are “beyond reliance,” and a hundred thousand hours are “beyond reliance.” And for this reason, I say:

Traps are a unity,129

Real time is the [concrete] twelve.130

Reliance and the state beyond reliance,

Are like vines clinging onto a tree.131

The reality of the universe and the whole universe itself,

At last are prior to the occurrence of words.

[82] A monk asks Great Master Shinsai132 of Joshu, “Does even a dog have the buddha-nature or not?”133

We should clarify the meaning of this question. “A dog” is a dog.134 The question does not ask whether the buddha-nature can or cannot exist in the dog; it asks whether even an iron man learns the truth.135 To happen upon such a poison hand136 may be a matter for deep regret, and at the same time the scene recalls the meeting, after thirty years, with “half a sacred person.”137 Joshu says, “It is without.”138 When we hear this expression, there are concrete paths by which to learn it: the “being without” with which the buddha-nature describes itself may be expressed like this; the “not having” which describes the dog itself may be expressed like this; and “there is nothing,” as

exclaimed by an onlooker, may be expressed like this.139 There may come a day when this “being without” becomes merely the grinding away of a stone.140

The monk says, “All living beings totally have the buddha-nature. Why is the dog without?” The intention here is as follows: “If all living beings did not exist, then the buddha-nature would not exist and the dog would not exist. How about this point? Why should the dog’s buddha-nature depend on ‘nonexistence’?,,

Joshu says, “Because it has karmic consciousness.”141 The intention of this expression is that even though “the reason it exists” is “karmic consciousness” and “to have karmic consciousness” is “the reason it exists,”142 the dog is without anything, and the buddha-nature is without anything. “Karmic consciousness” never understands intellectually what the dog is, so how could the dog meet the buddha-nature? Whether we cast away duality or take up both sides, the state is just the constant working of “karmic consciousness.”

[85] A monk asks Joshu, “Does the buddha-nature exist even in a dog or not?”143

This question may be the fact that this monk is able to stand up to Joshu. Thus, assertions and questions about the buddha-nature are the everyday tea and meals of Buddhist patriarchs. Joshu says, “It exists.”144 The situation of this “It exists” is beyond the “existence” of scholastic commentary teachers and the like, and beyond the dogmatic “existence” of the Existence school.145 We should move ahead and learn the Buddha’s existence. The Buddha’s existence is Joshu’s “It exists.” Joshu’s “it exists” is “the dog exists,” and “the dog exists” is “the buddha-nature exists.”

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The monk says, “It exists already——then why does it forcibly enter this concrete bag of skin?” This monk’s expression of the truth poses the question of whether it is present existence, whether it is past existence, or whether it is “existence already”;146 and although “existence already” resembles the other “existences,” “existence already” clearly stands alone. Does “existence already” need to force its way in? Or does “existence already” not need to force its way in?147 The action of “forcibly entering this concrete bag of skin” does not accommodate idle heedless consideration.

Joshu says, “Because it knowingly commits a deliberate violation!” As a secular saying these words have long since spread through the streets, but

now they are Joshu’s expression of the truth. What they discuss is deliberate violation. Those who do not doubt this expression of the truth may be few. The present word “enter” is difficult to understand; at the same time, the word “enter” is itself unnecessary.148 Moreover, “If we want to know the immortal person in the hut,/How could we depart from this concrete skinbag here and now?”149 Even if “the immortal person” is anyone, at what moment is it [necessary to say] “Do not depart from your skinbag!”? A “deliberate violation” is not always “entry into a skinbag,” and “to have forcibly entered a concrete skinbag” is not always “to knowingly commit a deliberate violation.” Because of “knowing,” there can be “deliberate violation.” Remember, this “deliberate violation” may contain the action of getting free of the body— this is expressed as “forcibly entering.” The action of getting free of the body, at just the moment of containment, contains self and contains other people.

100b At the same time, never complain that it is impossible to avoid being “a person before a donkey and behind a horse.”150 Still more, the founding patriarch Ungo151 says, “Even to have learned matters on the periphery of the Buddha-Dharma is to have adopted a mistaken approach already.”152 That being so, although we have been making the mistake for a long time—which has deepened into days and deepened into months—of half-learning matters on the periphery of the Buddha-Dharma, this may be the state of the dog that has forcibly entered a concrete skinbag. Though it knowingly commits a deliberate violation, it has the buddha-nature.

[89] In the order of Master Chosha Keishin,153 government official Jiku154 asks, “An earthworm has been cut into two, and the two parts are both moving. I wonder in which part is the buddha-nature.”

The master says, “Do not be deluded.”

The official says, “What should we make of their moving?”

The master says, “It is only that wind and fire have not dissipated.”155 Now when the official says “An earthworm has been cut into two” has he concluded that before it was cut it was one? In the everyday life of Buddhist patriarchs the state is not like that. An earthworm is not originally one, and when an earthworm has been cut it is not two. We must strive to learn in practice the meaning of the words one and two. He says, “The two parts together156 are moving.” Has he understood that two parts are a unity before being cut, or has he understood that the ascendant state of buddha is a unity?

Regardless of whether or not the official understands the words “two parts,” we should not discard the words. Is it that two parts which have been separated are made into a unity and thereafter a unity exists? In describing the movement, he says “both moving.” [Though] “Balance moves it and wisdom removes it,”157 it may be that both are movement. “I wonder in which part is the buddha-nature.” This might be expressed, “The buddha-nature has been cut into two. I wonder in which part is the earthworm.” We should clarify this expression of the truth in detail. Does saying “The two parts are both moving. In which part is there the buddha-nature?” mean that if both are moving they are unfit as a location for the buddha-nature? Does it mean that if both are moving, although movement takes place in both, the location of the buddha-nature must be one or the other of them? The master says, “Do not be deluded.” What might be his point here? He says, “Do not be deluded.” That being so, does he mean that when the two parts are both moving they are without delusion, or beyond delusion? Or does he simply mean that the buddha-nature is without delusion? We should also investigate whether he is just saying “There are no delusions!” without touching upon discussion of the buddha-nature and without touching upon discussion of the two parts. Do the words “What should we make of their moving?” say that, because they are moving, an extra layer of buddha-nature should be laid upon them? Or do the words assert that because they are moving they are beyond the buddha-nature? Saying “Wind and fire have not dissipated” may cause the buddha-nature to manifest itself. Should we see it as the buddha-nature? Should we see it as wind and fire? We should not say that the buddha-nature and wind-and-fire both appear together, and we should not say that when one appears the other does not appear. We should not say that wind and fire are just the buddha-nature. Therefore Chosha does not say “An earthworm has the buddha-nature” and he does not say “An earthworm is without the buddha-nature.” He only says, “Do not be deluded” and says, “Wind and fire have not dissipated.” To fathom the vigorous state of the buddha-nature, we should use Chosha’s words as the standard. We should quietly consider the words “Wind and fire have not dissipated.” What kind of truth is present in the words “not dissipated”? Does he say “not dissipated” to express that wind and fire have accumulated but there has not yet come a time for them to disperse? That could not be so.158 “Wind and fire have not dissipated” is Buddha

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preaching Dharma, and “undissipated wind and fire” are the Dharma preaching Buddha. For example, one sound preaching Dharma is the moment having arrived, and Dharma preaching as one sound is the arrived moment—for Dharma is one sound, and one sound is Dharma. Furthermore, to think that 101a the buddha-nature exists only in the time of life, and that it will vanish at the time of death, is extremely naive and shallow. The time of living is the buddha-nature as “existence” and is the buddha-nature as “being without.” The time of dying is the buddha-nature as “existence” and is the buddha-nature as “being without.” If we are able to discuss the dissipation and nondissipation of wind and fire, that may be [discussion of] the dissipation and nondissipation of the buddha-nature. The time of dissipation may be “existence” as the buddha-nature and may be “being without” as the buddha-nature. The time of nondissipation may be “existence” as the buddha-nature, and may be “being without” as the buddha-nature. Those who have wrongly attached to the contrary view, that the buddha-nature may or may not exist depending upon movement and non-movement, may or may not be divine depending upon consciousness and nonconsciousness, and may or may not be the natural function depending on knowing and not knowing, are non-Buddhists. Since the kalpa without a beginning, many stupid people have seen consciousness of the divine as the buddha-nature, and as the original human state. A person could die laughing! To express the buddha-nature further, although it need not be “getting covered in mud and staying in the water,” it is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles. When we express it in the further ascendant state, just what is the buddha-nature? Have you fully understood? Three heads and eight arms!

Shobogenzo Bussho

Preached to the assembly at Kannondorikosho-horinji in Kyoto prefecture on the fourteenth day of the tenth lunar month in the second year of Ninji.159

Notes

1    “Totally have” is shitsu-u. Shitsu, kotogoto[ku], means “totally.” 0,a[ru\, as a verb, means “have” or “possess” and also “exist”; as a noun it means “being” or “existence.” In his commentary Master Dogen interprets shitsu-u in his own way, as an adjective and noun suggesting reality itself: “total existence.”

2    Mahaparinirvana-sutra, chapter 27.

3    1241. See also following note.

4    The two phrases in parentheses are in small characters in the source text. Senshi, “late master” is Master Dogen’s usual way of referring to Master Tendo Nyojo, so it may be that the phrases were added by Master Dogen himself.

5    Saiten, “Western Heavens,” means India.

6    Tochi, “Eastern Lands,” means China.

7    Master Daikan Eno’s words to Master Nangaku Ejo. See, for example, Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan.

8    Master Dogen emphasized the inclusiveness of the state. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Katto.

9    Quoted from Master Yoka Genkaku’s poem Shodoka (“Song of Experiencing the Truth”). In the original poem the object that no one has ever recognized is the valuable pearl (mani-ju), i.e., zazen. Kongen o jiki[ni] ki[ru], “direct cutting of the root” comes from the following lines: “Direct cutting of the root is what the Buddha affirmed; It is impossible for me to pick up leaves and look for branches.”

10    Master Sekiso Keisho’s words, quoted in the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 15.

11    Master Nansen Fugan’s words, quoted in Shinji-shobogenzd, pt. 1, no. 19, and Vol. IV, Appendix Two, Butsu-kojo-no-ji.

12    A Brahmanist who questions the Buddha from an idealistic standpoint in the Garland Sutra. He also appears in chapter 39 of the Mahaparinirvana-sutra. See, for example, Chapter One (Vol. I), Bendowa.

13    Here the movement of wind and fire symbolizes the material basis of mind, which idealists fail to recognize.

Having dealt with the idealistic misinterpretation of the buddha-nature, Master Dogen now turns to deal with the materialistic misinterpretation.

Inmo, the ineffable state at the moment of the present. (In the moment of the present it is not possible to speak of movement from one point to another point.) See Chapter Twenty-nine, Inmo.

They are not abstractions.

Sekishin, lit., “red mind,” expresses the state of sincerity, i.e., the mind as it is.

The causes of the buddha-nature exist as real facts in this world.

“Should just reflect” is tokan. In the quotation, to, masa[ni] means “should” or “must.” The same character sometimes means “just,” i.e., “just at the moment of the present” or “here and now.” Master Dogen picked up this second meaning in his commentary. Kan, “reflect,” represents the Sanskrit vipasyana.

Mahaparinirvana-sutra, chapter 28.

The area that is colorful but not valuable.

Master Dogen changed yoku-chi, “wanting to know,” into to-chi, “really knowing just here and now”; see note 19.

Master Kapimala. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

With this quotation, Master Dogen’s explanation of the buddha-nature moves from his theoretical outline of what the buddha-nature is to preaching of the buddha-nature as the concrete world.

“All relying” in the second line of the poem is kai-e. Master Dogen explained the characters from the subjective side as zen-e, “total reliance,” or complete faith, and from the objective side as e-zen, “reliance on the total,” or belief in the universe.

Pali sutras, which are very old, and consequently reflect the fondness of ancient Indians for mystical expressions.

Zen sans an, go sansan, “three and three before, three and three behind,” suggests random concrete facts as opposed to general abstractions. See, for example, Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 27: Monju asks Mujaku: “Where have you come from?” Mujaku says: “The south.” Monju says: “How is the Buddha-Dharma of the south dwelled in and maintained?” Mujaku says: “Few bhiksus in the age of the latter Dharma observe the precepts.” Monju says: “How big is the sangha?” Mujaku says: “In some cases three hundred, in some cases five hundred.” Mujaku asks Monju: “How is the Buddha-Dharma here dwelled in and maintained?” Monju says: “The common and the sacred live together, and dragons and snakes mix in confusion.” Mujaku says: “How big is the sangha?” Monju says: “Three and three before, three and three behind.”

The Sanskrit paramita means gone to the opposite shore, crossed over, traversed, perfected. The six paramitas, or “perfections,” are listed in Chapter Two (Vol. I),

Maka-hannya-haramitsu. The six mystical powers are listed in Chapter Twenty-five, Jinzu.

29    See Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 88. The expression is quoted here as an example of a cliche, or a generality.

30    Master Daiman Konin (688-761).

31    In modern-day Hopeh province in east central China.

32    Master Daii Doshin (580-651). There is some doubt about the historical dates of the two masters. It may be that the story of Master Daiman Konin’s rebirth was invented to account for the historical discrepancy in the dates.

33    The Fourth Patriarch’s question is nanji [wa] nan [no] sei [zo]. Nanji means “you,” nani means “what,” and sei means “family name.” Master Dogen interpreted the characters not only as the question “What is your name?” but also as the statement “Your name is What!” that is, “You are someone who cannot be labeled with a name.”

34    In Keitokudentoroku, chapter 27, for example, someone asks Master Soga of Shishu, “What [is your] name?” The master replies, “My name is What.” [The questioner] asks the master further, “[You] are a person of what country?” The master says, “I am a person of What country.”

35    Master Daikan Eno’s words to Master Nangaku Ejo. See Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 1; Chapter Seven (Vol. I), Senjo; Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan; etc. The origin of the words can also be traced back to Buddhism in India. In the Majjhima-nikdya (translated by the Pali Text Society as “Middle Length Sayings”) the Buddha quotes the words of his former teacher Alara, “This doctrine that I have realized, you too have realized. As I am, so you are; as you are, so am I....”

36    The Fifth Patriarch’s answer, “I have a name,” is sei [wa] sunawa[chi] a[ri]. In the quotation sei means “family name,” sunawa[chi] is emphatic, and a[ri] means “I have,” so the quotation is literally, “A family name indeed I have.” Here Master Dogen has reversed the order of the characters to u-soku-sei, so that u means “existence” and soku means “is just”—“Existence is just the family name.”

37    Soku-u. Here soku, “here and now,” is used as an adjective, and u, “existence,” is a noun.

38    The Fourth Patriarch’s question is ko[re] nan [no] sei [zo]. In the story ko[re] means “it,” but in Master Dogen’s commentary, the same character ze means “the concrete,” “this concrete situation here and now,” or “this [reality].” In the story, nani means “what,” but in the commentary the same character ga means “that which cannot be described with words,” or “the ineffable state of What.”

39    “This” is ze and “not right” is fu-ze. The effect of the play on words is to emphasize that this concrete reality here and now, in any circumstance, is always just the buddha-nature.

Though reality is different from intellectual concepts, Master Dogen also affirmed the real function of concepts, or names. See, for example, Chapter Forty, Gabyo.

The Fourth Patriarch’s words “You are without the buddha-nature” are nanji-mu-bussho. Mu means “do not have” or “be without.” The Fourth Patriarch seemed simply to deny that the Fifth Patriarch had the buddha-nature. But the Fourth Patriarch’s real intention was to use mu and bussho like two nouns in apposition: “You are the real state which is without anything superfluous or lacking, and you are the buddha-nature.”

Butto, lit., “the tip of Buddha.”

Obai, Joshu, and Daii indicate the orders of Master Daiman Konin, Master Joshu Jushin, and Master Isan Reiyu, respectively.

“Emptiness” is ku, which means the sky, space, air, or emptiness. At the same time, it represents the Sanskrit sunyata. The first definition of sunyata given in the Monier-Williams Sanskrit-English Dictionary is “emptiness.” Other, seemingly more philosophical, definitions reflect idealistic thought: “nothingness, nonexistence, nonreality, illusory nature (of all worldly phenomena).” But the real philosophical meaning of sunyata is emptiness; the bare, bald, naked, raw, or transparent state, that is, the state in which reality is seen as it is. See Chapter Two (Vol. I), Maka-hannya-haramitsu; Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III), Kuge.

“Being without” is mu. The original Chinese pictograph depicts a piece of paper above some flames: mu suggests the denial that something is possessed or the denial that something exists.

In this sentence Master Dogen denies the interpretation that ku, or sunyata, is “nothingness, nonexistence, or nonreality.” He says ku wa mu ni ara zu, “ku is not mu,” “sunyata is not nonexistence.” In Master Dogen’s teaching sunyata is not the denial of real existence—it expresses the absence of anything other than real existence.

In this sentence “emptiness” and “void” are both translations of ku, and “being without” and “does not exist” are both translations of mu.

Shiki soku ze ku, quoted from the Heart Sutra. In this sentence of the Heart Sutra, the meaning of “emptiness” is more philosophical: it suggests “the immaterial” face of reality as opposed to matter. The sutra says that the immaterial and the material are two faces of the same reality. See Chapter Two (Vol. I), Maka-hannya-haramitsu.

A monk asks Master Sekiso Keisho, “What was the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?” The master says, “One stone in space...See Keitokuden-toroku, chapter 15. “Space” is also a translation of ku.

Master Daikan Eno.

Master Daiman Konin.

The Five Peaks. In Japanese pronunciation they are Taiyu, Shian, Ringa, Keiyo, and another Keiyo.

53    At that time, in the Tang dynasty, the center of government and civilization was in the north of China, and people from the south were sometimes looked down upon as primitive. At the same time, in his youth Master Daikan Eno lived in poverty, supporting his aged mother as a woodcutter. So the Fifth Patriarch’s words invite the understanding that Master Daikan Eno was too primitive to have the buddha-nature, although that was not his true intention.

54    The original word in the story nin, hito, “person,” “people,” can be either singular or plural, male or female. So the Fifth Patriarch’s words include both the general principle and words directed at Master Daikan Eno himself.

55    Suggests that the act of becoming buddha, for example practicing zazen, means getting free of what does not originally belong to us.

56    This quotation is a continuation of the previous story. Rokusodaishihobodankyo (Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch s Dharma Treasure), chapter 1, has a different version of the story. It is not clear from where Master Dogen quoted the story, but from the account in Rokusodaishihobodankyo we can assume that the conversation took place on the same occasion.

57    Keige no rikiryo, “power of restriction,” means the ability to realize things as they are. Master Dogen uses the formula “reality restricted by reality” to suggest reality as it is.

58    Master Dogen affirmed the means, not only the end.

59    A disciple of Master Daikan Eno. This monk’s name was Kozei Shitetsu. Gyosho was his personal name in secular life.

60    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 5.

61    Mujo, which represents the Sanskrit anitya. Mujo is usually understood as an attribute such as impermanence, transience, inconstancy, etc., but the Sixth Patriarch’s intention is to describe reality itself at the moment of the present.

62    Alludes to the Lotus Sutra, Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon (“The Universal Gate of Bodhi-sattva Regarder of the Sounds of the World”). See LS 3.252; Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke; Chapter Thirty-three, Kannon.

63    “Everyday” is jo, literally, “constant,” “everyday,” or “usual.”

64    Throughout the Shobogenzo, in general, sho does not mean “nature” or “essence” in an abstract sense but rather “the natural state” or “the natural function.” See also Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), Sesshin-sessho; Chapter Fifty-four (Vol. III), Hossho, etc.

65    Master Dogen interpreted both mujo, “absence of constancy,” and jo, “the constant,” as descriptions of the state just in the moment of the present. Because reality at the present moment is cut off from the past and the future, it cannot be said to remain constant and cannot be said to change.

Master Nagarjuna lived ca. 150-250 C.E. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

The three Chinese names for Master Nagarjuna are Ryuju, “Dragon Tree,” Ryusho, “Dragon Excellence,” and Ryumo, “Dragon Might.” The Sanskrit naga means “dragon.”

Master Kanadeva, the fifteenth patriarch. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

Muso zanmai. Mu means “without,” so means form, and zanmai represents phonetically the Sanskrit samadhi, which means “concentration” or “the balanced state.” MusO zanmai does not mean that the state has no form, i.e., that the master was invisible. It means that the master’s state was not restricted to any specific fixed form.

Ken, literally, “to see” or “to meet.”

This “seeing” represents another character, to, which can be used interchangeably with ken. But the question “Who can see it?” in the story includes this character, whereas Master Nagarjuna’s words include the character ken. So a distinction may be drawn between ken, which includes the whole attitude of the viewer, and to, which just means seeing.

In the poem the master simply used the character shin, “body or person,” to refer to himself. So shin suggests the master’s whole body-and-mind. This sentence suggests that reality has concrete attributes and at the same time it is a whole entity. “The physique of the buddhas” is shobuttai. The character tai also means “body” but it is sometimes more concrete, substantial, or real: for example, it is used in the compounds tairyoku, “physical strength,” taikaku, “physique” or “physical constitution,” and taiken, “real experience.”

In response to a question from Master Rinzai, Fuke overturns a dinner table. Master Rinzai says, “Very coarse person!” Fuke says, “This place is the place where something ineffable exists. Explain it as coarse or explain it as fine.” (Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 96.)

“It demonstrates by concrete means” is i-hyo, translated in the poem as “by this means to demonstrate.” I means “with,” “by means of,” or “by relying on something.” Master Dogen emphasized that real demonstration relies on some concrete means.

En-getsu-so, translated in the poem as “roundness of the moon,” is literally “round moon form,” but this sentence indicates that the words of the poem describe a state, not a geometric form.

Soku-in, translated in the story as “disappears at once.”

They are the usual state of a circle, not something strange.

Hanza, lit., ‘"half-seat,” refers to the Buddha sharing his seat with Master Mahakasyapa.

Zen-za no bun-za, lit., “complete-seat part-seat,” that is, a master in an auxiliary position but with ability to lead the whole order.

80    Kono i-hyo o buttai se zaran, literally, “not to buddha-physique this demonstration by [concrete] means.” Buttai su is used as a verb, “to buddha-body,” with i_hyd, “demonstration by means,” as its direct object—the usage is also unconventional in Japanese.

81    Nokatsu. No means a sack, and katsu means to fasten.

82    India, China, and Japan.

83    In general, gabyo, or “a picture of a rice cake,” symbolizes something that cannot stop real hunger. In Chapter Forty, Gabyo, Master Dogen considers the problem in more detail.

84    Alludes to the transmission between the Buddha and Master Mahakasyapa. See, for example, Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge.

85    “The shape of reality” is gyo-nyo, translated in the story as “in shape resembling....”

Gyo means “shape” or “form.” Nyo means “like,” “as,” “as it is,” and sometimes “reality as it is.”

86    In zazen.

87    We should study them as real (not only as circular).

88    1223.

89    Mount Ikuo in the modern-day province of Zhekiang was one of the five mountains designated by the Song government as centers of Buddhism. In 282 a man called (in Japanese) Ryu Sakka had found a tower on this mountain, and believed the tower to be one of those established by King Asoka. The mountain was named Aikuozan, meaning “King Asoka’s Mountain.”

90    1225.

91    Shika, one of the assistant officers in a big temple.

92    A district in modern-day Sichuan province in southwestern China.

93    A hall for Buddhist relics (sarira),

94    Dates and personal history not known.

95    Master Enkan Saian (?-842), a successor of Master Baso Doitsu. He is said to have died at an old age while practicing zazen.

96    In modern-day Zhekiang province in eastern China.

97    Rentoeyo, chapter 7; Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 15.

98    For example, a bamboo chair can be thought of as a living being, because all beings, animate and inanimate, and mind are one. See Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), San-gai-yuishin.

99    U-bussho, “have the buddha-nature” or “are the buddha-nature as existence.”

100    That is, buddhas.

101    In other words, getting rid is what makes the world one, and to make the world one is the transcendent way. “Getting rid” is datsuraku; these characters appear in Master Tendo Nyojo’s often-quoted words that zazen is getting rid of body and mind.

102    Master Isan Reiyu (771-853), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai. Master Hyakujo, like Master Enkan, was a successor of Master Baso Doitsu. Master Isan became a monk at the age of fifteen, and studied under Master Hyakujo from the age of twenty-three. His disciples included Masters Kyozan Ejaku, Kyogen Chikan, and Reiun Shigon. Daien was the posthumous title given to him by the Tang dynasty emperor Senso.

103    Rentdeyo, chapter 7; Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 15.

104    The dimension of thinking and the dimension of reality are absolutely different; we should not confuse the two.

105    Because it would belong to the area of thinking.

106    Because it is not a real state.

107    Master Hyakujo Ekai (749-814), successor of Master Baso. His disciples include Master Isan Reiyu and Master Obaku Kiun. Zen Master Daichi is his posthumous title.

108    It is not worried by life and death.

109 Kosonshukugoroku (Record of the Words of the Venerable Patriarchs of the Past), chapter 1.

110    Master Obaku Kiun (d. ca. 855), successor of Master Hyakujo.

111    Master Nansen Fugan (748-834), successor of Master Baso. His disciples include Master Joshu Jushin and Master Chosha Keishin.

112    The whole day; twenty-four hours.

113    “The patriarch” means “you.” Master Nansen thought Master Obaku’s words were so excellent that he wondered if they were Master Obaku’s own idea.

114    Master Nansen’s words are ironic praise.

115    Tenshdkdtoroku, chapter 8; Keitokudentoroku, chapter 8.

116    The two practices should not be seen as separate.

117    Suggests the practice of zazen.

118    “Who” means a person who does not have individual self-consciousness. Master Nansen asked about the ineffable state.

119    “Equal” is to, hito[shii], which generally expresses the equality or similarity of two factors. At the same time to sometimes expresses the balanced state—as in the phrase mujdshotokaku, “the supreme and right balanced state of truth”—so bussho togaku, “the buddha-nature’s equal practice,” suggests the practice of zazen in the balanced state.

120    Master Obaku’s words are juniji chu, which can be interpreted as “throughout the twelve hours,” or “the reality of the twelve hours,” or “the twelve hours themselves.” Chu, as a preposition, means “during” or “throughout,” but Master Dogen often uses it as an emphatic suffix to emphasize the reality of the noun that precedes it.

121    Master Dogen simply explained the meaning of the Chinese characters in Japanese.

122    Rokeikei are the words of Master Enchi Daian, quoted in Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajo. Here Master Dogen emphasizes that “viewpoint” does not describe only a subjective view.

123    Again, Master Dogen clarified the meaning of the Chinese characters of the story with a Japanese sentence.

124    For example, we should consider if meals are indispensable or not.

125    Master Isan Reiyu (771-853). He is referred to in the commentary as “Daii.”

126    Master Kyozan Ejaku (807-883), successor of Master Isan.

127    Master Dogen esteemed not only the ability to defeat an opponent but also the ability to tame an opponent.

128    I-rui-chu-gyo, “going among alien beings,” describes independent action.

129    In other words, the whole universe is a hindrance. “Traps” is raro, silk nets and bamboo cages used to trap birds and fish. The words (elsewhere translated as “restrictions and hindrances”) appear frequently in the Shobogenzo.

130    Master Obaku said juniji chu, using ji to mean “hours” and chu to mean “throughout the period.” Master Dogen saidjichujuni usingjichu to mean “time itself’ or “real time.” See also note 120.

131    Vines clinging to a tree suggests something too complicated to be understood intellectually. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Katto.

132    Master Joshu Jushin (778-897), a successor of Master Nansen Fugan. Great Master Shinsai is his posthumous title.

133    The conversation is recorded in the second half of the Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 14. It is also recorded in the Wanshizenjigoroku, chapter 1; Rentoeyo, chapter 6.

134    Master Dogen explained the Chinese characters ku-su with the Japanese word inu.

135    An iron man symbolizes someone who is very singleminded in pursuing the truth.

The monk was not looking for a simple “yes” or “no” but wanted to ask about the area beyond ordinary thinking.

136    In other words, such a severe question.

137    Master Shakkyo Ezo (a student of Master Baso Doitsu) says, “For thirty years my bow has been stretched and my arrow set. I have just been able to shoot half a sacred person.”

138    Mu.

139    Master Dogen considered various meanings of the character mu—real state, lack of possession, and absence.

140    The problem of the meaning of mu can be solved by following a concrete process.

141    “Karmic consciousness” is goshiki. Go represents the Sanskrit karma, which means action. Shiki means consciousness. Goshiki means consciousness that exists in the present as the concrete result of actions in the past. Thus Master Joshu used goshiki to suggest the concrete, real state at the moment of the present.

142    I-ta-u. In the story these words mean “Because it has....”

143    In this conversation (recorded in the first half of the Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 14), the monk’s question is exactly the same as the question in the previous conversation. Understood simply, the conversation is as follows: “Does even a dog have the buddha-nature or not?” “It has.” “[The dog] has the buddha-nature already. Why has it forced its way into this bag of skin?” “Because it commits a deliberate violation.”

144    U. Master Joshu’s answer looks like a simple affirmative answer (“Does a dog have the buddha-nature?” “It has.”). But Master Dogen’s interpretation is that the word is just the direct preaching of real existence (“Existence!”).

145    Ubu, “Existence school,” means the Sarvastivada, a school founded by Katyayani-putra around three hundred years after the Buddha’s death. Generally, Master Dogen esteemed the teachings of the Sarvastivada relatively highly; see Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), Kuyo-shobutsu. Their teachings are represented in Chinese by the words ga-ku-ho-u, “the self is empty, the Dharma exists,” san-ze jitsu-u, “the three times are real existence,” and hottai-go-u, “the universe is eternal existence.”

146    Ki-u, lit., “already existence,” means what is there already, real existence.

147    When living in reality, is it necessary to make intentional effort or not?

148    In several chapters of the Shobogenzo, Master Dogen denies (having sometimes also affirmed) that we “enter” reality. See, for example, Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke.

149    From a poem in Master Sekito Kisen’s book Sekitosoan-no-uta (Songs from Sekito,s Thatched Hut). The immortal person in the hut means a person who realizes the eternal state in a simple life.

150    A person who is not special.

Master Ungo Doyo (?-902), successor of Master Tozan Ryokai. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

Rentoeyo, chapter 23.

Master Chosha Kei shin (?-868), a successor of Master Nansen Fugan.

A lay student in Master Chosha’s order. His title shosho indicates that he was a mandarin charged with promulgating official documents.

See Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 20. The story is also recorded in the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 10; Rentoeyo, chapter 6.

Gu, tomo[ni] means either “both” or “together.” In his commentary, Master Dogen wonders if the official was able to understand the character in the second meaning.

The Nirvana Sutra says, “Just as in removing a firm stake, first we move it with the hands, then it comes out easily, so it is with balance and wisdom of bodhisattvas: first [bodhisattvas] move [an emotional interference] with the balanced state, then they remove it with wisdom.”

“Not dissipated” is misan. Mi, ima[da] literally means “not yet,” but misan describes the state that is real at the moment of the present (not related to the past).

1241.

[Chapter Twenty-three]

Gyobutsu-yuigi

The Dignified Behavior of Acting Buddha

Translator's Note: Gyo means to practice or to act, butsu means buddha, yui means dignity or dignified, and gi means ceremony, formal attitude, or behavior. Therefore gyobutsu-yuigi means the dignified behavior of acting buddha. Buddhism can be called a religion of action. Buddhism esteems action very highly, because action is our existence itself, and without acting we have no existence. Gautama Buddha ' historical mission was to find the truth of action, by which he could synthesize idealistic Brahmanism and the materialistic theories of the six non-Buddhist teachers. In this chapter Master Dogen explained the dignity that usually accompanies buddhas in action.

[97] The buddhas always practice to the full dignified behavior: this is acting buddha. Acting buddha is neither “resultant buddha” nor “transformed buddha” and is neither “buddha as the body of subjective nature” nor “buddha as the body of objective nature”; it is beyond “initiated enlightenment” and “original enlightenment” and is beyond “inherent enlightenment” and “nonexistent enlightenment.” “Buddhas” like these can never stand shoulder-to-shoulder with acting buddha. Remember, buddhas, being in the Buddha’s state of truth, do not expect enlightenment. Mastery of action in the Buddha’s ascendant state of truth belongs to acting buddha alone. It is never realized by “buddha as subjective nature” and the like, even in a dream.

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[99] Because this acting buddha realizes dignity at each moment, the dignity is realized before the body. Before verbal expression, the leaking out of the gist of the teaching covers time, covers [all] directions, covers buddha, and covers action. If we are not acting buddha, being not yet released from the fetter of “Buddha” and the fetter of “Dharma,” we are grouped among “Buddha”-demons and “Dharma”-demons.1 The meaning of “the fetter of

Buddha” is as follows: when we view and understand bodhi as “bodhi,” we have directly been fettered by that view itself and by that understanding itself. Passing instantaneously through the moment of consciousness, never expecting that it might be the period of liberation, we misunderstand [bodhi] in vain. To view and understand bodhi as just bodhi may be the very view that accords with bodhi; who could call this the false view? I remember it as just binding myself without rope! It is fetters at every moment, continuing endlessly; it is not a tree falling and wisteria withering.2 It is no more than fruitless struggling in caves on the Buddhist periphery. It neither recognizes the sickness of the Dharma body nor recognizes the privation of the reward body.3 Even theorists, teachers of sutras, teachers of commentaries, and the like, who have heard the Buddha’s truth from afar, say: “Then to establish toward the Dharma-nature a view on the Dharma-nature is just ignorance.”4 This theorist failed to say that when, in the Dharma-nature, a view of the Dharma-nature arises, “the Dharma-nature” is a fetter. Further, he added the fetter of “ignorance.” It is a shame that he did not know that “the Dharma-nature” contains a fetter, but if he recognized that he added the fetter of “ignorance,” that may have become a seed for the establishment of the bodhi-mind.

[101] The present acting buddha has never been fettered by such fetters. For this reason [the Buddha says], “The lifetime that I have realized by my original practice of the bodhisattva way is not exhausted even now, but will 101c still be twice the previous number [of kalpas] .”5 Remember, it is not that his lifetime as a bodhisattva is ranged continuously to the present, nor that his lifetime as Buddha has permeated the past.6 The “previous number” described now is the totality that “he has realized.” The “even now” that he has just expressed is his total “lifetime.” “My original practice,” even if one track of iron for ten thousand miles, is also to abandon [all things] for a hundred years, letting them be vertical or horizontal.7 This being so, practice-and-experience is beyond nonexistence, practice-and-experience is beyond existence, and practice-and-experience is beyond being tainted.8 Though there are a hundred thousand myriad places where there are no buddhas and no human beings, [those places] do not taint acting buddha, and so acting buddha is not tainted by practice and experience. This does not mean that practice and experience are [always] untainted.9 [At the same time] “this untaintedness” is “not nonexistent.”10 Sokei says, “Just this untaintedness is that which the buddhas

guard and desire. You are also like this. I am also like this. And all the patriarchs of India were also like this.” Thus, because [the buddhas as] “you” are “also like this,” they are the buddhas, and because [the buddhas as] “I” are “also like this,” they are the buddhas. In this untainted state that is truly beyond “I” and beyond “you,” “real I, this concrete I,”11 “that which the buddhas guard and desire,” is the dignified behavior of acting buddha. “Real you, this concrete you,” “that which the buddhas guard and desire,” is the dignified behavior of acting buddha. Because he is “I also,”12 the master is excellent. Because he is “you also,” the disciple is strong. The master’s excellence and the disciple’s strength are the “perfection in knowledge and action”13 of acting buddha. Remember, “that which the buddhas guard and desire” is “mine also” and “yours also.” Although the expression of the truth by the eternal buddha of Sokei is beyond “I,” how could it not be about you? That which acting buddha “guards and desires,” and that which acting buddha masters, is like this. Therefore we have seen that practice-and-experience is beyond [concepts] such as essence and form or substance and detail. Acting buddha’s departing and arriving instantaneously cause buddha to act, at which time buddha is just causing action. Here there is “giving up the body for the Dharma,” and there is giving up the Dharma for the body—“not begrudging body and life,”14 and solely begrudging body and life. It is not only that we give up “Dharma” for the Dharma; there is dignified behavior in which we give up Dharma for the sake of the mind.15 We should not forget that giving up is unfathomable. We should not utilize consideration in the state of buddha to fathom or to suppose the great truth: consideration by buddha is [only] one corner; for example, like “opening flowers.”16 We should not utilize consideration by the mind to grope for or to analogize dignified behavior: consideration by the mind is [only] one face; for example, like “the world.”17 Consideration by a stalk of grass evidently is consideration by the mind of the Buddhist patriarchs. It is a fragment in which acting buddha has already recognized its own footprint. Even when we see to the end that consideration by the undivided mind already includes boundless buddha-consideration, if we aim to consider the demeanor and stillness, the movement and quietness, of acting buddha, they have features that are originally beyond consideration. Because they are action that is beyond consideration, they are indefinable, unusable, and unfathomable.

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[107] Now, in regard to the dignified behavior of acting buddha, there are individual researches. The dignified behavior that is “I also” and “you also,” when it has “come like this”18 as buddha here and now and as the self here and now, is connected with the “ability” of an “I alone,” but at the same time it is just the liberation that is “the state like that of buddhas in the ten directions,”19 and it is never simply an identification. For this reason, an eternal buddha says, “After grasping in physical experience matters in distant places, we come back to this concrete place and act.”20 When we are already maintaining and relying upon the state like this, all dharmas, all bodies, all acts, and all buddhas are familiar and direct. These buddhas whose bodies practice the Dharma each solely have the state of restriction in direct expe-rience.21 Because they have restriction in direct experience, they solely have liberation in direct experience. Do not be disturbed that [when] the “clear, clear hundreds of things” are restricted by eyes, “not a single dharma is seen and not a single object is seen.”22 At this dharma23 [reality] has “already 102b    arrived.”24 At that dharma [reality] has “already arrived.” When we act, in

fetching and taking away and in leaving and entering through a common gate, because the “whole world has never been hidden,”25 the World-honored One’s secret talk,26 secret experience, secret action, secret transmission, and so on are present.

If I leave through the gate, just grass.

If I enter through the gate, just grass.

For ten thousand miles, not an inch of grass!27 The word “enter”

And the word “leave”

Are useless at this place And useless at that place.28

The present grasping does not depend upon action, which is a letting go; rather, it is a dream, an illusion, a flower in space. Who can put this mistake in its place, as a dream, an illusion, a flower in space? A forward step is a mistake, a backward step is a mistake, one step is a mistake, and two steps are a mistake; therefore [action] is mistakes at every moment. Because “the separation is as great as that between heaven and earth,”29 “to arrive at the truth is without difficulty.”30 We should utterly realize dignified

behavior, and behavioral dignity, as “the body, in the great truth, being relaxed.”31 Remember, “when born into life we are born at one with the truth,” and “when entering death we enter at one with the truth.” In the head-to-tail rightness of that state, as a jewel turning or a pearl spinning, dignified behavior is manifest before us. That which imparts and possesses single fragments of the dignified behavior of buddha is the whole of the cosmos32 and the earth, and the whole of living-and-dying and going-and-coming. It is lands of dust33 and it is the Lotus Flower.34 This land of dust and this Lotus Flower, each is one corner. In the thoughts of many students, it is supposed that “the whole cosmos” might mean this southern continent of JambudvTpa, or that it might mean this unity of four continents.35 Again, [some] appear simply to conceive of the single nation of China or think of the single nation of Japan. [Some] appear to think that “the whole earth,” also, means only a three-thousand-great-thousandfold world. [Some] appear merely to imagine one province or one district. If you want to learn through experience the words “the whole earth and the whole cosmos,” mull them over three times and five times. Do not conclude that they are just discussing width. This attaining of truth is the state of transcending the buddhas and transcending the patriarchs which is “the extremely large equaling the small, and the extremely small equaling the large.”36 That the large does not exist and the small does not exist seems doubtful, but it is the acting buddha of dignified behavior.37 In both cases expressed by the buddhas and the patriarchs, dignified behavior as the whole cosmos and dignified behavior as the whole earth, we should learn in practice, as “the whole world,” the state of “never having been hidden.” What “has never been hidden” is not only “the whole world,” [but also] that which perfectly hits the target of acting buddha: dignified behavior.

[113] In expounding the Buddha’s truth, [people usually say that] beings born from the womb and born from metamorphosis are the action of the Buddha’s truth, but they never mention beings born from moisture and born from eggs. Still less have they ever realized, even in a dream, that even beyond this “birth from the womb, eggs, moisture, and metamorphosis” there is birth. How much less could they see, hear, or sense that beyond “birth from the womb, eggs, moisture, and metamorphosis” there is birth from the womb, eggs, moisture, and metamorphosis? In the present great truth of the buddhas and patriarchs, the fact that beyond “birth from the womb, eggs,

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moisture, and metamorphosis” there is birth from the womb, eggs, moisture, and metamorphosis, has been authentically transmitted in the state of “never having been hidden” and has been authentically transmitted in the state of immediacy. As what kind of group should we see those who will not hear, will not learn, will not recognize, and will not clarify this expression of the truth? We have heard already about the four kinds of birth. For death, how many kinds are there? Might there be, for the four kinds of birth, four kinds of death? Or might there be three kinds of death or two kinds of death? Again, might there be five deaths, six deaths, thousands of deaths, or myriad deaths? Even merely to doubt this principle is a kind of learning in practice. Let us consider for a while, among the miscellaneous beings [born from] these four kinds of birth, could there be any that have birth but no death? And are there any that receive a single-line transmission of only death, without receiving a single-line transmission of birth? We must unfailingly study in practice the existence or nonexistence of kinds which solely are born or which solely die. There are those who merely hear the phrase “non-birth”38 without clar-103a ifying it, seeming to set aside effort with body and mind. It is the utmost stupidity. They must be called a kind of animal that cannot arrive at even discussion of “devotional and Dharma [practice]” or of “instantaneous and gradual [realization].” The reason is that even if they hear [the words] “being without birth,” they need [to ask] “What is the intention of this expression of the truth?” They utterly fail to consider whether it might mean “buddha as being without,” “the truth as being without,” “the mind as being without,” or “cessation as being without,” or whether it might mean “non-birth as being without,” or whether it might mean “the world of Dharma as being without” or “the Dharma-nature as being without,” or whether it might mean “death as being without.” This is because they are as idly absent-minded as water weeds. Remember, living-and-dying39 is the action of the Buddha’s truth and living-and-dying is a tool in the Buddha’s house. “In using it, we should use it carefully. In clarifying it we are able to be clear.” Therefore buddhas are “utterly clear” in this penetration and nonpenetration and are “utterly able” in this “careful use.” If you are unclear in regard to this living-and-dying, who can say that you are yourself? Who can call you a character who has comprehended life and mastered death? You cannot hear that you are immersed in living-and-dying, you cannot know that you exist in living-and-dying, you

cannot believe and accept that living-and-dying is living-and-dying, and you can neither be beyond understanding nor beyond knowing. Some express the notion that buddhas appear in the world only in the human state, never manifesting themselves in other directions or in other states. If it is as they say, must every place where buddhas are present be a human state? That is a human buddha’s expression of the truth that “I alone am the Honored One.”40 There may also be god-buddhas, and there may be buddha-buddhas. Those who say that buddhas manifest themselves only in the human domain do not enter deep beyond the threshold of the Buddhist patriarchs.

[117] An ancestral patriarch41 says, “Sakyamuni Buddha, having received the transmission of the right Dharma from Kasyapa Buddha, went to Tusita Heaven to teach the gods of Tusita, and he is still there now.”

Truly we should remember, although at that time the Sakyamuni of the human world spread the teaching that was the manifestation of his extinc-tion,42 the Sakyamuni of the heavens above “is still there now,” teaching the gods. Students should know that the existence of the speech, the action, and the preaching of the Sakyamuni of the human world, [though] of thousandfold changes and myriad transformations, are [only] one corner—in the human domain—of his radiance of brightness and his manifestation of good omens. We should not stupidly fail to recognize that the teaching of the Sakyamuni of the heavens above might also be of thousandfold kinds and myriad aspects. The fundamental point, which transcends “severance” of the great truth authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha, and which has gotten free of being “without beginning and without end,”43 has been authentically transmitted only in Buddhism: it is a virtue that other sorts neither know nor hear. At places where acting buddha establishes the teaching there exist living beings beyond “the four kinds of birth,” and there may exist places beyond “the heavens above,” “the human domain,” “the world of Dharma,” and the like. When you want to glimpse the dignified behavior of acting buddha, do not use eyes of the heavens above or the human world and do not employ the sentimental thinking of the heavens above or the human world. Do not aim to fathom [dignified behavior] by such means. Even [bodhisattvas in] the ten sacred and three clever stages neither know it nor clarify it: how much less could the calculating intellect of the human world and the heavens above reach it? As human consideration is short and small, so too is knowledge-based wisdom short and small. As a lifetime is short and pressed, so too is the intellect short and pressed—how could it fathom the dignified behavior of acting buddha? Thus, with regard to the lineage that simply takes the human world to be the Buddha-Dharma and [the lineage] that narrowly takes human methods to be the Buddha-Dharma, never permit that either the former or the latter are the Buddha’s disciples. They are only ordinary beings as the results of karma. They have never experienced the hearing of Dharma through body-and-mind, and they have never possessed a body-and-mind that has practiced the truth. They do not live in conformity with Dharma. They do not die in conformity with Dharma. They do not see in conformity with Dharma. They do not hear in conformity with Dharma. They do not walk, stand, sit, and lie in conformity with Dharma. Groups like this have never experienced the moistening benefit of Dharma. The assertion that acting buddha is neither in love with “original enlightenment” nor in love with “initiated enlightenment,” and is beyond “not having enlightenment” and beyond “having enlightenment,” describes just this principle. Such [concepts] as “mindfulness” and “being without mindfulness,”44 or “having enlightenment” and “being without enlightenment,” or “initiated enlightenment” and “original enlightenment,” which are excitedly considered by the common people of today, are solely the excited consideration of the common person; they are not what has been transmitted and received from buddha to buddha. The “mindfulness” of the common person and the mindfulness of the buddhas are far apart: never liken them. The common person’s excited consideration of original enlightenment and the buddhas’ real experience of original enlightenment are as far apart as heaven and earth: they are beyond comparison. Not even the vigorous consideration of [bodhi-sattvas in] the ten sacred and three clever stages can arrive at the buddhas’ state of truth: how could the common people who vainly count grains of sand fathom it? Yet there are many who, while merely giving excited consideration to the essentialist and trivialist45 false views of common people and non-Buddhists, conceive [these views] to be the state of the buddhas. The buddhas have said, “The roots of wrongdoing of these fellows are deep and heavy,”46 and “They are beings to be pitied.” Their deep and heavy roots of wrongdoing are limitless; at the same time, the deep and heavy burden is borne by “these fellows” themselves. For a while they should let go of this deep and heavy burden, and put on eyes and look! They may take hold [of their burden again] and restrict themselves with it, but that is not the beginning of anything.

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[122] The present unrestricted state of the dignified behavior of acting buddha is restricted by the state of buddha, in which state, because the vigorous path of “dragging through mud and staying in water”47 has been mastered, there is no restriction. In the heavens above, [the state of acting buddha] teaches gods; in the human world, it teaches human beings. It has the virtue of “flowers opening,”48 and it has the virtue of “the occurrence of the world,”49 without any gap between them at all. For this reason, it is “far transcendent”50 over self and others and it has “independent excellence”51 in going and coming. Just here and now, it goes to Tusita Heaven. Just here and now, it comes from Tusita Heaven. Just here and now, it is just Tusita Heaven52 here and now. Just here and now, it goes to Peace and Happiness.53 Just here and now, it comes from Peace and Happiness. Just here and now, it is just Peace and Happiness here and now. Just here and now, it is far transcendent over Tusita. Just here and now, it is far transcendent over Peace and Happiness. Just here and now, it “smashes” Peace and Happiness and Tusita “into hundreds of bits and pieces.”54 Just here and now, it holds onto and lets go of Peace and Happiness and Tusita. It swallows them whole in one gulp. Remember, “Peace and Happiness” and “Tusita” are akin to the Pure Land and to Paradise, in that each turns in the circuit of mundane existence.55 When [Peace and Happiness and Tusita] are action, the Pure Land and Paradise, similarly, are action. When [the former] are great realization, [the latter] similarly are great realization. When [the former] are great delusion, [the latter] similarly are great delusion. This state is, for the present, toes wiggling inside the sandals of acting buddha. Sometimes it is the sound of a fart and the whiff of a shit. Those who have nostrils are able to smell it. With organs of hearing, organs of body, and organs of action, they hear it. There are also times when it “gets my skin, flesh, bones, and marrow.”56 Being attained through action, it is never got from others. When the great truth of understanding life and mastering death has already been mastered openly, there is an old expression for it: [namely, that] great saints leave life-and-death at the mercy of the mind, leave life-and-death at the mercy of the body, leave life-and-death at the mercy of the truth, and leave life-and-death at the mercy of life-and-death.57 Although the revelation of this principle is beyond the past and present, the dignified

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behavior of acting buddha is instantaneously practiced to the full.58 The truth being a cycle, [the state of acting buddha can] momentarily intuit and affirm the import of life-and-death and body-and-mind. Practicing to the full and clarifying to the full are not enforced actions: they greatly resemble “a head being deluded and making out shadows,” and they are totally akin to “the turning of light and reflection.”59 This brightness, which is brightness over brightness, permeates the meridians of acting buddha, and is utterly entrusted to the “acting.” [To research] this truth of moment-by-moment utter entrust-ment, we must research the mind. In the mountain-still state of such research, we discern and understand that ten thousand efforts60 are [each] the mind being evident, and the triple world is just that which is greatly removed from the mind. This discernment and understanding, while also of the myriad real dharmas, activate the homeland of the self. They make immediate and concrete the vigorous state of the human being in question. Then, in shaking the sieve two times and three times, grasping criteria within phrases and seeking 104b expedients outside words, there is taking hold in excess of “taking hold” and there is letting go in excess of “letting go.” Consideration therein is as follows: What is life and what is death? What are body and mind? What are giving and taking away? What are leaving be and going against? Is [this consideration] a leaving and entering through a common gate without any meeting taking place? Is it a stone having been placed already,61 in which state [even if] the body is concealed the horns are showing through? Is it immense consideration followed by understanding? Is it maturation of thought followed by knowing? Is it the one bright pearl? Is it the whole treasury of the teachings? Is it a staff? Is it a face and eyes? Does it follow after thirty years? Is it ten thousand years in one moment of consciousness? Investigating in concrete detail, we should make investigation [itself] concrete and detailed. When investigation is done in concrete detail, “a whole eye hears sounds,” and “a whole ear sees forms.” Further, when “a sramana's one eye”62 is open and clear, “this state is not [only] the real dharmas before the eyes,” and “this state is not [only] the facts before the eyes.” There is a face of gentle countenance breaking [into a smile], and there is the winking of an eye: they are the fleetingness of the dignified behavior of acting buddha. [Acting buddha] is not “to be pulled by objects”; it is “to be beyond the pull of objects.” It is beyond “being without birth and without becoming in [the process of]

dependent origination.” It is beyond “the original nature” and “the Dharma-nature.” It is beyond “abiding in one’s place in the Dharma.” It is beyond the state of original existence.” And it is not only the concrete affirmation of “reality as it is.” It is nothing other than the acting buddha of dignified behavior.63 This being so, the real state of “working for Dharma and working for the body” can be left at the mercy of the mind; and the dignified behavior that gets rid of “life” and gets rid of “death” is utterly entrusted, for the present, to buddha. Therefore we have the expressions “The myriad dharmas are only the mind” and “The triple world is only the mind.”64 When we express the truth in a further ascendant state, there is an expression of the truth by “only the mind” [itself]: namely, “fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.”65 It is because [mind] is not “only the mind” that [fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles] are not fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles. Such are the truths of “entrust-ment to the mind and entrustment to the Dharma” and of “working for the Dharma and working for the body,” which are the dignified behavior of acting buddha. It is beyond the orbit of “initiated enlightenment,” “original enlightenment,” and so on; how much less could it be in the orbit of non-Buddhists, the two vehicles, and [bodhisattvas in] the three clever and ten sacred stages? This dignified behavior is simply the “not understanding” of every individual and is “not understanding” in every instance.66 Even “the state of vigorous activity”67 is also a situation as it is moment by moment. Is it “the single track of iron,”68 or is it “two parts moving”?69 The single track of iron is beyond long and short, and the two parts moving are beyond self and others. When we realize the effort that is the energy of this [real state of] “making things progress and throwing ourselves into the moment,”70 then “dignity covers the myriad dharmas,” and “the eye is as high as the whole of civilization.” There is brightness that does not interfere with reining in and letting go:71 it is “the monks’ hall, the Buddha hall, the kitchen, and the three gates.”72 There is brightness that is utterly beyond letting go and reining in: it is the monks’ hall, the Buddha hall, the kitchen, and the three gates. Further, there are eyes that permeate the ten directions, and there are eyes that totally take in the earth; there is the moment before the mind and there is the moment after the mind. Because such brightness and virtue, in eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind is burning, there are “the buddhas of the three times,” who have maintained and relied upon the state of “being not known”; and there

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are “cats and white oxen,” which have thrown themselves into the moment of “being known to exist.”73 [When] this ring in the nose is present and this eye is present, the Dharma preaches acting buddha, and the Dharma sanctions acting buddha.

[131] Great Master Shinkaku of Seppozan74 preaches to the assembly: “The buddhas of the three times are inside the flame of the fire,75 turning the great wheel of Dharma.”

Great Master Shuitsu of Gensha-in Temple76 says: “The flame is preaching Dharma for the buddhas of the three times, and the buddhas of the three times are standing on the ground to listen.”

Zen Master Engo77 says:

[Seppo] deserves to be called the White Baron,78

[But] also present is the Black Baroness.79

Reciprocally they throw themselves into the moment:

Gods appear and demons vanish.80

Blazing flame covers the cosmos:81 Buddha preaches Dharma.

The cosmos is in blazing flame: Dharma preaches Buddha.

Ahead of the wind, nests of arrowroot and wisteria82 have been cut away.

With one word, VimalakTrti83 has been tested and defeated.84

The present “buddhas of the three times” means all the buddhas. Acting buddha is just “the buddhas of the three times”85 themselves. Among the buddhas of the ten directions, there is none who is not “of the three times.” When the Buddha’s truth preaches “the three times,” it preaches them wholly, like this. Now, when we research acting buddha, it is just “the buddhas of the three times” themselves. Whether its “existence is known” or whether its 105a “existence is not known,”86 it is always acting buddha as “the buddhas of the three times.” Even so, the three olden buddhas,87 while expressing the truth of “the buddhas of the three times”88 in like fashion, have the [individual] expressions described above. For instance, Seppo says, “The buddhas of the three times are inside the flame, turning the great wheel of Dharma,” and we should learn this truth. Every place of practicing truth89 in which the buddhas of the three times turn the wheel of Dharma might be “the inside of flame.”90 And every “inside of flame” might be a buddha’s place of practicing truth.

Teachers of sutras and teachers of commentaries cannot hear [this], and non-Buddhists and the two vehicles cannot know it. Remember, the flame of buddhas can never be the flame of other sorts. Indeed, we should reflect upon whether or not other sorts have flame at all. We should learn the teaching conventions [employed by] the buddhas of the three times while they are “inside flame.” When they are located “inside flame,” are “flame” and “the buddhas” cemented together? Are they drifting apart? Are object and subject oneness? Do object and subject exist? Are object and subject the same situation? Are object and subject equally far removed? “Turning the great wheel of Dharma” may include “turning the self and turning the moment.”91 It is “making things progress and throwing oneself into the moment.”92 It may include “turning the Dharma” and “the Dharma turning.”93 The “turning the wheel of Dharma” that [Seppo] has already expressed——even if the whole earth is totally in flame——may include “turning the wheel of Dharma” which is “the wheel of fire,”94 may include “turning the wheel of Dharma” which is “the buddhas,” may include “turning the wheel of Dharma” which is “the wheel of Dharma,” and may include “turning the wheel of Dharma” which is “the three times.” In sum, “flame” is the great place of practice in which “the buddhas turn the great wheel of Dharma.” To fathom this state by spatial thinking, temporal thinking, human thinking, the thinking of the common and the sacred, and so on does not hit the target. Because [this state] is not fathomed by such thinking, it is just “the buddhas of the three times being inside flame and turning the great wheel of Dharma.” “The buddhas of the three times” that [Seppo] has already expressed have gone beyond thinking. Because “the buddhas of the three times” are places of practice for “the turning of the Dharma wheel,” “flame” exists. Because “flame” exists, “the buddhas’” places of practice exist.

[135] Gensha says, “The flame is preaching Dharma for the buddhas of the three times, and the buddhas of the three times are standing on the ground to listen to the Dharma.” Hearing these words, [some might] say that Gensha’s words are a fitter expression of the truth than Seppo’s words; it is not necessarily so. Remember, the words of Seppo and the words of Gensha are separate: that is to say, Seppo is speaking of the concrete place where the buddhas of the three times are “turning the great wheel of Dharma,” and Gensha is speaking of the buddhas of the three times “listening to the Dharma.” Whereas

105b

Seppo’s words express the very “turning of the Dharma”95 itself, the existence at a concrete place of “turning of the Dharma” does not necessarily call into discussion “listening to the Dharma” or not “listening to the Dharma.” Thus, we cannot hear [Seppo say] that in “turning of the Dharma” there must always be “listening to the Dharma.” Further, there may be import in [Seppo] not saying that the buddhas of the three times are preaching Dharma for the flame, not saying that the buddhas of the three times are turning the great wheel of Dharma for the buddhas of the three times, and not saying that the flame is turning the great wheel of Dharma for the flame.96 Is there any difference between saying “turning the Dharma wheel”97 and saying “turning the great wheel of Dharma”? “Turning the wheel of Dharma” is beyond “preaching Dharma.” Must “preaching Dharma” necessarily be done for others?98 Thus, Seppo’s words are not words that fail to express fully the words that he meant to express. We must learn in practice, and always in complete detail, Seppo’s [words] “existing inside the flame, turning the great wheel of Dharma.” Do not confuse them with Gensha’s words. To penetrate Seppo’s words is to dignify and to behave with the dignified behavior of buddha. “The flame’s” accommodation of “the buddhas of the three times” is beyond only the permeation of one limitless Dharma world or two limitless Dharma worlds, and it is beyond only the penetration of one atom or two atoms. For a measure of “the turning of the great wheel of Dharma,” do not look to measures of the large, small, wide, and narrow. “The turning of the great wheel of Dharma” is not for self or for others, and is not for preaching or 105c for listening. Gensha’s expression is: “The flame is preaching Dharma for the buddhas of the three times, and the buddhas of the three times are standing on the ground to listen.” This, although [it says that the flame] is “preaching Dharma for the buddhas of the three times,” never says that [the flame] is “turning the wheel of Dharma.” Neither does it say that the buddhas of the three times are “turning the wheel of Dharma.” The buddhas of the three times are standing on the ground to listen, but how could [Gensha’s] flame turn the buddhas of the three times’ “wheel of Dharma”?99 Does the flame that is “preaching Dharma for the buddhas of the three times” also “turn the great wheel of Dharma,” or does it not? Gensha never says, “Turning of the wheel of Dharma is this moment!” Neither does he deny the existence of turning of the wheel of Dharma, but I wonder whether Gensha has stupidly

understood “turning the wheel of Dharma” to mean preaching about the wheel of Dharma. If so, he is blind to Seppo’s words. He has recognized that when the flame is “preaching Dharma” for the buddhas of the three times, “the buddhas of the three times” are standing on the ground and listening to the Dharma, but he does not know that where “the flame” is “turning the wheel of Dharma,” there “the flame” is standing on the ground and listening to the Dharma. He fails to say that where “the flame” is turning the wheel of Dharma, “the flame” simultaneously is turning the wheel of Dharma. The buddhas of the three times’ “listening to the Dharma” is the Dharma-state of the buddhas: it is not influenced by others. Do not see “the flame” as “Dharma,” do not see “the flame” as “Buddha,” and do not see “the flame” as “flame.” Truly, we should not disregard the words of master or disciple. How could it be [sufficient] only “to have expressed that a red-beard is a for-eigner”? It is also the fact that “a foreigner’s beard is red.”100 Although Gen-sha’s words are like this,101 present in them is something which we should esteem as the power of learning in practice. That is to say, we should learn in practice the essence and forms that have been authentically transmitted by the buddhas and the patriarchs, and which are not connected with essence and forms in the limited Mahayana and Hinayana thinking of sutra teachers and commentary teachers. What [Gensha] describes is the buddhas of the three times’ listening to the Dharma, which is beyond the essence and forms of Mahayana and Hinayana [Buddhists]. They know only that buddhas have— when it is accommodated by opportunities and circumstances—“the preaching of Dharma”; they do not know that the buddhas are “listening to the Dharma.” They do not assert that the buddhas are training, and they do not assert that the buddhas are realizing the state of Buddha. Now in Gensha’s expression, he has already asserted that “the buddhas of the three times are standing on the ground and listening to the Dharma,” and this contains the essence and the form of the buddhas’ “listening to the Dharma.” Do not see being able to preach as necessarily superior, and do not say that “those who are able to listen to this Dharma”102 are inferior. If those who preach are venerable, those who listen also are venerable. Sakyamuni Buddha said:

If they preach this sutra,

106a

At once they will see me103

[But] to preach it to [even] a single person:

That indeed will be hard.104

So to be able to preach the Dharma is to meet Sakyamuni Buddha—for the “me” who “at once they will meet” is Sakyamuni Buddha. He also said:

After my extinction,

To listen to and to accept this sutra,

And to inquire into its meaning:

That indeed will be hard.105

Remember, “listening and acceptance” also, equally, “are hard”: there is no superiority or inferiority. Even though [those who are] “standing on the ground to listen” are “the buddhas,” the supremely venerable, they should be “standing on the ground to listen to the Dharma.” [Those who are] “standing on the ground to listen to the Dharma” are “the buddhas of the three times,” and so those buddhas are in the realized state; we do not talk of listening to the Dharma as a causal process. They are already the buddhas of the three times, and so we should remember that the buddhas of the three times, standing on the ground to listen to the flame preach Dharma, are buddhas. [Although] we cannot trace the whole truth of the teaching and the conventions, when we endeavor to trace them, the state is “arrow tips having collided.”106 Flame invariably preaches the Dharma for the buddhas of the three times and, in the state of red mind moment by moment, flowers bloom on iron trees and the world is fragrant. In brief, while flame remains standing on the ground to listen to the preaching of Dharma, ultimately what is realized? The answer may be wisdom surpassing the master or wisdom equaling the master. Further, by researching deep beyond the threshold of master and disciple,107 [flame]108 106b becomes the buddhas of the three times.

[142] Engo says that [Seppo’s] deserving to be called the White Baron does not prevent the Black Baroness from also [being present], and that their “reciprocal throwing themselves into the moment” is “gods appearing and demons vanishing.” Now, although [Seppo can] manifest himself in the same situation as Gensha, there may be in Gensha a way in which he does not enter the same situation [as Seppo]. At the same time, is “flame” the buddhas? Are buddhas “flame”?109 The mind of reciprocation between black and white

appears and vanishes in the gods and demons of Gensha, but the sounds and forms of Seppo never remain in the area of black and white.110 And, while this is so, we should recognize that in Gensha there is fitness of verbal expression and there is unfitness of verbal expression, whereas in Seppo there is taking up with verbal expression and there is leaving be with verbal expression. Now Engo, in addition, has an expression that is not the same as Gensha and not the same as Seppo: namely, that “blazing flame covering the cosmos” is Buddha preaching Dharma, and that “the cosmos in blazing flame” is Dharma preaching Buddha. This expression really is brightness to students of later ages. Even if we are blind to “blazing flame,” because we are covered by “the cosmos,” I have that condition and the other has this condition. Places covered by “the cosmos” are already “blazing flame.” What is the use of hating this and relying on that?111 We should be glad that this skinbag—although its place of birth is “distantly removed from the sacred quarter” and the present in which it is living is “distantly removed from the sacred time”112—has still been able to hear the guiding teaching of “the cosmos.” That “Buddha preaches Dharma” we had heard, but with regard to the fact that Dharma preaches Buddha, how deeply enmeshed were we in ignorance? In summary, the buddhas of the three times are preached in the three times by the Dharma, and the Dharma of the three times is preached in the three times by Buddha. There solely exists “the cosmos,” which, ahead of the wind, cuts away nests of arrowroot and wisteria. A single word has conspicuously tested and defeated Vimalakirti and others besides VimalakTrti too. In sum, Dharma preaches Buddha, Dharma practices Buddha, and Dharma experiences Buddha; Buddha preaches Dharma, Buddha practices Buddha, and Buddha becomes Buddha. States like this are all the dignified behavior of acting buddha. Over the cosmos and over the earth, over the past and over the present, “those who have attained it do not trivialize it, and those who have clarified it do not debase it.”

Shobogenzo Gyobutsu-yuigi

106c

Written at Kannondorikoshohorinji in the last

ten days of the tenth lunar month in the second

year of Ninji.113

Sramana Dogen

Notes

1    Butsuma, homa means idealists who are disturbed by the concept of “Buddha” and “Dharma.”

2    Juto-toko, “a tree falling and wisteria withering,” represents the natural falling away of that which binds.

3    Hosshin, “Dharma body,” represents the Sanskrit dharmakaya. Hojin, “reward body,” represents the Sanskrit sarnbhogakaya. Sarnbhoga, which means enjoyment or sensuality, suggests the physical aspect of the body. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. This sentence suggests that being bound by concepts hinders both spiritual fulfillment and physical well-being.

4    Quoted from the Makashikan, a text of the Tendai sect based on the lectures of Master Tendai Chigi.

5    The Buddha’s words in Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryo (“The Tathagata’s Lifetime”). See LS 3.18-20.

6    The Buddha’s words are about life here and now.

7    Ju-o, “vertical or horizontal,” means free in all directions.

8    Master Daikan Eno asked Master Nangaku Ejo, “Do you rely on practice and experience or not?” Master Nangaku said, “It is not that there is no practice and experience, but the state can never be tainted.” Master Daikan Eno said, “Just this untaintedness is that which the buddhas guard and desire. You are also like this. I am also like this. And the ancestral masters of India were also like this.” The story is recorded in Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 1, and also quoted in Chapter Seven (Vol. I), Senjo, and chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan.

9    In other words, motivation in the state of acting buddha is always pure, but motivation in zazen and other Buddhist practices is not always pure. Zenna, “taintedness,” describes, for example, sitting in zazen with expectation of reward other than the experience of zazen itself.

10    Kono fu-zenna, “this untaintedness,” and fu-mu, “not nonexistent,” both allude to the famous conversation between Master Daikan Eno and Master Nangaku Ejo about practice and experience.

11    Nyo-go-ze-go. In Master Daikan Eno’s words go-yaku-nyoze, “I am also like this,”

the compound nyoze means “like this.” Here Master Dogen separates the compound into the two adjectives nyo, “real,” and ze, “this, concrete.”

Go-mata. In this usage, mata, “also” or “again,” is emphatic——the master is just himself.

Myogosoku, from the Sanskrit vidyd-carana-sampanna, is one of the ten epithets of the Buddha. The expression praises the Buddha as not only perfect in knowledge but also perfect in conduct, and as not only perfect in conduct but also perfect in knowledge.

Fu-shaku-shinmyo alludes to the Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryo (“The Tathagata’s Lifetime”). See LS 3.30.

Master Dogen imagined a concrete situation in which, for example, a Buddhist monk breaks the precept of not eating after lunch in order to maintain a balanced and satisfied state of mind.

Kekai means the appearance of phenomena.

Sekai represents concrete existence. The twenty-seventh patriarch, Master Prajnatara, said kekai-sekai-ki, “flowers opening are the occurrence of the world”; in other words, phenomena and concrete existence are one. See Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III), Kuge.

Inmo-rai alludes to the former of the two famous conversations between Master Daikan Eno and Master Nangaku Ejo. Master Daikan said to Master Nangaku, “What is it that comes like this?” In this context, “it has come like this” means “it is actually present.” See, for example, Chapter Twenty-nine, Inmo.

No, “able,” yui-ga, “I alone,” and juppo-butsu-nen, “buddhas in the ten directions are like that,” allude to the Buddha’s words in the Lotus Sutra, Hoben (“Expedient Means”) chapter. See LS 1.70, 1.74.

Nahen [noji, “matters in distant places,” means matters that are thought about, abstract concerns. These words are quoted from the Wanshizenjigoroku (Broad Record of Master Wanshi Shogaku), vol. 5.

Joto, literally, “receiving a hit.” Master Dogen’s independent work Gakudoyojinshu explains the term as follows: “With this body-and-mind, we directly experience the state of buddha: this is to receive a hit.”

Mei-mei [taru] hyaku-so-to, or “clear, clear are the hundreds of weeds,” are traditional words in Chinese Buddhism, attributed to the so-called Happy Buddha, Hotei (see Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho). That they are restricted by eyes means that they are seen as they are. That no separate dharma or object is seen means that the view is whole.

Shaho, “this dharma,” suggests the Dharma as a concrete fact here and now. Naho, “that dharma,” suggests the Dharma as theory. See also note 20.

24    Nyaku-shi, literally, “if it arrives.” See Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho, paragraph 14.

25    Henkai-fusozo. The words of Master Sekiso Keisho, quoted in Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 58.

26    Mitsugo. See Chapter Fifty-one (Vol. III), Mitsugo.

27    Banri-mu-sunso, “for ten thousand miles, not an inch of grass,” appears in the Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 82. In general, grass (or weeds) symbolizes concrete objective things (see note 22). At the same time, as that which is attractive to oxen, grass sometimes symbolizes that which distracts Buddhist practitioners from practice.

28    Reality in the present is neither entered nor left.

29    Tenchi-kenkaku, from the third sentence of Master Kanchi Sosan’s verse Shinjinmei: “If there is a hundredth or thousandth of a gap, the separation is as great as that between heaven and earth.” Master Dogen quotes the same words in the Fukanzazengi to describe the gulf between intellectual thinking and action. See Vol. I, Appendix Two.

30    Shido-munan, from the opening sentence of the Shinjinmei: “To arrive at the truth is without difficulty; just hate picking and choosing.”

31    Daido-taikan, from a sentence in the middle of the Shinjinmei: “In the great truth the body is relaxed, and there is neither difficulty nor ease.”

32    “Cosmos” is kenkon. The four directions (north, south, east, and west) are represented by four of the twelve Chinese horary signs. The eight intermediate forty-five degree segments of the compass (north to northeast, northeast to east, etc.) are represented by the remaining twelve horary signs. Ken, or inu-i, “the dog and the boar” means the direction between the dog’s segment (west to northwest) and the boar’s segment (northwest to north); that is, the northwest. Kon, or hitsuji-saru, “the sheep and the monkey,” means the southwest. Kenkon, “northwest and southwest,” represents all points of the compass, that is, the universe or the cosmos.

33    Jinsetsu suggests the dry material world.

34    Renge, as in Mydhorengekyo, the full title of the Lotus Sutra, suggests the world as an aesthetic whole. See Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke.

35    Shishu, “four continents,” from the Sanskrit catur-dvipa, are Jambudvlpa (south), Purvavideha (east), Aparagodaniya (west), and Uttarakuru (north). See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

36    Gokudai-do-sho or gokudai [wa] sho [ni] ona{jiku], and gokusho-do-dai or gokusho [wa] dai [ni] ona[jiku] allude to two sentences at the end of the Shinjinmei: “The extremely large is the same as the small, and no outer surface is seen,” and “The extremely small is the same as the large; boundaries are completely forgotten.”

37    Yuigi-gyobutsu means the state of acting buddha that is realized in dignified behavior.

Musho, “non-birth” or “being without birth,” is sometimes used as a synonym for nirvana.

Shoji is the title of Chapter Ninety-two (Vol. IV). Sho means both birth and life.

Yui-ga-doku-son. In the Long Agama Sutra, the legendary Buddha says these words. Here the expression suggests human arrogance.

The quote is attributed to Master Tendo Nyojo, but the specific source has not been traced. Related preaching by Master Tendo appears at the end of Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), Shisho.

Alludes to the teaching of the Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryo (“The Tathagata’s Lifetime”). See LS 3.30: “In order to save living beings,/As an expedient method I manifest nir-vana,/Yet really I have not passed away....”

Danzetsu, “severance,” and mushi-mushu, “without beginning, without end,” represent two views of time: as separate moments of existence and as eternity. The truth of action transcends both views.

Unen means “mindfulness,” or “having thought,” or “having intention.” Munen means “being without mindfulness,” or “being without thought,” or “being without intention.” The two concepts appear in Master Daikan Eno’s poem quoted in Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke; and Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Kankin.

Honmatsu means beginning and end, substance and detail, origin and future, essence and trivialities, and therefore—in conclusion—idealism and materialism. In Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), Kuyo-shobutsu, the viewpoint of idealism is represented as hongo-honke or “the essentialist view of past kalpas,” as opposed to materialism represented by matsuko-makken or “the trivialist view of future kalpas.”

Lotus Sutra, Hoben. See LS 1.86.

Dadei-taisui, symbolizing daily struggles.

Kekai means the appearance of phenomena.

Sekaiki means the existence of facts. See notes 16 and 17.

Keidatsu.

Dokubatsu or “unique outstandingness.” Master Ungo Doyo said, “When a single word is far transcendent, and unique and outstanding, then many words are not necessary. And many are not useful.” See also Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Keisei-sanshiki.

Tusita Heaven is the place where Bodhisattva Maitreya is practicing the truth. It is said to be the fourth of the six heavens in the world of desire, but here Master Dogen describes it in the time and place of action.

Anraku represents the Sanskrit Sukhavatl, which is the name of a heaven supposedly established by Amitabha Buddha. At the same time, Master Dogen described zazen as anraku [no] homon, “The Dharma gate of peace and happiness.”

54    Hyaku-zassai. The words of Master Gensha Shibi (see Chapter Twenty [Vol. I], Kokyo). The real state of acting buddha shatters the idealism of Tusita Heaven and the realm of Peace and Happiness.

55    Rine represents the Sanskrit samsara. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

56    Toku-go-hi-niku-kotsu-zui alludes to the transmission between Master Bodhidharma and four disciples. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Katto.

57    Great saints do not worry about life-and-death.

58    The philosophy of acting buddha is eternal, but its whole realization is just now.

59    Eko-hensho describes the state in zazen: “clarification” means not intellectual recognition but illumination by the state of brightness in zazen. The words eko-hensho originate in a verse by Master Sekito Kisen recorded in the Sekitosoan-no-uta (Songs from Sekito s Thatched Hut). See also Vol. I, Appendix Two, Fukanzazengi.

60    Bankai, lit., “ten thousand circuits” or “ten thousand times,” may be interpreted as ten thousand zazen sittings, or ten thousand efforts in zazen.

61    Ichijaku-rakuzai, lit., “one move lying in place,” describes the placement of a stone in a game of go, which is often used in the Shobogenzo as a symbol of a concrete action.

62    Shamon-isseki-gen, the words of Master Chosha Keishin. See Chapter Sixty (Vol. III), Juppo.

63    Yuigi-gyobutsu. See note 37.

64    Sangai-yuishin is the title of Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III).

65    Sho-heki-ga-ryaku, an expression of the truth by Master Nan’yo Echu. See Chapter Forty-four (Vol. III), Kobusshin.

66    Fue means “not understanding” or “transcendence of [intellectual] understanding.” Master Daikan Eno said, “I do not understand the Buddha-Dharma.” See Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 59. See also Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke.

67    Katsu-hatsu-hatsu-chi. This expression appears in several chapters of the Shobogenzo. See, for example, the opening paragraph of Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), Zanmai-o-zanmai.

68    Ichi-jotetsu stands for banri-ichijo-tetsu, “a ten-thousand-mile iron track,” a symbol of unification. The expression appears earlier in this chapter, in paragraph 101, and, for example, in Chapter Twenty-nine, Inmo, paragraph 99.

69    Ryd-to-do alludes to the story quoted at the end of Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho.

70    Master Tosan Shusho said: “In words there is no development of things,/In talk we do not throw ourselves into the moment./Those who listen to words miss out,/Those who stick in phrases get lost.”

71    Shuho means reining in and letting go, or contracting and relaxing, or tightening and releasing. “Reining in and letting go” suggests self-control, passive and active.

72    Master Unmon’s words, quoted in Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 81. See also Chapter Thirty-six, Komyo, paragraph 134.

73    Master Nansen Fugan preached, “As to the existence of the buddhas of the three times, I do not know their existence. As to cats and white oxen, I know they exist.” See Hekiganroku, no. 61; Shoyoroku, no. 69.

74    Master Seppo Gison (822-907), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan.

75    Master Seppo was likely referring to a charcoal burner present at that time.

76    Master Gensha Shibi (835-907), successor of Master Seppo.

77    Master Engo Kokugon (1063-1135). Master Engo was in the lineage of Master Rinzai. He compiled the Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record), based on an earlier collection of poems and commentaries by Master Setcho Juken.

78    Kohaku, an excellent thief in Chinese legends.

79    Kokoku, an even more accomplished thief in Chinese legends. The story goes that she stole the shirt off Kohaku’s back. Master Engo is praising both Master Seppo and Master Gensha.

80    Shinshutsu-kibotsu, “gods appear, demons vanish,” describes unexpectedness and elusiveness. Kenkyusha s New Japanese-English Dictionary gives the sample phrase shinshutsu-kibotsu no kaito, “a phantom thief who appears in an unexpected place at an unexpected moment and leaves no trace behind.”

81    Retsu-en goten. In the next line, Master Engo simply reverses the two compounds thus: goten retsu-en. Goten, or ten [o] wata[ru], in the former line means “to extend throughout the sky/heavens/cosmos,” and in the latter line means “that which extends throughout the sky/heavens/cosmos,” i.e., the cosmos itself.

82    Katto, “arrowroot and wisteria” or “the complicated,” is the title of Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Katto.

83    VimalakTrti was a layman of the Buddha’s time who was very skilled in discussion of Buddhist philosophy.

84    Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 3, no. 88.

85    Sanze-shobutsu. Sanze, the three times (past, present, and future), means eternity. Sho expresses plurality, and so shobutsu means buddhas as individuals at concrete times and places, as opposed to simply butsu, hotoke, which means Buddha as the state of wisdom, action, or truth.

86    Alludes to Master Nansen Fugan’s words. See note 73.

87    Master Seppo, Master Gensha, and Master Engo. The rest of the present paragraph

is a commentary on Master Seppo’s words. The following two paragraphs are commentaries on the words of Master Gensha and Master Engo respectively.

Sanze-shobutsu may be seen as an expression of the truth in itself—as an expression of the oneness of concrete individual buddhas and inclusive eternity.

Dojo, lit., “truth place” or “way place,” represents the Sanskrit bodhimanda, or “seat of bodhi.” See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

Ka-en-ri. Ka-en, “flame,” represents the vigorous state. Ri, “inside,” describes a concrete place. “The inside of flame” means a concrete place in the vivid state of reality.

Ten means to turn or to change. At the same time, it means to unroll a sutra and, by extension, to participate in the unfolding of the universe. See Chapter Seventeen (Vol.

I), Hokke-ten-hokke. The phrase tenki, “changing of the moment,” appears in Vol. I, Appendix Two, Fukanzazengi.

Alludes to the words of Master Tosan Shusho. See note 70.

Tenbo, hoten alludes to the terms ten-hokke, “we turn the Flower of Dharma,” and hokke-ten, “the Flower of Dharma turns,” in Master Daikan Eno’s famous verse. See Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke; Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Kankin.

Karin, “wheel of fire,” in ancient Indian cosmology, is one of the five wheels or rings (in Sanskrit panca-mandalaka) of earth, water, fire, wind, and space that make up the material world. The four parts of this sentence follow four phases: the wheel of fire is material, the buddhas are Buddhist, the wheel of Dharma is real, and the three times are existence-time itself.

Tenbd, “turning the Dharma,” suggests ten-hokke, “turning the Flower of Dharma” and tenborin, “turning the wheel of Dharma.” These terms mean, respectively, to read the Lotus Sutra and to preach Buddhist preaching; at the same time both terms represent the action of the universe itself. See Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke; Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), Tenborin.

Master Gensha’s expression includes the word i, [no] tame [ni], which means “for” or “for the sake of.” Master Seppo’s expression is more direct, without recognition of a purpose.

Tenbdrin, “turning the Dharma wheel,” is the conventional term. See Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), Tenbdrin.

For example, preaching Dharma is sometimes done for fame and gain.

Master Gensha said that the flame was preaching Dharma, i.e., representing reality. Master Dogen’s objection is that to turn the wheel of Dharma is to realize reality itself.

In the story of Master Hyakujo and the wild fox (see Chapter Seventy-six [Vol. IV], Dai-shugyo; Chapter Eighty-nine [Vol. IV], Shinjin-inga; and Sh inji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 2), Obaku steps up and gives Master Hyakujo a slap. The master laughs and

says, “You have just expressed that a foreigner’s beard is red, but it is also a fact that a red-beard is a foreigner.” Here Master Dogen reverses the order to suggest that we need not only the interpretative or deductive viewpoint (of Master Gensha) but also the direct observation (of Master Seppo).

101    “Like this” means limited to the deductive viewpoint (a red-beard is a foreigner).

102    Untraced quotation from a sutra.

103    Lotus Sutra, Ken-hoto (“Seeing the Treasure Stupa”). See LS 2.194.

104    Ibid., LS 2.198.

105    Ibid., LS 2.198.

106    Senpd-soshu, or “arrow-tips couple.” This figure of speech is used in Master Sekito Kisen’s verse, Sandokai. It alludes to an old Chinese story about two archers, Kishu and his teacher Hitei. In the whole of China there was no one to rival Kishu except for his own teacher. Eventually the two entered into a duel, but their arrows met and fell to the ground. Hence, senpd-soshu suggests complete mastery of some practical skill, so that the disciple’s experience perfectly matches that of the master. Master Dogen affirmed that although the intellect cannot grasp the truth, the whole truth can be transmitted in practice or experience.

107    Although Master Seppo transmitted the Dharma to Master Gensha as master to disciple, they established a temple together (see Chapter Thirty, G;ydj^), and the many conversations between them recorded in the Shobogenzo show transcendence of usual formalities between master and disciple.

108    Grammatically, the subject is still flame. In context, flame means those, such as Master Seppo and Master Gensha, who are in the sincere and vigorous state.

109    Master Gensha’s expression separates the state of flame (which preaches) and buddhas (who listen). In that sense, it is open to criticism. At the same time, Master Dogen recommended us to consider the nature of the relation between the state of flame and buddhas.

110    White and black refer to Kohaku (the White Baron) and Kokoku (the Black Baroness). At the same time, in the context of the previous question, black may be interpreted as representing flame and white as representing buddhas. In Master Gensha’s mind there was reciprocation between the two factors, but in Master Seppo’s mind there was no discrimination between the two.

111    Nato, “that” or “distant objects,” means abstract matters as opposed to what concretely exists here and now. See also notes 20, 23, and 28.

112    “The sacred quarter” and “the sacred time” mean the land and the lifetime of Gautama Buddha.

113    1241.

[Chapter Twenty-four]

Bukkyo The Buddha’s Teaching

Translator's Note: Butsu means buddha or Buddhist, and kyo means teaching or teachings. Bukkyo is usually translated as Buddhism, but in this chapter Master Dogen emphasized the importance of the theoretical side of Buddhism. For this reason it is better here to translate bukkyo as “Buddha s teaching” in order to distinguish between the peculiar usage of the word in this chapter and the usual usage. Some Buddhist sects, wanting to emphasize the value ofpractice in Buddhism, insist on the importance of a transmission that is beyond and separate from theoretical teachings. They say we need not rely on any verbal explanation of Buddhism. But Master Dogen saw that this theory itself was mistaken. Of course, practice is very important in Buddhism, but Master Dogen considered that both practice and theory are important. If we deny the importance of the theoretical side of Buddhism, we lose the method to transmit Buddhism to others. In this chapter Master Dogen explained the role of Buddhist theory and insisted that we should not forget the importance of theoretical Buddhist teachings.

[147] The realization of the truth of the buddhas is the Buddha’s teaching. Because Buddhist patriarchs perform it for the benefit of Buddhist patriarchs, the teaching authentically transmits it for the benefit of the teaching. This is turning of the wheel of Dharma. Inside the eye of this wheel of Dharma, [the teaching] causes Buddhist patriarchs to be realized and causes Buddhist patriarchs to enter parinirvdna. Those Buddhist patriarchs, without fail, possess manifestation in a single atom and possess nirvana in a single atom; they possess manifestation through the whole universe and possess nirvana through the whole universe; they possess manifestation in a single instant and possess manifestation through the ocean of abundant kalpas. Yet their manifestation in one atom at one instant is utterly without incomplete virtue; and their manifestation through the whole universe through the ocean of abundant kalpas

is never an effort to make up a deficiency. For this reason, we never say that buddhas who realize the truth in the morning and then pass into nirvana1 in the evening are lacking in virtue. If we say that one day is of meager virtue, 107a then the human span of eighty years is not long; and when we compare the human span of eighty years with ten kalpas or twenty kalpas, it may be like the relation between one day and eighty years. The virtue of this buddha and of that buddha2 may be indistinguishable: when we take the virtue that belongs to a lifetime of long kalpas and the virtue in eighty years, and try to compare them, we might be unable to arrive at even doubt. For this reason, “the Buddha’s teaching” is just “teaching a buddha.”3 It is the perfectly realized virtue of a Buddhist patriarch. It is not true that the buddhas are high and wide while the Dharma teaching is narrow and small. Remember, when “buddha” is big “the teaching” is big, and when “buddha” is small “the teaching” is small. So remember, “buddha” and “the teaching” are beyond measures of big and small; they are beyond such properties as “good, bad, and indifferent”; and they are not for self-teaching or for the teaching of others.

[150] Some fellow has said, “Old Man Sakyamuni, besides expounding the teaching and the sutras throughout his life, also authentically transmitted to Mahakasyapa the Dharma of the one mind which is the supreme vehicle, and this transmission has passed from rightful successor to rightful successor. So the teaching is opportunistic idle discussion, but the mind is the essential true reality. This authentically transmitted one mind is called ‘the separate transmission outside the teachings.’4 It is not to be likened to discussion of the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching. Because the one mind is the supreme vehicle, we speak of ‘direct pointing into the human heart’ and ‘seeing the nature and becoming buddha.’” This expression is never about the everyday conduct of the Buddha-Dharma: it lacks the vigorous road of getting the body free, and it has no dignified behavior throughout the body. Fellows like this, even hundreds or thousands of years ago, were proclaiming themselves to be leading authorities; but we should know that, if they had such talk as this, they neither clarified nor penetrated the Buddha’s Dharma and the Buddha’s truth. Why not? Because of not knowing “buddha,” not knowing “the teaching,” not knowing “the mind,” not knowing “inside,” and not knowing “outside.” This not knowing is due to never having heard 107b the Buddha-Dharma. Now they talk of “the buddhas” without knowing what

their substance and details are and without ever studying even the borders of [the buddhas’] going and coming; that being so, they do not deserve to be called the Buddha’s disciples. The reason they say that [buddhas] authentically transmit only the one mind, without authentically transmitting the Buddha’s teaching, is that they do not know the Buddha-Dharma. Not knowing the one mind as the Buddha’s teaching and not hearing the Buddha’s teaching as the one mind, they say that there is the Buddha’s teaching outside of the one mind. Their “one mind” never having become the one mind, they say that there is a “one mind” outside of the Buddha’s teachings. It may be that their “Buddha’s teachings” have never become the Buddha’s teaching. Although they have transmitted and received the fallacy of “a separate transmission outside the teachings,” because they have never known “inside” and “outside,” the logic of their words is not consistent. How could the Buddhist patriarchs who receive the one-to-one transmission of the Buddha’s right-Dharma-eye treasury fail to receive the one-to-one transmission of the Buddha’s teaching? Still more, why would Old Man Sakyamuni have instituted teachings and methods that could have no place in the everyday conduct of Buddhists? Old Man Sakyamuni intended, already, to create teachings and methods to be transmitted one-to-one: what Buddhist patriarch would wish to destroy them? Therefore, the meaning of “the one mind that is the supreme vehicle” is just the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching, and is just the Mahayana treasury and the Hinayana treasury.5 Remember, because “the Buddha’s mind” means the Buddha’s eye, a broken wooden dipper, all dharmas, and the triple world, therefore it is the mountains, the oceans, and national lands, the sun, the moon, and the stars. “The Buddha’s teaching” means myriad phenomena and accumulated things. The meaning of “outside” is this concrete place, this concrete place having arrived.6 The authentic transmission is authentically transmitted from a self to a self, and so within the authentic transmission there is self. [The authentic transmission] is authentically transmitted from the one mind to the one mind, and so in the authentic transmission there must be the one mind. The one mind that is the supreme vehicle is soil, stones, sand, and pebbles. Because soil, stones, sand, and pebbles are the one mind, soil, stones, sand, and pebbles are soil, stones, sand, and pebbles. If we speak of the authentic transmission of the one mind that is the supreme vehicle, it should be like this. But the fellows who speak of “a separate transmission outside the teachings” have never known this meaning. Therefore, do not, through belief in the fallacy of “a separate transmission outside the teachings,” misunderstand the Buddha’s teaching. If it were as those [fellows] say, might it be possible to speak of the teaching as “a separate transmission outside the mind”? If we spoke of “a separate transmission outside the mind,” not a single phrase nor half a verse could be transmitted. If we do not speak of “a separate transmission outside the mind,” we should never speak of “a separate transmission outside the teachings.”

[155] Mahakasyapa, as already the rightful successor of Sakyamuni, is owner of the teaching of the Dharma treasury; and, having received the authentic transmission of the right-Dharma-eye treasury, he is the keeper of the Buddha’s state of truth. To say, on the contrary, that he need not have received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s teaching, may be onesided and limited learning of the truth. Remember, when one phrase is authentically transmitted, the authentic transmission of the whole Dharma takes place. When one phrase is authentically transmitted, there is the transmission of mountains and the transmission of waters, and “it is impossible to depart from the transmission at this concrete place.”7 Sakyamuni‘s right-Dharma-eye treasury and supreme state of bodhi were authentically transmitted only to Mahakasyapa; they were not authentically transmitted to other disciples. The authentic transmission is, inevitably, Mahakasyapa. For this reason, in the past and present, every individual who learns the true reality of the Buddha-Dharma, when deciding upon teaching and learning that have come from the past, inevitably investigates them under the Buddhist patriarchs; we do not seek the decision under anyone else. Unless we have obtained the right decision of the Buddhist patriarchs, [our decision] is not yet the right decision. If we hope to determine whether the teachings we rely upon are right or not, we should determine it under the Buddhist patriarchs. The reason is that the original owners of the whole wheel of Dharma are the Buddhist patriarchs. Only the Buddhist patriarchs, having clarified and authentically transmitted the expression “existence,” the expression “nonexistence,” the expression “emptiness,” and the expression “matter,” are past buddha and present buddha.8

[157] Haryo,9 on one occasion, is asked by a monk, “The Patriarch’s intention and the intention of the teachings: are they the same or are they different?” The master says, “Hens when cold perch in trees. Ducks when cold enter the water.”10

Learning these words in practice, we should meet with the ancestral patriarchs of Buddhism and we should see and hear the teachings and methods of Buddhism. The present asking about the Patriarch’s intention and the intention of the teachings, is asking whether the Patriarch’s intention and the Patriarch’s intention are the same or different. The present assertion that “hens when cold perch in trees; ducks when cold enter the water” expresses sameness and difference, but not the sameness and difference that is at the mercy of the perceptions of people who hold views on sameness and difference. Thus, because [Haryo] is beyond discussion of sameness and difference, he might be saying, “It is the same difference.” Therefore, he seems to be saying, “Do not ask about sameness and difference.”

[158] Gensha,11 on one occasion, is asked by a monk, “The three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching being unnecessary, just what is the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?” The master says, “The three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching completely being unnecessary.”

The monk’s question here, “The three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching being unnecessary, just what is the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?” as commonly understood, says that “the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching” are individual branches of a forked road, and asks whether “the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west” might exist elsewhere. [The common understanding] does not recognize that “the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching” are “the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west itself.”12 How much less could it know that the aggregate of eighty-four thousand Dharma gates is just “the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west”? Let us now investigate why “the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching” are “unnecessary.” When, if ever, they are “necessary,” what kind of criteria do they contain? Where “the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching” are “unnecessary,” is learning in practice of “the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west” realized? The appearance of this [monk’s] question might not be for nothing. Gensha says, “The three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching completely being unnecessary.” This

expression is the wheel of Dharma. We should investigate the fact that where 108b this wheel of Dharma turns, the Buddha’s teaching exists as the Buddha’s teaching. The point is that “the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching” are the wheel of Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs.13 It turns at times and places in which there are Buddhist patriarchs,14 and it turns at times and places in which there are no Buddhist patriarchs.15 It turns the same before a patriarch and after a patriarch. Further, it has the virtue of turning a Buddhist patriarch. Just at the moment of “the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west,”16 this wheel of Dharma is “completely beyond necessity.”17 That it is “completely unnecessary” means neither that we do not use it nor that it is worn out: it is simply that this wheel of Dharma at this time is turning the wheel of “complete non-necessity.” We do not deny the existence of “the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching”; we should glimpse the moment of their “complete non-necessity.” Because they are “complete non-necessity,” they are “the three vehicles and twelve divisions of the teaching.” Because they are “the three vehicles and twelve divisions of the teaching,” they are not “three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching.” For this reason, we express them as “the three vehicles and twelve divisions of the teaching.” To quote one from among innumerable examples of those “three vehicles and twelve divisions of the teaching,” it is as follows.

[161] The three vehicles: “First, the vehicle of the iravaka,”18 who attains the way [of bodhi] through the Four Truths.19 The Four Truths are the truth of suffering, the truth of accumulation, the truth of cessation, and the truth of the Way. Hearing these and practicing these, [sravakas] traverse and attain release from birth, aging, sickness, and death; and they realize the ultimateparinirvana.20 The assertion that “In the practice of these Four Truths, suffering and accumulation are secular while cessation and the Way are paramount”21 is the view and opinion of teachers of commentaries. Providing that [the Four Truths] are practiced in accordance with the Buddha-Dharma, the Four Truths are each of “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,” the Four Truths are each “the Dharma abiding in the place of the Dharma,” the Four Truths are each “real form,” and the Four Truths are each “the buddha-nature.” For this reason, they are utterly beyond discussion of “being without the nature,” “non-becoming,” and so 108c    forth—because the Four Truths are each “completely beyond necessity.”

[163] “Second, the vehicle of the pratyekabuddha,22 who attains parinirvana through twelvefold dependent origination.23 “Twelvefold dependent origination” means: 1) ignorance, 2) action, 3) consciousness, 4) name and form, 5) the six senses, 6) contact, 7) feeling, 8) love, 9) taking, 10) coming into existence, 11) birth, 12) aging and death. While practicing these twelve causes, causing dependent origination to occur in the past, present, and future, we take causes one by one and—though not discussing a subject who reflects or an object that is reflected—we investigate them in practice, at which time they are the turning of the wheel of “complete non-necessity”24 and they are causes as “complete non-necessity.” Remember, if ignorance is the one mind, then action, consciousness, and so on are also the one mind. If ignorance is cessation, then action, consciousness, and so on are also cessation. If ignorance is nirvana, then action, consciousness, and so on are also nirvana. Because appearance is also disappearance, we make such assertions as these.25 Even “ignorance” is a word that speaks. “Consciousness,” “name and form,” and so on are also like this. Remember, ignorance, action, and so on are “I have an axe and would like to live with you on [this] mountain.”26 Ignorance, action, consciousness, and so on are “When I set out, I received the master’s permission and now I would like to receive the axe.”27

[165] “Third, the vehicle of the bodhisattva,” who accomplishes anuttara samyaksambodhi through the teaching, practice, and experience of the six paramitas. The meaning of this “accomplishing” is beyond “becoming,” beyond “non-becoming,” beyond “initiation,” beyond “new creation,” beyond “age-old creation,” beyond “original practice,” and beyond “non-doing”: it is just to accomplish anuttara samyaksambodhi. “The six paramitas'” means dana-paramita, sila-paramita, ksanti-paramita, virya-paramita, dhyana-paramita, andprajna-paramita.28 Each of these is the supreme state of bodhi, and is beyond discussion of “non-birth” and “non-becoming.” We do not always see dana as the first and prajnd as the last. A sutra says, “A keenwitted bodhisattva [can] see prajna as the first and dana as the last. A dull-witted bodhisattva [only] sees dana as the first and prajna as the last.” At the same time, ksanti might also be first, and dhyana might also be first. There might be thirty-six realizations of the paramitas—from [each] trap, a trap being realized.29 The meaning of “paramita ” is the far shore having arrived. The far shore is beyond the semblance or trace of going or coming, but its arrival is realized.30 Arrival is the universe: do not think that practice leads to the far shore. Practice exists on the far shore; therefore, if we are practicing, the far shore has arrived——because this practice invariably is equipped with the power of realization of the entire universe.

109a

[168] The twelve divisions of the teaching (the sutras; also called the scriptures):31

1)    Sutra—here32 called “original scriptures”;33

2)    Geya—here called “praising over again”34 (praising of a sutra in verse);

3)    Vyakarana—here called “affirmation”;35

4)    Gatha—here called “chants”36 (here [also] called “[verses] other than geya:’’37 they are like the poems and poems of praise of this region);38

5)    Udana—here called “spontaneous preaching without being asked”39 (“Sutras that are spontaneous preaching without being asked”: Sacred human beings generally wait to be requested to preach the Dharma, but [in this case] they become unsolicited teachers of living beings, and so [the preaching] is spontaneous preaching without being asked. Again, the Buddha-Dharma is so difficult to know that it is called “unaskable.” If it is not preached spontaneously, the many will not know it. In preaching for others, still again, [sacred ones] may not know what Dharma to preach for others. Therefore, they preach spontaneously without being asked, in order thereby to manifest preaching so profound that is only realized in experience. Thus, by means of spontaneous preaching without being asked, [sacred ones] manifest what is to be disclosed);

6)    Nidana—here called “[accounts of] causes and circumstances”40 (“Sutras of causes and circumstances” aim to clarify the method of the precepts and to show, on the basis of violations, what a transgression is. When the form of a transgression is evident, it is possible properly to establish discipline. This [division] also, through causes and circumstances, clarifies what is to be disclosed);

7)    Avadana—here called “parables”41 (avadana);42

8)    Itivrttaka—here called “past episodes”43 (here called “accounts as they occurred”44 or called “past episodes”);

9)    Jdtaka—here called past lives45 (The events in “past lives” describe tales of deeds performed in former lives as a bodhisattva. The events in “past episodes” describe various concurrences in former ages);

10)    Vaipulya—here called “the exact and the wide”;46

109b

11)    Adbhuta-dharma—here called “the unprecedented”;47

12)    Upadesa—here called “discussion of doctrine.”48

The Tathagata just directly preached for others Dharma [both] fictional and factual, such as entry into the world of aggregates. This [division] is called “sutra. ”

Sometimes, with verses of four, five, six, seven, eight, or nine words, he praised over again facts such as entry into the world of aggregates. This [division] is called “geya. ”

Sometimes he directly affirmed things that would come to living beings in the future, even affirming, for instance, that pigeons and sparrows would become buddha. This [division] is called “vydkarana. ” Sometimes with independent verses he affirmed facts such as entry into the world of aggregates. This [division] is called “gdthd. ”

Sometimes, without anyone asking, he spontaneously preached the facts of the world. This [division] is called “uddna. ”

Sometimes he summarized non-virtuous facts of the world, in order to consolidate the precepts. This [division] is called “niddna. ” Sometimes he used parables to preach the facts of the world. This [division] is called “avaddna. ”

Sometimes he related the facts of the world in the past. This [division] is called “itivrttaka.,’

Sometimes he related the facts of lives received in the past. This [division] is called “jdtaka.,’

Sometimes he preached on broad and great facts of the world. This [division] is called “vaipulya.,’

Sometimes he preached on unprecedented facts of the world. This [division] is called “adbhuta-dharma.,’

Sometimes he inquired critically into the facts of the world. This [division] is called “upadesa.,’

These [divisions] are the realization49 of the world. For the delight of living beings, [the Tathagata] established the twelve divisions of the teaching.

[173] The names of the twelve parts of the sutras are heard rarely. When the Buddha-Dharma has spread through a society, they are heard. When the Buddha-Dharma has died out already, they are not heard. When the Buddha-Dharma has yet to spread, again, they are not heard. Those who, having planted good roots50 for long ages, are able to meet the Buddha, hear these [names]. Those who have heard them already will be able, before long, to attain the state of anuttara samyaksambodhi. These twelve are each called sutras. They are called “the twelve divisions of the teaching” and called “the twelve parts of the sutras.” Because the twelve divisions of the teaching are each equipped with the twelve divisions of the teaching, they are one hundred and forty-four 109c    divisions of the teaching. Because the twelve divisions of the teaching are each

combined into the twelve divisions of the teaching, they are simply one division of the teaching. At the same time, they are beyond calculation in numbers of below a hundred million or above a hundred million. They are all the eye of the Buddhist patriarchs, the bones and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs, the everyday conduct of the Buddhist patriarchs, the brightness of the Buddhist patriarchs, the adornments of the Buddhist patriarchs, and the national land of the Buddhist patriarchs. To meet the twelve divisions of the teaching is to meet the Buddhist patriarchs. To speak of the Buddhist patriarchs is to speak of the twelve divisions of the teaching. Thus, Seigen “dangling a leg”51 is just the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching. Nangaku’s “To describe a thing does not hit the target”52 is just the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching. The meaning of the “complete non-necessity” that Gensha now expresses is like this. When we pick up this point, [the state] is nothing but the Buddhist patriarchs——there being no other half person or single object at all——and is “not a single fact ever having arisen.” Just at this moment, how is it? We might say, “it is completely beyond necessity.”

[175] Sometimes mention is made of “the nine parts,”53 which might be called “the nine divisions of the teaching.”

The nine parts: 1) Sutra, 2) gdthd, 3) past episodes (itivrttaka), 4) past lives (jdtaka), 5) the unprecedented (adbhuta-dharma), 6) [accounts of] causes and circumstances (niddna), 7) parables (avaddna), 8) geya, 9) upadesa.54

Because these nine parts are each equipped with the nine parts, they are eighty-one parts. And because the nine are each equipped with the whole, they are the nine. Without the virtue of belonging to the whole, they could not be the nine. Because they have the virtue of belonging to the whole, the whole belongs to [each] one.55 For this reason, they are eighty-one parts. They are “a part of this,”56 They are “a part of me,”57 they are a part of a whisk, they are a part of a staff, and they are a part of the right-Dharma-eye treasury.

[177] Sakyamuni Buddha says:

110a

This my Dharma of nine parts,

Which, obediently following living beings, I preach,

Is the basis for [their] entering the Great Vehicle.

For which purpose I preach this sutra.58

Remember, the “I” that is “this”59 is the Tathagata, his face and eyes and body and mind having been revealed. This “I” as “this” is, already, “the Dharma of nine parts,” and “the Dharma of nine parts” might be just “I” as “this.”60 One phrase or one verse in the present is “the Dharma of nine parts.” Because “I” is “this,” it “preaches obediently following living beings.”61 Thus, all living beings living their life relying on this concrete place is just “the preaching of this sutra,”62 and their dying their death relying on this concrete place is just “the preaching of this sutra.” Even instantaneous movements and demeanors are just “the preaching of this sutra.” “Teaching all living beings,/Causing all to enter the Buddha’s truth,”63 is just “preaching this sutra.” These “living beings” are “obedient followers”64 of “this my Dharma of nine parts.”65 This “obedient following” is to “follow others completely,”66 to follow oneself completely,67 to follow “the many beings” completely, to follow “living”68 completely, to follow “I” completely, and to follow “this” completely. Because those living beings, in every case, are an “I” that is “this,” they are individual branches of “he Dharma of nine parts.” “To enter the Great Vehicle as the basis” means to experience the Great Vehicle, means to practice the Great Vehicle, means to hear the Great Vehicle, and means to preach the Great Vehicle. This being so, we do not say that “living beings” inherently have attained the truth; they are one bit of it. “To enter” is “the basis,” and “the basis” is right from head to tail. Buddha preaches Dharma, and Dharma preaches Buddha. Dharma is [naturally] preached by Buddha,

and Buddha is [naturally] preached by Dharma. Flame preaches Buddha and 110b    preaches Dharma. Buddha preaches flame, and Dharma preaches flame.69 In

“this sutra,” already there is good “cause”70 for “the preaching of purpose,”71 and there is good “cause” for “purposeful preaching.”72 Even if [the Buddha] intends not to preach “this sutra,” that is impossible. Therefore he says, “Purposefulness preaches this sutra.”73 “Purposeful preaching” covers the cosmos, and the cosmos74 is “purposeful preaching.” Both this buddha and that buddha,75 with one voice, proclaim “this sutra.” Both our world and other worlds purposefully preach “this sutra.” Therefore, [the Buddha] “preaches this sutra,” and “this sutra” itself is the Buddha’s teaching. Remember, the Buddha’s teaching as sands of the Ganges76 is a bamboo stick and a fly-whisk. The sands of the Ganges as the Buddha’s teaching are a staff and a fist. Remember, in sum, that the three vehicles, the twelve divisions of the teaching, and so on are the eye of the Buddhist patriarchs. How could those who do not open their eyes to these [teachings] be descendants of the Buddhist patriarchs? How could those who do not take up these [teachings] receive the one-to-one transmission of the right eye of the Buddhist patriarchs? Those who do not physically realize the right-Dharma-eye treasury are not the Dharma successors of the Seven Buddhas.

Shobogenzo Bukkyo

Preached to the assembly at Kosho Temple in Yoshu77 on the fourteenth day of the eleventh lunar month in the second year of Ninji.78

Notes

1    “To pass into nirvana,” in this case, means to die.

2    Shibutsu-hibutsu, “this buddha and that buddha,” may be interpreted as concrete buddha in the present and eternal buddha.

3    Bukkyo, “buddha-teaching,” is just kyobutsu, “teaching-buddha.” The eternal teaching of the Buddha, and the concrete fact of a Buddhist being taught in the present, are one.

4    Kyoge-betsuden is the first line of a four-line poem attributed to Master Bodhidharma. The other three lines are: furyu-monji, nondependence on writings; jikishi ninshin, direct pointing to the human heart; and kensho-jobutsu, seeing one’s nature and becoming buddha.

5    Daizd-shozo, lit., “great treasury and small treasury,” means the three storehouses (Tripitaka) of Sutra, Vinaya, and Abhidharma retained in the Great Vehicle (Mahayana Buddhism) and in the Small Vehicle (Hinayana Buddhism).

6    Ge, “outside,” as a description of concrete reality, describes what is already present outside of the intellectual sphere.

7    These words are in the form of a quotation from a Chinese text, but the source has not been traced.

8    Kobutsu-konbutsu, “past buddha and present buddha,” means buddhas throughout time; eternal buddhas.

9    Master Haryo Kokan, a successor of Master Unmon Bun’en.

10    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 22.

11    Master Gensha Shibi (835-907), successor of Master Seppo Gison.

12    Soshi-sairai [noi is the title of Chapter Sixty-seven (Vol. III). In that chapter, Master Dogen asserts that the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west is just reality itself.

13    The three vehicles and twelve divisions of the teaching are the Buddhist teaching itself, which is reality itself.

14    For example, at a lecture in a Buddhist temple.

For example, at a solitary place in the mountains.

Just at the moment of reality.

So-fuyo means “completely unnecessary,” or “to be completely beyond necessity,” or “complete non-necessity.” Master Dogen interpreted Master Gensha’s words as an expression of reality itself, in which there is nothing to worry about.

Shomon, literally, “voice-hearer.” See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

Shitai, “Four Truths,” are ku, shu, metsu, do. These words derive from the Sanskrit duhkha-satya (truth of suffering), samudaya-satya (truth of accumulation), nirodha-satya (truth of dissolution), and marga-satya (truth of the right way).

Parinirvana, lit., “complete extinction of the flame,” here suggests attainment of a completely peaceful state.

Daiichi-gi, lit., “of number one significance,” stands for dai-ichi-gi-tai, lit., “truth of number one significance” or “the paramount truth.” This refers to the doctrine of shinzoku-nitai, “two truths, genuine and secular.” In the Sanron sect (said to be the first Buddhist sect to reach Japan from China) philosophy of affirmation is called the secular truth while philosophy of negation is called the paramount truth.

Engaku, literally, “perceiver of circumstances.”

Juni-innen, “twelve causes,” from the Sanskrit dvadasangah-pratTtya-samutpada. See, for example, LS 2.56. They are: 1) avidya (Jp. mumyo), 2) samskara (Jp. gyo),

3) vijnana (Jp. shiki), 4) nama-rupa (Jp. myoshiki), 5) sad-ayatana (Jp. rokuju), 6) sparsa (Jp. shoku), 7) vedana (Jp. ju), 8) trsna (Jp. ai), 9) upadana (Jp. shu), 10) bhava (Jp. u), 11) jati (Jp. sho), 12) jaramarana (Jp. roshi).

Sofuyo-rin, “wheel of complete non-necessity,” used in place of the usual compound horin, “wheel of Dharma,” suggests that the words “complete non-necessity” and “Dharma” are interchangeable—both represent reality itself.

The links in the chain of causation not only extend over time but also all arise and vanish at each moment. See, for example, the explanation of the doctrine of “the instantaneous appearance and disappearance of all things” in Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), Hotsu-bodaishin.

Master Seigen Gyoshi spoke these words to Master Sekito Kisen when Sekito decided to leave Master Seigen’s order at Jogo Temple and practice instead in the order of Master Nangaku Ejo. In this context, Master Seigen’s words may be interpreted as representing the sincere state of reality—Master Seigen wished to give to his disciple the concrete means to eradicate hindrances. The episode is recorded in the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 5: Master [Seigen] ordered [Kisen] to take a letter to Master Nangaku, and he said, “After you have delivered the letter, come back soon. I have a pickax [and hope] to live with you on [this] mountain.” [Kisen], on arriving there, before he had presented the letter, asked at once, “What is it like when we do not idolize the saints and do not attach importance to our own spirit?” [Ejo] said, “The disciple asks of life on a tremendously

high level. Why do you not aim your question lower?” [Kisen] said, “How could I accept forever being sunk? I shall pursue liberation without following sacred ones.” [Ejo] then desisted. [Kisen] went back to Jogo. Master [Seigen] said, “It is not long since the disciple left. Have you delivered the letter or not?” [Kisen] said, ‘No information was communicated nor any letter delivered.” The master said, “What happened?” [Kisen] related the above story, and then said, “When I set out, I received the master’s permission and now I would like to receive that pickax.” The master let a leg hang down. [Kisen] did prostrations to it. Then he departed for Nangaku.

27    Sekito’s words to Master Seigen also suggest the sincere state of living in reality. Sekito could not accept the manifestation of the balanced state by the two masters; to him they seemed to be too relaxed. Nevertheless, he continued pursuing the truth, going back and forth, until he was able at last to succeed to the Dharma of Master Seigen.

28 In English the sixparamitas, or accomplishments, are giving (dana), discipline (sTla), patience (ksanti), fortitude (vfrya), concentration (dhyana), and wisdom (prajna). See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

29    Raro, “trap,” originally a net or a cage for catching and keeping small birds, in this case suggests a paramita as a device for catching and keeping the truth.

30    To, “to arrive,” “to have arrived,” “to be already present,” describes the state just now. See Chapter Eleven (Vol. I), Uji, paragraph 44.

31    Senkyo, literally, “line-sutras.” “Lines” represents the original meaning of the Sanskrit sutra: “a thread, line, cord; that which like a thread runs through or holds together

everything.” See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

32    China—this is a quotation from the Daichidoron, the Chinese translation of the Maha-prajnaparamita-sastra.

33    Kaikyo. Kai means “to accord with.” Kaikyo means the Buddha’s discourses as they were delivered by the Buddha.

34    Juju. Ju means to add another layer or to go over again, and ju means praise or eulogy. Geya come at the end of a sutra, and summarize in verse the teachings contained in the sutra.

35    Juki, affirmations by the Buddha of a Buddhist practitioner. See Chapter Thirty-two, Juki.

36    Fuju, independent verses such as the verse in praise of the kasaya. See Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Kesa-kudoku.

37    Fujuju, literally, “not praising over again.”

38    China, or China and Japan. The comments in parenthesis may have been added to the main text in China or in Japan. Like the main text, they are written in Chinese characters only.

Mumon-jisetsu.

Innen, “causes and circumstances,” means the concrete causes and circumstances pertinent to a violation of the precepts.

Hiyu. See, for example, chapters 3, 5, and 7 of the Lotus Sutra.

The main text renders the Sanskrit avaddna as ha-da-na. The transliteration in the comment is a-ba-da-na, a closer approximation to the Sanskrit.

Honji, stories of previous lives of bodhisattvas.

Nyozego, literally, “like this words.” Most sutras begin with the words nyoze-ga-mon, “Thus have I heard.” See, for example, LS 1.8.

Honsho, the Buddha’s past lives as a bodhisattva.

Hdko, extensions or applications of Buddhist philosophy. “Exact and wide” represents the original meaning of the Sanskrit vaipulya. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

Mizo-u, marvels. See, for example, the story of the god Sakra and the wild fox from the Mizoukyo, quoted in Chapter Eighty-eight (Vol. IV), Kie-sanbo.

Rongi, commentaries, for example, the Mahdprajndpdramitd-sdstra.

Shitsudan transliterates the Sanskrit siddham, which means accomplishment, fulfillment, or realization. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. The Daichidoron explains four kinds of siddham, the first of which is realization of the world.

Zenkon represents the meaning of the Sanskrit kusala-mula. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

Sui-issoku comes from a story in the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 5 (see also note 26). By letting a leg hang down from the master’s zazen chair, Seigen manifested the relaxed situation of samddhi.

Setsuji-ichimotsu-sokufuchu. This is a direct quotation of Master Nangaku Ejo’s words to Master Daikan Eno, also contained in the Keitokuden toroku, chapter 5. See also, for example, Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan.

Bu means a concrete part. Master Dogen’s commentary emphasizes a part as something with a distinct concrete form, as opposed to a vague abstraction.

The reciprocation between transliterations of the sound, and translations of the meaning, of the original Sanskrit, exactly mirrors that in the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.102.

Ichibu ichibu [ni] ki[suru], literally, “one part belongs to one part.” The first ichibu means “the whole,” and the second ichibu means “each one.”

Shibu. Shi, “this,” means what concretely exists here and now. The character is drawn from the quotation of the Buddha’s words in the next paragraph. Bu, “part,” suggests the particular and the concrete as opposed to the general and the abstract.

57    Gabu. Ga, “I,” “me,” or “my,” means the Buddha or the state of buddha that is each person’s own natural state. The character is again drawn from the quotation of the Buddha’s words in the next paragraph.

58    Lotus Sutra, Hoben. See LS 1.104.

59    Gashi, “I-this,” in the Lotus Sutra is “This my. . . Here gashi, “I which is this,” means the state of the Buddha, or the self in action, which concretely exists.

60    Gashi, “I as this,” suggests the reality that is the combination of self and concrete

existence.

61    Because the Buddha’s state is concrete, he tailors his preaching to the needs of his audience.

62    Setsu-zekyo. Setsu, “preaching,” means not only verbal preaching but real manifestation; zekyo, “this sutra,” means the universe itself as the Buddha’s teaching.

63    Lotus Sutra, Hoben: “Know, Sariputra!/I in the past made a vow,/Wishing to cause all creatures/To be equal with me and without differences./In accordance with the vow I made in the past,/Now already I am satisfied./Teaching all living beings,/I cause them all to enter the Buddha’s truth.” LS 1.108.

64    Zuijun in the Lotus Sutra works as an adverb: “I preach as befits living beings.” In his commentary, Master Dogen uses the two characters as a noun phrase (“obedient followers” and “obedient following”).

65    Living beings, even those which have free will, are totally governed by the Dharma.

66    Zuitako, “to follow others completely,” is a traditional expression of the state that is completely harmonized with circumstances. The phrase may originate with Master Daizui Hoshin; see Chapter Thirty-seven, Shinjin-gakudo.

67    Zuijiko, “to follow self completely,” is Master Dogen’s variation, as are the following elements of this sentence.

68    Shu, “the many,” an expression of plurality, is the first half of the compound shujo, “living beings.” Sho or jo, “living” or “living being,” is the second half of the compound shujo.

69    Kaen, “flame,” means the vivid state. The preceding four lines allude to the conversation between Master Seppo Gison and Master Gensha Shibi, and the comment of Master Engo Kokugon, quoted in Chapter Twenty-three, Gyobutsu-yuigi.

70    Mot[te] in the last line of the quotation is an adverb: “for which purpose... .” Here, however, i is used as a noun, and it means the cause or the concrete reason for doing something.

71    Setsuko means to preach the Buddhist purpose (which, as the Buddha has already stated earlier in Lotus Sutra, Hoben, is to cause living beings to disclose, display, realize, and enter the state of the Buddha’s wisdom; see LS 1.88-90). Setsuko emphasizes the theoretical, motivational, or mental side (the purpose).

72    Kosetsu, “purposeful preaching,” means preaching that is done purposefully, that is, with determined effort. At the same time, kosetsu, “preaching that is the purpose,” suggests preaching that is done as an end in itself. Kosetsu emphasizes the practical or physical side (the action of preaching).

73    I-jo-ko-setsu-zekyo, “by purposefulness this sutra is preached.” These five characters form the last line of the Lotus Sutra quotation. In this context, they suggest that the Buddha’s natural state is purposefulness, and, regardless of the Buddha’s intention, his purposefulness preaches reality.

74    Goten, “covers the cosmos” or “the cosmos,” again alludes to the words of Master Engo Kokugon quoted in Chapter Twenty-three, Gyobutsu-yuigi.

75    Shibutsu-hibutsu, “this buddha and that buddha,” means buddha in the concrete present and buddha in eternity.

76    Gosha, “sands of the Ganges,” represents that which is beyond calculation; all things and phenomena.

77    Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture.

78    1241.

[Chapter Twenty-five]

Jinzu Mystical Power

Translator's Note: Jin means mystical and zu, which is a corruption of tsu, means ability or power, so jinzu means mystical power It is said in Buddhism that a person who has attained the truth may have certain kinds of mystical power, but many Buddhists invented fantastic exaggerations of these powers. Master Dogen did not affirm such exaggerations. He affirmed the existence of Buddhist mystical powers, which we can get when we become buddhas, but he thought that in the case of Buddhist mystical powers, mystical means not supernatural but real. Master Dogen thought that Buddhist mystical powers are the abilities we use in our usual life. When asked what Buddhist mystical powers are, an old Chinese Buddhist replied, “Fetching water and carrying firewood.,’

[183] Mystical power,1 as it is, is the tea and meals of Buddhists; and the buddhas, to the present, have not tired of it. In it, there are six mystical powers2 and there is the one mystical power; there is the state of being without mystical power3 and there is supremely ascendant mystical power.4 Its embodiment is three thousand acts in the morning and eight hundred acts in the evening. It arises together with buddha but is not recognized by buddha; it vanishes together with buddha but does not break buddha. In ascending to the heavens, [buddha and mystical power] are the same state; in descending from the heavens, they are the same state; in doing training and getting experience, they are always the same state. They are one with the Snow Mountains.5 They are as trees and rocks. The buddhas of the past are the disciples of Sakyamuni Buddha, to whom they come holding aloft the kasaya and come holding aloft stupas. At such times, Sakyamuni Buddha says, “The mystical powers of the buddhas are unthinkable.”6 Thus, clearly, [the buddhas] of the present and future too are “also like this.”

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[186] Zen Master Daii7 is the thirty-seventh patriarch in the line of direct descent from Sakyamuni Tathagata and is the Dharma successor of Hyakujo

Daichi.8 The many Buddhist patriarchs of today who have flourished in the ten directions, [even those] who are not the distant descendants of Daii, are just the distant descendants of Daii. Once while Daii is lying down, Kyozan comes to see him. Daii just then turns so that he is lying facing the wall. Kyozan says, “Ejaku is the master’s disciple. Do not show him your backside!” Daii gets set to rise. Kyozan by then is leaving, but Daii calls him, “Disciple Jaku!” Kyozan comes back. Daii says, “Let this old monk tell you his dream.” Kyozan lowers his head, ready to listen. Daii says, “See if you can divine the dream for me.” Kyozan fetches a bowl of water and a towel. Daii, by and by, washes his face. After washing his face, he sits for a short while, and then Kyogen comes along. Daii says, “I and disciple Jaku have just practiced a mystical power that is one step ascendant.9 It is not the same as the small ones of the Small [Vehicle].” Kyogen says, “Chikan was in the wings. I was able to witness everything clearly.” Daii says, “[Then,] disciple, you must try to say something!” 111a Kyogen immediately goes to make and bring a cup of tea. Daii praises them, saying, “The mystical powers and the wisdom of you two disciples are far superior to those of Sariputra and Maudgalyayana”10

[187] If we want to know the mystical power of Buddhists, we should learn in practice the words of Daii. Because “it is not the same as the small of the small,” “to perform this learning is called Buddhist learning, and learning other than this is not called Buddhist learning.”11 It is the mystical power and the wisdom transmitted from rightful successor to rightful successor. Never learn the mystical powers of non-Buddhists and the two vehicles in India, or those studied by commentary teachers and the like. Now, when we study the mystical power of Daii, it is supreme; at the same time, there is a way of observing it that is “one step ascendant”:12 that is to say, from “the time of lying down”13 there is a “turning to lie facing the wall,” there is a “rising posture,” there is a “calling out of ‘Disciple Jaku! ’,” there is “telling of a dream,” and there is “after washing the face, a short while of sitting.” In the case of Kyozan, similarly, there is “lowering of the head to listen” and there is “fetching a bowl of water” and “fetching a towel.” And yet Daii says, “I and Disciple Jaku have just practiced a mystical power that is one step ascendant.” We should learn this mystical power. Ancestral masters of the authentic transmission of the Buddha-Dharma speak like this. Do not fail to discuss “the telling of the dream” and “the washing of the face”: decide that

they are the mystical power that is one step ascendant. He has said already “It is not the same as the small of the small”: it cannot be the same as the small thoughts and small views of the Small Vehicle, and it must not be equated with the likes of [bodhisattvas in] the ten sacred and three clever stages. These all learn the small mystical powers and attain only the capacities of the small body; they do not arrive at the great mystical power of the Buddhist patriarchs. This is the mystical power of buddha, and mystical power in the ascendant state of buddha.14 Students of this mystical power should not be moved by demons and non-Buddhists. Sutra teachers and commentary teachers have never heard of [this mystical power], and even if they heard, it would be hard for them to believe. The two vehicles, non-Buddhists, sutra teachers, commentary teachers, and the like learn the small mystical powers; they do not learn the great mystical power. Buddhas abide in and retain the great mystical power, and they transmit and receive the great mystical power. This is the mystical power of buddha. Without the mystical power of buddha, [Kyozan] could not “fetch a bowl of water” and “fetch a towel,” there could be no “turning to lie facing the wall,” and there could be, “after washing the face,” no “short while of sitting.” Through the influence of this great mystical power, small mystical powers also exist. The great mystical power entertains small mystical powers, [but] small mystical powers do not know the great mystical power. “Small mystical powers” are “a hair swallowing the vast ocean,” and “a poppy seed containing Sumeru.”15 Again, they are “the upper body emitting water, the lower body emitting fire,”16 and suchlike. The five powers17 and the six powers also are all small mystical powers. Their devotees have never seen the mystical power of buddha even in a dream. The reason the five powers and the six powers are called small mystical powers is that the five powers and the six powers are tainted by practice and experience,18 and they are confined to and cut off by time and place. They exist in life [but] are not realized after the body. They belong to the self [but] are beyond other people. They are realized in this land but are not realized in other lands. They are realized in unreality but they are unable to be realized in real time. This great mystical power is not so: the teachings, practice, and experience of the buddhas are realized as one in [this] mystical power. They are realized not only in the vicinity of “buddhas”; they are realized also in the ascendant state of buddha. The teaching and forms of mystically powerful

111b

buddha are truly unthinkable. They are realized prior to the existent body; the realization is not connected with the three times. Without the mystical power of buddha, the establishment of the mind, training, bodhi, and nirvana of all the buddhas could never be. That the present limitless ocean of Dharma worlds is constant and unchanging is entirely the mystical power of Buddha. It is not only that “a hair swallows the vast ocean”: a hair is maintaining and retaining the vast ocean, a hair is manifesting the vast ocean, a hair is vomiting the vast ocean, and a hair is using the vast ocean. When in a single hair there is swallowing and vomiting of the whole world of Dharma, do not study 111c    that—if the whole of the world of Dharma is like that—then it is impossible

for the whole world of Dharma to exist. “A poppy seed containing Sumeru” and suchlike are also like this. A poppy seed is vomiting Sumeru; and a poppy seed is manifesting the world of Dharma, the ocean of limitless storage. When a hair vomits the vast ocean and a poppy seed vomits the vast ocean, they spew up in a single moment of mind and they spew up for ten thousand kalpas. Given that ten thousand kalpas and a single moment of mind similarly are spewed from hair and poppy seed, then from what are hair and poppy seed begotten? They are begotten just from the mystical power. And this begetting is itself the mystical power, so it is just that the mystical power gives birth to the mystical power: we should study that the three times have no occurrence or disappearance at all. Buddhas play19 in this mystical power alone.

[194]    Layman Houn20 is a great person in the orders of patriarchs. He has not only learned in practice in the orders of both Kozei21 and Sekito;22 he has met with and encountered many genuine masters who possess the truth. On one occasion he says:

The mystical power and wondrous function,

Carrying water and lugging firewood.23

[195]    We must investigate this truth thoroughly. “Carrying water” means loading water and fetching it. There being our own work and self-motivation, and there being the work of others and the motivation of others, water is caused to be carried. This is just the state of mystically powerful buddha. We can say that knowing is existence-time, but the mystical power is just the mystical power.24 Even in a person’s not knowing, that state of Dharma25

does not fade and that state of Dharma does not die. Although the person does not know it, [that] state of Dharma is the Dharma itself. Although [the person] does not know that carrying water is the mystical power, the state of carrying water as mystical power does not regress. “Lugging firewood” means carrying wood for fuel—as for example the Sixth Patriarch did in former days.26 Although we neither recognize that three thousand acts in the morning are the mystical power, or sense that eight hundred acts in the evening are the mystical power, in them the mystical power is realized. Truly, those who see and hear the mystical power and the wondrous function of the buddha-tathagatas are able without fail to attain the truth. Therefore, the attainment of the truth of all the buddhas has been accomplished, in every case, through the force of this mystical power. So we should study that whereas the present “emitting water” of the Small Vehicle is a small mystical power, “carrying water” is the great mystical power. “Carrying water and lugging firewood” have never yet been abandoned, and people have not neglected them. Therefore they have arrived from the ancient past at the present; and what has been transmitted from here to others, without even an instant of regression or deviation, is the mystical power and the wondrous function. This is the great mystical power. It can never be the same as the small ones of the small.

[197]    Great Master Tozan Gohon27 in former days served as an attendant of Ungan,28 at which time Ungan asks, “What is the mystical power and the wondrous function of disciple Kai?”29 Then Tozan folds his hands,30 steps forward, and stands there. Again Ungan asks, “How might we describe the mystical power and the wondrous function?” Tozan then conveys best wishes31 and leaves.

112a

[198]    In this episode, truly the mystical power is present as “understanding the fundamental principle on hearing words,” and the mystical power is present as “things existing in the state where box and lid fit.”32 Remember, the mystical power and the wondrous function will surely have children and grandchildren; they are not subject to regression. And they must properly have their founding patriarchs; they are not subject to evolution. Do not idly suppose that they may be the same as those of non-Buddhists and the two vehicles. In the Buddha’s truth there are mystical transformations and mystical powers of the upper body and the lower body: the whole universe in the ten

directions now is a real body of a sramana.33 All things, from the nine mountains and eight seas, to the ocean of [buddha-]nature and the waters of the ocean of sarvajna,34 are “emitting water”35 from the upper body, the lower body, and the middle body, and are “emitting water” from upper non-body, lower non-body, and middle non-body.36 This also extends to “emitting fire.” It is not only a matter of water, fire, wind, and so on: the upper body emits buddha, the lower body emits buddha, the upper body emits patriarchs, the lower body emits patriarchs, the upper body emits countless asamkheyas of kalpas, the lower body emits countless asamkheyas of kalpas, the upper body gets out of the ocean of Dharma worlds, and the upper body enters into the ocean of Dharma worlds.37 Moreover, the “vomiting of seven or eight”38 and the “swallowing of two or three” of the lands of the world is also like this. The present four elements, five elements, six elements,39 all elements, countless elements, are all the mystical power that is to appear and that is to vanish, and they are the mystical power that is to swallow and that is to vomit. They are the act of spewing and the act of gulping as momentary aspects of the present earth and space. To be spun by a poppy seed is real ability, and to be suspended by a hair is real ability. [This real ability] is born from and with that which is beyond consciousness, it abides in and retains that which is beyond consciousness, and it relies on as its real refuge that which is beyond consciousness. Truly, the changing forms of the mystical power of buddha are unconnected with short and long; how could it be [sufficient] to approach them only with one-sided intellectual thinking?

[201]    In ancient times, a wizard of the five powers served under the Buddha, at which time the wizard asks, “The Buddha has six powers and I have five powers. What is that other one power?” The Buddha then calls to the wizard, “Wizard of the Five Powers!” The wizard responds. The Buddha says, “That is the one power you should ask me about.”40

[202]    We must investigate this episode thoroughly. How could the wizard know that “the Buddha has six powers”? “The Buddha has incalculable mys-

112c tical powers and wisdom”: he is beyond only six powers. Even though [the wizard] sees only six powers, he cannot realize even six powers. How much less could he see other mystical powers, even in a dream. Now let us ask: Even though the wizard is looking at Old Man Sakya, is he meeting Buddha or not? Even if he is “meeting Buddha,” is he looking at Old Man Sakya or

not? Even if he is able to look at Old Man Sakya, even if he is meeting Buddha, he should ask whether or not he has met the Wizard of the Five Powers. In this question, he should learn the use of entanglement41 and should learn entanglement being cut away. How then could “the Buddha has six powers” reach [even] the level of counting one’s neighbor’s treasures? What is the meaning of the words now spoken by Old Man Sakya, “That is the one power you should ask me about”? He neither says that the wizard has “that one power,” nor says that the wizard lacks it.42 Although the [wizard] discusses penetration43 and nonpenetration of “that one power,” how could the wizard penetrate “that one power”?44 For, even if the wizard has five powers, they are not five powers from among “six powers the Buddha has.” The wizard’s powers are seen through by the Buddha’s power of penetration, but how could the wizard’s powers penetrate the Buddha’s power? If the wizard were able to penetrate even one of the Buddha’s powers, relying on this power he would be able to penetrate Buddha. When we look at wizards, they have something that resembles the powers of Buddha, and when we look at a buddha’s forms of behavior, they have something that resembles the powers of a wizard; but we should know that even if [what a wizard shows] is the forms of behavior of a buddha, that is not the mystical power of Buddha.45 Without penetration, the five powers are all different from Buddha. [The Buddha’s words mean:] “What is the use of you abruptly asking about ‘that other one power’?” The idea of Old Man Sakya is: “You should ask about any one of the powers”; “You should ask about that one power, and [then] ask about that one power”; and “There is no way for a wizard to attain even one of the powers.” Thus, comparing the mystical power of the Buddha and the powers of others, the words “mystical power” are the same, but the words “mystical power” are very different.

[206] Hence...

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Great Master Esho of Rinzai-in Temple46 says,

A man of old said:

The Tathagata’s manifestations of his whole body

Were for the purpose [of teaching] accordance with the situations of the world.

[But] fearing that people might beget the nihilistic view,47

He provisionally established void concepts And expediently spoke of the thirty-two [signs].48 The eighty [signs] also are empty sounds.

The existent body is not the body of the Truth.

The state without form is just the True Configuration.

You say that the Buddha has six powers, which are unthinkable. [But] all the gods, wizards, asuras,49 and mighty demons also have mystical powers—can they be buddhas or not? Followers of the Way, make no mistake! When Asura fought with god-king Indra and, on losing the battle, led eighty-four thousand followers into hiding inside the holes of lotus roots, this was not sacred, was it? In the example I50 have just quoted, all was due to karmic powers51 and dependent powers.52 Now, the six powers of Buddha are not like that. When [Buddha] enters the world of sights, it is not beguiled by sights. When it enters the world of sounds, it is not beguiled by sounds. When it enters the world of smells, it is not beguiled by smells. When it enters the world of tastes, it is not beguiled by tastes. When it enters the world of sensations, it is not beguiled by sensations. When it enters the world of dharmas, it is not beguiled by dharmas. Thus, when [a person] realizes that the six categories—sights, sounds, smells, tastes, sensations, and dharmas53— all are bare manifestations, then nothing can bind this nonreliant person of the truth. Though this state is substance discharged from the five aggregates, it is just mystical power walking over the ground. Followers of the Way! True Buddha has no set shape and true Dharma has no fixed form. You are only fashioning images and inventing situations on the basis of fantastic transformation. Though you may find what you seek, those things are all the ghosts of wild foxes—never the true state of Buddha, but only the views and opinions of non-Buddhists.54

113b    [209] So the six mystical powers of the buddhas can neither be attained

nor be supposed by all gods and demons or by the two vehicles and the like. The six powers of the Buddha’s state of truth are transmitted one-to-one solely to disciples of the Buddha who are in the Buddha’s state of truth; they are not transmitted to anyone else. The six powers of Buddha are transmitted one-to-one in the Buddha’s state of truth. Those who have not received the one-to-one

transmission cannot know the six powers of Buddha. And we should learn in experience that those who have not received the one-to-one transmission of the six powers of Buddha cannot be people of the Buddha’s truth.

[210]    Zen Master Hyakujo Daichi55 says, “Eyes, ears, nose, tongue: each is not tainted by greed for all existent and nonexistent dharmas.56 This state is called ‘to be receiving and retaining a four-line verse,’ and also called ‘the fourth effect.’57 The six senses being without any trace also is called ‘the six mystical powers. ’ When, for instance, just in the present, the state is not hindered by all existent and nonexistent dharmas, and it is beyond nonreliance on knowing and understanding, this is called ‘mystical power. ’ Not to hold onto this mystical power is called ‘being without mystical power. ’ Bodhisattvas without mystical power, as thus described, are of untraceable tracks, are human beings in the ascendant state of buddha, are human beings who are utterly unthinkable, and are just gods of themselves.”58

[211]    The mystical power transmitted to the present from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch is like this. The mystical power of buddhas is “a human being in the ascendant state of buddha,” is “a human being who is utterly unthinkable,” is “a god of just the self,” is “a bodhisattva being without mystical power,” is “knowledge and understanding of nonreliance,” is “mystical power not holding onto this,” and is “all dharmas not being hindered.” The six mystical powers are present now in the Buddha’s state of truth, and the buddhas have received their transmission and retained them for long ages. Not a single buddha has failed to receive and retain them; those who do not receive and retain them are not buddhas. Those six mystical powers make the six senses clear, in the state of being without any trace. As regards the meaning of “being without traces,” a man of old said:

The six kinds of mystical function are emptiness and are beyond emptiness.

A ball of brightness transcends inside and outside.59

“To transcend inside and outside” may be “to be without traces.” When we do training, learn in practice, and realize and enter, in the state without traces, we do not disturb the six senses. As regards the meaning of “not to disturb,” one who disturbs deserves thirty [strikes] of the staff.60 So we should master the six mystical powers in the state described above. Other than rightful successors in the Buddha’s house, who can hear even that this principle exists? [Others] have merely mistaken a vain outward chase for the conduct of coming home.61 Again, “the fourth effect” is a tool of the Buddha’s truth, but no scholar of the Tripitaka62 has received its authentic transmission. How could those who count grains of sand63 or those who wander astray64 attain this real effect? The sort who on “attaining the small are satisfied”65 have never arrived at mastery of the state; only buddhas have received it from each other. “The fourth effect” is, namely, the state of “receiving and retaining a four-line verse.” “Receiving and retaining a four-line verse” means the state in which, facing all “existent and nonexistent dharmas,” the “eyes, ears, nose, and tongue” are each “untainted by greed.” “Not to be tainted by greed is untaintedness.”66 “Untaintedness” is “the everyday mind,”67 and is [the state of] “I am always sharp at this concrete place.”68 The authentic transmission in Buddhism of the six powers and the fourth effect has been like this. If there is any [teaching] that goes against this, we should know that it is not the Buddha-Dharma. In sum, the Buddha’s truth is mastered, in every case, through mystical power. In such mastery, a bead of water swallows and spews the vast ocean, and a particle of dust holds up and lets go of the highest mountain—who could doubt it? This is just the mystical power itself.

Shobogenzo Jinzu

Preached to the assembly at Kannondoriko sho -horinji on the sixteenth day of the eleventh lunar month in the second year of Ninji.69

Notes

1    Jinzu (mystical power) represents the Sanskrit abhijna. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

2    Rokujinzu (six mystical powers) are traditionally interpreted as 1) the power of mystical transmutation, 2) the power to know others’ minds (see Chapter Eighty [Vol. IV], Tashintsu), 3) the power of supernatural vision, 4) the power of supernatural hearing,

5) the power to know past lives, 6) the power to end excess. (But see also paragraph 206 onward.)

3    Mu-jinzu. See paragraph 210.

4    Mujo-jinzu. See note 12.

5    Setsuzan, “Snow Mountains,” usually means the Himalayas. See also Chapter Sixty-nine (Vol. III), Hotsu-mujoshin.

6 Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-jinriki (“The Mystical Power of the Tathagata”). See LS 3.158.

7 Master Isan Reiyu (771-853), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai. Daii, short for Daiizan, “Great Isan Mountain,” is the name of the mountain where the master lived. His two disciples mentioned in the story are Master Kyozan Ejaku (807-883) and Master Kyogen Chikan (?-898).

8    Master Hyakujo Ekai (749-814), successor to Master Baso Doitsu. Zen Master Daichi is his posthumous title, and Hyakujozan is the name of the mountain where he lived.

9    Ichio-jinzu, literally, “one above mystical power.” The meaning of jo, “above” or “ascendant,” can be understood as in the phrase butsu-kojo-no-ji. See Chapter Twenty-eight, Butsu-kojo-no-ji, and notes 12 and 14.

10    Sariputra and Maudgalyayana were two of the Buddha’s ten great disciples. They are described in ancient Indian texts as having supernatural powers. Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 61. See also Keitokudentoroku, chapter 9.

11    Untraced quotation from a Chinese text.

12    Mujo, lit., “with nothing above” or “supreme” (ideal), is opposed to ichijo, lit., “one-above” or “one-step ascendant” (i.e., real). Jo, “to ascend,” represents progression from the area of consideration (in which there is supremacy or perfection) into the area of reality (in which there are concrete actions).

Gaji, literally, “lying down and then. ..” or “while he is lying down.” In the previous paragraph Master Dogen related the story mainly in Japanese, but these two characters are drawn directly from the Chinese story in the Shinji-shobogenzo. By using here direct quotations of Chinese characters, Master Dogen increases the objectivity of the description.

Butsu-kojo-jinzu. Butsu-kojo, “the ascendant [reality] of buddha,” is explained in Chapter Twenty-eight, Butsu-kojo-no-ji.

A hair swallowing the vast ocean and a poppy seed containing Mount Sumeru are examples, taken from the VimalakTrti Sutra, of happenings that appear to be impossible. Later Master Dogen uses the same examples to represent the oneness of reality.

Lotus Sutra, Myo-shogon-o-honji (“The Story of King Resplendent”): “Thereupon the two sons, out of consideration for their father, sprang up into space, to a height of seven tdla trees, and manifested many kinds of mystical transformation, walking, standing, sitting, and lying in space; the upper body emitting water, the lower body emitting fire. . . .” See LS 3.292-94.

Gotsu, short for go-jinzu, the five mystical powers. These are the six mystical powers minus the sixth, the power to end excess.

Tainted practice and experience means practice-and-experience separated into means (practice) and end (experience).

Yuge suru means to play or to enjoy. The characters appear in the phrase yuge-zanmai, “playing in samddhi” or “samddhi as enjoyment.” See the opening paragraph of Chapter One (Vol. I), Bendowa.

Layman Houn is mentioned several times in the Shobogenzo, for example, in Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV), Sanjushichi-bon-bodai-bunpo. More than three hundred of his poems survive.

Master Baso Doitsu (709-788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejo. Kozei is the name of the district where he lived.

Master Sekito Kisen (700-790). He was a successor of Master Seigen Gyoshi, but like Master Baso he had also studied under Master Nangaku Ejo.

Keitokuden toroku, chapter 8.

In this part Master Dogen deemphasized the importance of subjective consciousness and emphasized the importance of just acting.

Sono ho, “that Dharma,” means that real state of action in which mystical power is mystical power.

Master Daikan Eno was a woodcutter before joining the order of Master Daiman Konin. See, for example, Chapter Thirty, Gyoji.

27    Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869), a successor of Master Ungan Donjo. Great Master Gohon is his posthumous title.

28    Master Ungan Donjo (782-841), a successor of Master Yakusan Igen.

29    “Kai” means [Ryo]kai, the monk’s name of Master Tozan.

30    Shashu. Hands held against the chest, forearms horizontal, left hand curled around the thumb into a fist, right hand palm down over left hand.

31    Chincho, or “Please take good care of yourself,” was an expression used between monks when taking leave of each other, or at the end of a talk. In this case, Master Tozan may have said “Chincho, ” or he may have conveyed the meaning of “Chincho ” by bowing.

32    Both quotations come from Master Sekito Kisen’s poem, Sandokai.

33    Shamon-isseki no shinjittai alludes to Master Chosha Keishin’s words shamon-isseki-gen. Master Chosha said, “The whole universe in the ten directions is a sramana,eye” (see Chapter Sixty [Vol. III], Juppo), Master Dogen’s variation suggests that the eye, or state of experience, of a sramana (a striver) is his or her real body.

34    The Sanskrit sarvajna means all-knowing or omniscient. The nine mountains and eight seas (which are said to surround Mount Sumeru) represent the physical world. The oceans of buddha-nature and omniscience represent the mental world.

35    Shussui, “emitting water,” alludes to the previous quotation from the Lotus Sutra (LS 3.292-94). Master Dogen uses the words to suggest the real manifestation of concrete phenomena, which is mystical and miraculous in itself.

36    Hishin, “non-body,” means mind or spirit—reality is manifested not only by physical phenomena but also by mental phenomena. “Upper and lower non-body” can be interpreted as high and low spirits, and “middle non-body” can be interpreted as balanced mind.

37    The upper body getting out of and entering into the ocean of Dharma worlds suggests, from two sides, the upper body losing its separate identity—as in zazen, or in entering and leaving a bath.

38    Tokyaku-shichi-hachi-ko alludes to Master Tosu Daido’s description of the moon quoted in Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III), Tsuki. In that chapter, vomiting represents the function of concrete manifestation, as opposed to swallowing which represents inclusion within abstract generalization. At the same time, Master Dogen interprets both vomiting and swallowing as actions.

39    The four elements (from the Sanskrit catvari mahabhutani) are earth, water, fire, and wind. The five elements (from the Sanskritpanca mahabhutani) are earth, water, fire, wind, and space. The six elements (from the Sanskrit sad dhatavah) are earth, water, fire, wind, space, and consciousness.

40    Gotoegen, chapter 1.

41    Katto, literally, “arrowroot and wisteria.” See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Katto.

42    A reflection of Master Dogen’s view of the buddha-nature. See Chapter Twenty-two,

Bussho.

43    Tsu, as a verb, means to pass through, to penetrate, or to master. As a noun it suggests the power or ability to do something thoroughly.

44    Na-itsu-tsu, “that one power,” in the wizard’s usage means an extra-special mystical power, but in the Buddha’s usage means the practical everyday state.

45    A phony can imitate a buddha’s forms but cannot imitate the state of buddha.

46    Master Rinzai Gigen (815?-867), a successor of Master Obaku Kiun.

47    Danken, lit., “cutting-off view,” or nihilism, or materialism, represents the Sanskrit uccheda-drsti, one of the two extreme views (antagraha-drsti). The other extreme view is jdken, “eternity view,” or idealism, from the Sanskrit sasvata-drsti. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

48    Thirty-two auspicious features that were said to distinguish the Buddha. The eighty are a refinement of the thirty-two.

49    Asuras are evil spirits or demons who oppose the gods. In this paragraph the word is used first collectively and then as a proper name, Asura. The story about Asura being defeated by the god Indra and hiding in lotus roots is recorded in the Kanbutsu-zanmaikyo (Sutra of Reflection on the Buddha’s Samadhi).

50    Sanso, “mountain monk,” a humble term used by Master Rinzai to refer to himself.

51    Gotsu means powers acquired as a result of past practice (for example, those of an excellent martial artist), as distinct from intuitive power which emerges instantaneously from the balanced state.

52    Etsu means powers obtained through medicines, tantric formulae, and so on, as opposed to power that emerges naturally.

53    Shiki, sho, ko, mi, shoku, ho are the objects of the six sense organs. See Chapter Two (Vol. I), Maka-hannya-haramitsu.

54    Quoted from the Rinzaizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Rinzai Gigen).

55    Master Hyakujo Ekai (749-814), a successor of Master Baso Doitsu. Daichi is his posthumous title.

56    Issai-umu-shoho means all material and immaterial things—for example, material possessions and Buddhist teaching.

57    Shika means the state of an arhat. See Chapter Thirty-four, Arakan.

58    Tenshokotoroku, chapter 9.

59    Quoted from the Shodoka by Master Yoka Genkaku.

60    Alludes to the line of a verse in fascicle 6 of the Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record).

61    Kike, “returning home,” means returning to our self in zazen. In the Fukanzazengi, Master Dogen describes zazen as taiho, “a backward step [to our original state].”

62    Sanzo, lit., “three storehouses,” representing the Sanskrit Tripitaka (three baskets), was used in China as a title for a scholar accomplished in studying the Tripitaka.

63    Sansa, “counting sand,” alludes to another line in the Shodoka: “They know no respite from analyzing concepts and forms; having entered the ocean, they vainly exhaust themselves by counting grains of sand.”

64    Reihei, to wander astray or to stumble, is thought to allude to the story in the Lotus Sutra about the rich man’s son who wanders in poverty in foreign lands. The characters reihei with the same meaning and the same pronunciation appear in the Lotus Sutra, Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”) chapter. See LS 1.236.

65    “The small” suggests the Small Vehicle, Hinayana Buddhism, as opposed to Mahayana Buddhism. The source of the quotation from Chinese has not been traced.

66    Fuzenna. Master Daikan Eno asks Master Nangaku Ejo, “Do you rely on practice and experience or not?” Nangaku says, “Practice-and-experience is not nonexistent, but for it to be tainted is impossible.” The Sixth Patriarch says, “Just this untaintedness is that which buddhas guard and desire. You are also like this. I am also like this. And the ancestral masters of India were also like this.” (Sh inj i-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 1.) See also Chapter Seven (Vol. I), Senjo; Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan, etc.

67    Byojoshin. Master Joshu asks Master Nansen, “What is the truth?” Nansen says, “The everyday mind is the truth.” See Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 19.

68    The words of Master Tozan Ryokai. See Sh inj i-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 55.

69    1241.

[Chapter Twenty-six]

Daigo Great Realization

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Translator's Note: Dai means great and go means realization, so daigo means great realization. Many Buddhist scholars, for example Dr. Daisetsu Suzuki, have translated go as “enlightenment.,’ But the meaning of the word “enlightenment” is ambiguous and the word has for many years been a stumbling block to the understanding of Buddhism. So it may be better to translate go as realization. The meaning of realization in Master Dogen s theory is also difficult to understand. Anyway, it is clear that realization is not only intellectual understanding but a more concrete realization of facts in reality. So we can say that realization in Master Dogen,s theory is realization in real life. We can study his thoughts on realization in this chapter.

[217] The great truth of buddhas, having been transmitted, is a continuous line of immediacy; and the meritorious conduct of patriarchs, having been revealed, is a level expanse. Therefore, to actualize great realization, to arrive at the truth without realizing it, to reflect on realization and to play with realization, and to forget realization and let go and act: these are just the everyday state of Buddhist patriarchs. [Buddhist patriarchs] experience utilization of the twelve hours, in which they take things up, and they experience being used by the twelve hours, in which they throw things away. Springing out further from this pivot-point, they also experience playing with mud-balls1 and playing with the soul.2 From their great realization onward, Buddhist patriarchs inevitably master learning in practice that is actualized like this; at the same time, great realization that is totally realization is not seen as a “Buddhist patriarch,” and a Buddhist patriarch who is totally a Buddhist patriarch is not “total great realization.” A Buddhist patriarch springs out beyond the boundaries of “great realization,” and great realization is a face and eyes springing out in the state that is ascendant over “Buddhist patriarchs.” Still, human makings are of many kinds. Namely, there are “the innately

intelligent,”3 who, by living, penetrate and get free from life—this, in other words, [whether] at the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of life, is a physical realization. There are [people of] “learned intelligence,”4 who, through learning, master the state of themselves—in other words, they physically realize the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of learning. There are “people of the buddha-intelligence,” who are beyond innate intelligence and beyond learned intelligence; transcending the boundaries of self and others, they are limitless at this place and are free from the fetters of subjective or objective intelligence. There are “people of the intelligence that has no teacher”; they neither rely on good counselors nor rely on sutras, they neither rely on the nature nor rely on forms, and they neither deny or change themselves nor convert others; but still they disclose a commanding presence. Of these several kinds, we do not see one kind as keen and see a second kind as dull. The many kinds actualize many corresponding kinds of meritorious conduct. Then what 114b kind of being, sentient or nonsentient, could be incapable of innate intelligence?—we must study this in practice. When there is innate intelligence, there is innate realization, there is innate verification, and there is innate training. Thus, the Buddhist Patriarch, though already the Controller of Humans,5 has been praised as “[the man of] innate realization”; he is the life that brought realization into being, and so he is described like this. To become satisfied with the state of great realization may be [called] “innate realization”; it is to have learned to bring forth realization, and so it is described like this.6 This being so, we realize great realization by bringing forth the triple world, realize great realization by bringing forth the four elements, realize great realization by bringing forth the hundreds of weeds, realize great realization by bringing forth the Buddhist patriarchs, and realize great realization by bringing forth the universe.7 All these are instances of bringing forth great realization and thereby realizing afresh the state of great realization. The time that is just the moment of this [realization] is now.

[221]    Great Master Esho8 of Rinzai-in Temple says, “If we search throughout the great kingdom of Tang for someone who does not realize, it is hard to find one person.”9

[222]    What Great Master Esho expresses now is the authentically propagated skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, in which there can be no wrongness. “Throughout the great kingdom of Tang” means inside10 our own eye: it is

not connected with “the whole universe” and is not stuck in “lands of dust.” If we search inside this concrete place for a person who does not realize, it is hard to find one. The self of yesterday that is the subjective self is not one who does not realize, and the self of today that is the objective self is not one who does not realize. If we search among mountain people and water people, past and present, looking for nonrealization, we will never find it. Students who study Rinzai’s words like this will not be passing time in vain. Even so, we should study further, in experience, what behavior the ancestral founder has in mind. In short, I would like to question Rinzai, for the present: If you know only that someone who does not realize is hard to find, and do not know that someone who does realize is hard to find, that is never enough to be affirmed, and it is hard to say you have fully understood that someone who does not realize is hard to find. If we look for someone who does not realize, it is hard to find “one person,” but have you ever, or have you never, met with “half a person”11 who is beyond realization and whose face and eyes and easy bearing are imposing and majestic? If we search the great kingdom of Tang for someone who does not realize, it is hard to find one person, but do not think that having difficulty in finding is the ultimate state. We should try searching for two or three great kingdoms of Tang in one person or half a person. Is it difficult? Is it not difficult? When we are equipped with these eyes, we can be affirmed as Buddhist patriarchs who are experiencing satisfaction.

[224]    Great Master Hochi12 of Kegonji in Keicho (succeeded Tozan; his monk’s name was Kyujo) on one occasion is asked by a monk: “What is it like at the time when a person in the state of great realization returns to delusion?” The master says, “A broken mirror does not again reflect. Fallen blossoms cannot climb back onto the trees.”13

114c

[225]    The present question, while it is a question, is like preaching to the assembly—[preaching] not proclaimed except in the order of Kegon, and not possible for anyone except a rightful successor of Tozan to deliver. Truly this may be the squarely regulated order of a Buddhist patriarch who experiences satisfaction. “A person in the state of great realization” is not intrinsically in great realization and is not hoarding a great realization realized externally. It is not that, in old age, [the person] meets with a great realization [already] present in the public world. [People of great realization] do not forcibly drag

it out of themselves, but they unfailingly realize great realization. We do not see “not being deluded” as great realization. Neither should we aim, in order to plant the seed of great realization, to become at the outset a deluded being. People of great realization still realize great realization, and people of great delusion still realize great realization. If there is a person in great realization, accordingly there is Buddha in great realization, there are earth, water, fire, wind, and air in great realization, and there are outdoor pillars and stone lanterns in great realization. Now we have inquired into a person in the state of great realization. The question “What is it like at the time when a person in the state of great realization returns to delusion?” truly asks a question that deserves to be asked. And Kegon does not hate [the question]; he venerates 115a the ancient ways of the forest orders—[his conduct] may be the meritorious conduct of a Buddhist patriarch. Let us consider for a while, is the return to delusion of a person in the state of great realization completely the same as a person being in the unenlightened state? At the moment when a person in the state of great realization returns to delusion, is [that person] taking great realization and making it into delusion?14 Does [the person] return to delusion by bringing delusion from a distant place and covering great realization?15 Or does the person in the state of great realization, while remaining a whole person and not breaking great realization, nevertheless partake in a return to delusion?16Again, does “the return to delusion of a person in the state of great realization” describe as “returning to delusion” the bringing forth of a further instance of great realization?17 We must master [these questions] one by one. Alternatively, is it that great realization is one hand, and returning to delusion is one hand?18 In any case, we should know that the ultimate conclusion of our study up to now is to hear that a person in the state of great realization experiences returning to delusion. We should know that there is great realization that makes returning to delusion a familiar experience. Thus, recognizing a bandit as a child does not define returning to delusion, and recognizing a child as a bandit does not define returning to delusion.19 Great realization may be to recognize a bandit as a bandit, and returning to delusion is to recognize a child as “a child.” We see great realization as “a bit being added in the state of abundance.” When “a bit is taken away in the state of scarcity,” that is returning to delusion. In sum, when we grope for and completely get a grip on someone who returns to delusion, we may encounter a person in the state

of great realization. Is the self now returning to delusion? Is it beyond delusion? We must examine it in detail, bringing it here. This is to meet in experience the Buddhist patriarchs.

[229] The master says, “A broken mirror does not again reflect. Fallen blossoms cannot climb back onto the trees.” This preaching for the multitude expresses the very moment of a mirror being broken. That being so, to concern the mind with the time before the mirror is broken and thereupon to study the words “broken mirror” is not right. [Some] might understand that the point of the words now spoken by Kegon, “A broken mirror does not again reflect, fallen blossoms cannot climb back onto the trees,” is to say that a person in the state of great realization “does not again reflect,” and to say that a person in the state of great realization “cannot climb back onto the trees”—to assert that a person in the state of great realization will never again return to delusion. But [Kegon’s point] is beyond such study. If it were as people think, [the monk’s question] would be asking, for example, “How is the everyday life of a person in the state of great realization?” And the reply to this would be something like “There are times of returning to delusion.” The present episode is not like that. [The monk is asking] what it is like at “the time” when a person in the state of great realization returns to delusion; therefore he is calling into question20 the very moment itself of returning to delusion. The actualization of an expression of the moment like this is: “A broken mirror does not again reflect. Fallen blossoms cannot climb back onto the trees.” When fallen blossoms are just fallen blossoms, even if they are rising to the top of a hundred-foot pole, they are still fallen blossoms.21 Because a broken mirror is a broken mirror just here and now, however many vivid situations it realizes, each similarly is a reflection that “does not again reflect.”22 Picking up the point that is expressed as “a mirror being broken”23 and is expressed as “blossoms being fallen,” we should grasp in experience the moment that is “the time when a person in the state of great realization returns to delusion.” In this [moment], great realization is akin to having become buddha, and returning to delusion is akin to [the state of] ordinary beings. We should not study [Kegon’s words] as if they discussed such things as “turning back into an ordinary being” or “traces depending on an origin.”24 Others talk about breaking the great state of enlightenment and becoming an ordinary being. Here, we do not say that great realization is broken, do not

115b

say that great realization is lost, and do not say that delusion comes.25 We should never let ourselves be like those others. Truly, great realization is limitless, and returning to delusion is limitless. There is no delusion that hinders great realization, [but] having brought forth three instances of great realization, we create half an instance of small delusion.26 In this situation, there are [Snow Mountains] realizing great realization for the sake of Snow Mountains; trees and stones are realizing great realization relying on trees and stones; the great realization of buddhas is realizing great realization for the sake of living beings; and the great realization of living beings is greatly realizing 115c the great realization of buddhas: it cannot be related to before and behind.27 Great realization now is beyond self and beyond others. It does not come; at the same time, “it fills in ditches and fills up valleys.” It does not go; at the same time, “we keenly hate pursuit that follows an external object.”28 Why is it so? [Because] we “follow objects perfectly.”29

[232] Master Keicho Beiyu30 has a monk ask Kyozan,31 “Does even a person of the present moment rely upon realization, or not?” Kyozan says, “Realization is not nonexistent, but how can it help falling into the second consciousness?”32 The monk reports this back to Beiyu. Beiyu profoundly affirms it.33

[233]    “The present moment” of which he speaks is the now of every person. Although [instances of] “causing ourselves to think of the past, the present, and the future” occur in thousands and tens of thousands, even they are present moments, are now. The state of each person is inevitably the present moment. Sometimes eyes have been described as the present moment, and sometimes nostrils have been described as the present moment. “Do we rely upon realization, or not?” We must investigate these words quietly; we should replace our heart with them and replace our brain with them. Recent shavelings in the great kingdom of Song say, “To realize the truth is the original aim,” and, so saying, they vainly wait for realization. But they seem not to be illuminated by the brightness of the Buddhist patriarchs. Indolently, they disregard the need solely to comprehend in experience under a true good counselor. Even during the ancient buddhas’ appearance in the world, they might not have attained salvation. The present words “Do we rely upon realization, or not?” neither say that realization does not exist, nor say that it exists, nor say that it comes: they say “Do we rely on it, or not?” They are

akin to asserting that the realization of a person of the present moment, somehow, has already been realized. If we speak, for example, of attaining realization, it sounds as if [realization] did not used to exist. If we speak of realization having come, it sounds as if that realization used to exist elsewhere. If we speak of having become realization, it sounds as if realization has a beginning. We do not discuss it like this and it is not like this; even so, when we discuss what realization is like, we ask if we need to rely on realization. Thereupon, with regard to “realization,” [Kyozan] has said, “What can it do about falling into the second consciousness?” He is thus saying that the second consciousness also is realization. By “the second consciousness,” he seems to mean “I have become realization,” or “I have attained realization,” or “realization has come.” He is saying that even “I have become” and even “it has come” are realization. So, while regretting the fact of falling into the second consciousness, he seems to be denying that second consciousness exists! Second consciousness produced from realization, at the same time, may be taken to be true second consciousness. In that case, even if it is second consciousness, and even if it is consciousness [divided into] hundreds of thousands, it may be the state of realization. It is not true that for the second consciousness to exist it must be left over from previously existing primary consciousness. For example, while I see the “I” of yesterday as myself, yesterday I called [the “I” of] today a second person.34 We do not say that present realization was not there yesterday; neither has it begun now. We should grasp it in experience like this. In sum, heads of great realization are black, and heads of great realization are white.35

Shobogenzo Daigo

116a

Preached to the assembly at Kannondori-in-koshohorinji on the twenty-eighth day of the first lunar month in the third year of Ninji.36

Written, and preached to a great gathering of human beings and gods, during a stay at the old Kippo Temple in Etsu,37 on the twenty-seventh day of the first lunar month in the second year of Kangen.38

I copied this on the twentieth day of the third lunar month, in the spring of the same second year [of Kangen], while serving as [the master’s] attendant in the inner sanctums of Kippo Temple in Etsu—Ejo

Notes

1 Ro-teiden suggests the performance of mundane daily tasks in the balanced state.

2 Ro-zeikon. In Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge, Master Dogen describes zazen as playing with the soul.

3    Shochi, which generally means “innate intelligence” or “natural sage” (see Vol. I, Appendix Two, Fukanzazengi), can also be interpreted as “knowing through life.” In his explanation, Master Dogen utilizes the ambiguity of sho, which as an adjective means “innate” or “inborn,” as a noun means “birth” or “life,” and as a verb means “to live” or “to be born.” In Master Dogen’s commentary, “innate” does not mean innate in a naturalistic sense; it means naturally present but at the same time realized by effort in life. See also Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV), Shizen-biku, paragraph 54: “In the Buddha’s teaching, there are no people of innate intelligence.”

4    Gakujichi, like shochi, is originally a Confucian concept. See Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV), Shizen-biku, paragraph 56.

5    Chogo-jobu, representing the Sanskrit purusa-damya-sdrathi, is one of ten epithets of the Buddha. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. The ten are listed in Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), Kuyo-shobutsu.

6    Realization, even though it is innate or natural, has to be realized through effort in life, and so it is described as shogo, which means both “innate realization” and “realization through living.” See note 3.

7    Koan. See Chapter Three (Vol. I), Genjo-koan.

8    Master Rinzai Gigen (815?-867), a successor of Master Obaku Kiun. Great Master Esho is his posthumous title.

9    A slightly different version of Master Rinzai’s words is quoted in the Kosonshuku-goroku, chapter 5: “Even if we break the kingdom of Tang searching for someone who does not understand, we cannot find one person.”

10    Ri, lit., “backside” or “inside,” appears in Master Rinzai’s words as “throughout.”

11    Hannin, “half a person,” is opposed to ichinin, “one person,” in Master Rinzai’s words. Master Dogen often uses han, “half,” to represent concrete reality.

12    Master Kegon Kyujo, successor of Master Tozan Ryokai. Great Master Hochi is his posthumous title.

13    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 17. “Fallen blossoms do not return to their branches; a broken mirror does not again reflect” (rakuge eda ni kaerazu, hakyo futatabi terasazu) is a proverb still heard in Japan today.

14    For example, making a problem out of natural desire (idealistic phase).

15    For example, throwing away Buddhist effort and drinking beer (materialistic phase).

16    For example, reading fiction (behavior in day-to-day life).

17    Suggests that it is ultimately difficult to discriminate between delusion and realization.

18    Ichi-seki-shu, “one hand,” represents a concrete thing. Master Dogen brought his discussion back into the area of concrete things.

19    Zoku, “bandit,” may be interpreted as an enemy of the Buddha’s teaching, and shi, “child,” may be interpreted as a disciple of the Buddha. The point of the sentence is that delusion is an inclusive state, and therefore not only a matter of mistaken recognition.

20    Mishin, or ibukashi, means not yet clarified in detail. In stories in the Shinji-shobogenzo, the words ibukashi, “I do not understand,” are often spoken by monks to ask a master for further clarification. Here Master Dogen uses the compound unconventionally as

a verb, mishin suru.

21    Rakuge, “fallen flowers,” describes the momentary real state of flowers, which is irrelevant to their relative position.

22    Fu-ju-sho, “does not again reflect,” describes the state in a moment of the present; it is not concerned with the future.

23    Hakyo, “broken mirror” or “a mirror being broken,” and rakuge, “fallen flowers” or “flowers being fallen,” here represent the momentary state of action of concrete things.

24    “Turning back into an ordinary being” describes a process and “traces depending on origin” describes a separation in time or space, but Master Kegon’s words describe a momentary state.

25    Again, “delusion comes” describes a process, but Master Dogen saw delusion as a momentary state.

26    For example, after making something to eat, having an alcoholic drink with it.

27    Great realization is not related to the past and future—because it is a momentary state.

28    Because pursuing the truth is returning to ourselves.

29    Zuitako, “follow objects perfectly” or “follow others out,” is a common expression in the Shobogenzo of the state that is completely harmonized with circumstances.

30    Master Keicho Beiyu, a successor of Master Isan Reiyu.

31    Master Kyozan Ejaku (807-883), also a successor of Master Isan Reiyu.

32    Dai-ni-to, lit., “head number two,” means divided consciousness.

33    Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 7; Rentoeyo, chapter 8; Wanshijuko, no. 62.

34    Because there is only the reality of the present moment, even divided consciousness is also realization. But consideration based on the assumption of past, present, and future gives rise to the distinction between realization and second consciousness, or self and second person.

35    Black heads and white heads suggest the heads of young people and of old people. The sentence suggests that all people are in the state of great realization, whether we realize it or not.

36    1242.

37    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture.

38    1244.

[Chapter Twenty-seven]

Zazenshin A Needle for Zazen

116b9

Translator's Note: Shin means a bamboo needle that was used for acupuncture in ancient China. So shin means a method of healing body and mind, and the word came to be used as a maxim that has the power to cure a human being of physical and mental discomfort. Subsequently, the word shin was used to describe short verses useful in teaching the important points of a method of training. In this chapter Master Dogen first explained the true meaning of zazen, quoting and commenting on a famous exchange between Master Nangaku and Master Baso. Then he praised a Zazenshin written by Master Wanshi Shogaku, andfinally, he wrote his own Zazenshin.

[3] While Great Master Yakusan Kodo1 is sitting, a monk asks him, “What are you thinking in the still-still state?”2 The master says, “Thinking the concrete state of not thinking.” The monk says, “How can the state of not thinking be thought?” The master says, “It is non-thinking.”3

[4] Experiencing the state in which the words of the great master are like this, we should learn in practice “mountain-still sitting,”4 and we should receive the authentic transmission of “mountain-still sitting”: this is the investigation of “mountain-still sitting” that has been transmitted in Buddhism. “Thinking in the still-still state” is not of only one kind, but Yakusan’s words are one example of it. Those words are “Thinking the concrete state of not thinking.” They include “thinking” as skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, and “not thinking” as skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. The monk says, “How can the state of not thinking be thought?” Truly, although “the state of not thinking” is ancient, still it is “How can it be thought about!”5 “In the still-still state” how could it be impossible for “thinking” to exist? And why do [people] not understand the ascendancy6 of “the still-still state”? If they were not the stupid people of vulgar recent times, they might possess the power, and might possess the

thinking, to ask about “the still-still state.” The great master says, “It is nonthinking.” This use of “non-thinking” is brilliant; at the same time, whenever we “think the state of not thinking,” we are inevitably using “non-thinking.” In “non-thinking” there is someone, and [that] someone is maintaining and

116c relying upon me. “The still-still state,” although it is I, is not only “thinking”: it is holding up the head of “the still-still state.” Even though “the still-still state” is “the still-still state,” how can “the still-still state” think “the still-still state”? So “the still-still state” is beyond the intellectual capacity of Buddha, beyond the intellectual capacity of the Dharma, beyond the intellectual capacity of the state of realization, and beyond the intellectual capacity of understanding itself. The one-to-one transmission to Yakusan in the state like this is the thirty-sixth, already, in a line of direct descent from Sakyamuni Buddha; and when we trace upward from Yakusan, there is, after thirty-six generations, the Buddha Sakyamuni. Having been authentically transmitted like this, “hinking the concrete state of not thinking” is present already. In recent years, however, stupid unreliable people7 have said, “In the effort of zazen, to attain peace of mind8 is everything. Just this is the state of tranquility.” This opinion is beneath even scholars of the Small Vehicle. It is inferior even to the vehicles of humans and gods. How can we call such people students of the Buddha-Dharma? In the great kingdom of Song today, people of such effort are many. It is lamentable that the Patriarch’s truth has gone to ruin. There is another group of people [who say]: “Sitting in zazen to pursue the truth is an essential mechanism9 for beginners and late-learners, but it is not necessarily the action of Buddhist patriarchs. For them, ‘walking also is Zen, and sitting also is Zen. In talking and silence, movement and rest, the body is at ease.’10 Do not associate [Buddhist patriarchs] exclusively with this effort [of zazen].” Many who call themselves followers of Rinzai are of this opinion. They speak like this because they have been remiss in receiving the transmission of the true life of the Buddha-Dharma.

117a What is “a beginner”? Which [sort] is not a beginner? At what place do they locate a beginner?11 Remember, as the established [method of] investigation in learning the truth, we pursue the state of truth in zazen. The point, in manifest form, is that there is acting buddha which does not expect to become buddha. Because acting buddha is utterly beyond becoming buddha, the universe is realized. The body-buddha is utterly beyond becoming buddha, [but] when nets and cages are broken, sitting buddha does not hinder becoming buddha

at all. Just at this moment, the power is originally present, through a thousand ages and ten thousand ages, to enter [the state of] Buddha or to enter [the state of] demons. And forward steps and backward steps possess the capacity intimately to fill ditches and to fill valleys.

[9] Zen Master Daijaku of Kozei,12 after receiving the immediate transmission of the mind-seal13 while learning in practice under Zen Master Daie of Nangaku,14 constantly sits in zazen. Nangaku on one occasion goes to Daijaku’s place and asks him, “Virtuous monk! What are you aiming at, sitting in zazen?”15 We should quietly consider and investigate this question. That is, we should consider in detail whether [Nangaku] is asking: Is there an aim that might be superior to sitting in zazen? Beyond the framework of sitting in zazen, has there never yet been a state of truth to aim at? Should we not aim at anything at all? Just in the moment of sitting in zazen, what kind of aim is being realized? More than we love a carved dragon, we should love the real dragon.16 We should learn that the carved dragon and the real dragon both possess the potency of clouds and rain. Do not hold the remote17 in high regard, and do not hold the remote in low regard: be accustomed to it as the remote. Do not hold the close18 in high regard, and do not hold the close in low regard: be accustomed to it as the close. Do not think light of the eyes, and do not attach importance to the eyes. Do not attach importance to the ears, and do not think light of the ears. Make the ears and eyes sharp and clear.19

[11] Kozei says, “Aiming to become buddha.”20 We should clarify and master these words. When he says “becoming buddha” just what does he mean? Does “becoming buddha” describe becoming buddha being done by a buddha? Does “becoming buddha” describe becoming buddha being done to a buddha? Does “becoming buddha” describe the manifestation of one instance and the manifestation of two instances of “buddha”? Is “aiming to become buddha,” being the dropping off [of body and mind], “aiming to become buddha” as dropping off? Does “aiming to become buddha” describe that even though “becoming buddha” is of myriad kinds, it continues to be entangled21 with this “aiming”? Remember, the words of Daijaku are that to sit in zazen is, in every case, “aiming to become buddha.” To sit in zazen is, in every case, “becoming buddha” as “aiming.” The “aiming” may be before the “becoming buddha,” may be after the “becoming buddha,” and may be just the very moment of “becoming buddha.” Let us ask for a while: How

117b

many instances of “becoming buddha” does one such instance of “aiming” entangle? This entanglement is further entwining with entanglement. At this time, all cases of entanglement—as totally “becoming buddha” in separate instances, and as totally “becoming buddha” always being exactly itself— are individual instances of “aiming.” We cannot flee from a single instance of “aiming.” At a time when we flee from a single instance of “aiming,” we lose body and life. [But even] the time when we lose body and life is an instance of entanglement as “aiming.”

[13]    Nangaku then picks up a tile and starts to polish it on a stone. Daijaku eventually asks, “What is the master doing?” Truly, who could fail to see that he is polishing a tile? But who can see it as polishing a tile? Rather, the polishing of a tile has [always] been questioned like this: “What are you doing!” The “doing” of “what” is always the polishing of a tile. In this land and other worlds, different though they are, polishing a tile may possess an import that has never ceased. It is not simply a matter of not fixing to our own views as our own views: we perfectly ascertain that in the myriad kinds

117c of work there is import to be learned in practice. Remember, we witness buddha without knowing or understanding buddha, just as we see waters without knowing them and see mountains without knowing them. [Nevertheless,] if we hastily conclude that there can be no path of penetration to the Dharma before our eyes, that is not Buddhist study.

[14]    Nangaku says, “Polishing to make22 a mirror.” We should clarify the meaning of these words. In “polishing to make a mirror” Buddhist truths are always present and the realized universe is present: it is never an empty pretense. Though tiles are tiles and mirrors are mirrors, we should know that when we are striving to master the truth of polishing, [polishing] possesses a limitless abundance of distinguishing features. It may be that even the eternal mirror and the clear mirror23 are made into mirrors by polishing a tile. If we do not know that mirrors derive from polishing a tile, we are without a Buddhist patriarch’s expression of the truth, we have not experienced a Buddhist patriarch’s mouth opening, and we are not seeing and hearing a Buddhist patriarch’s exhalations.

[15]    Daijaku says, “How can polishing a tile realize a mirror?” Truly, polishing a tile, as [the work of] an iron man, does not rely upon the resources of others. Even so, “polishing a tile” is not “to realize a mirror.” The realization

of a mirror——though it is nothing other than itself—may be [described as] instantaneous.

[16] Nangaku says, “How can sitting in zazen make you into a buddha?” Clearly, there is a truth that zazen does not expect to become buddha. The principle is evident that to become buddha is irrelevant to zazen.

[16]    Daijaku says, “Just what is right, here and now?” These words look like a question only about this concrete place, but they are also asking about rightness here and now at any other place. Remember, for example, the moment when a close friend meets a close friend: [his] being my close friend is [my] being his close friend. “Just what is right, here and now,” is direct manifestation [of both sides] at once.

118a

[17]    Nangaku says, “If, when a person is riding in a cart, the cart does not move, is it right to prod the cart, or is it right to prod the ox?” Now, as to the meaning of “If the cart does not move,” what is a cart moving and what is a cart not moving? For example, is water flowing a cart moving? Is water not flowing a cart moving?24 We might say that flowing is water not moving.25 It may also be that water moving is beyond ‘"flowing.” Thus, when we investigate the words, “if the cart does not move,” we may find that there is “not moving,” and we may find that there is no “not moving”—because [the cart] must be in time.26 The words “if it does not move” have not one-sidedly expressed only not moving. [Nangaku] says, “Is it right to prod the cart, or is it right to prod the ox?” Can there be both prodding the cart and prodding the ox? Must prodding the cart and prodding the ox be equivalent, or might they be not equivalent? In the secular world there is no method of prodding the cart.27 Though the common person has no method of prodding the cart, we have seen that in Buddhism there is a method of prodding the cart—it is the very eyes of learning in practice. And though we learn that there is a method of prodding the cart, [prodding the cart] cannot be completely the same as prodding the ox. We should consider this in detail. Though methods of prodding the ox are present in the ordinary world,28 we should investigate further and learn in practice the prodding of the ox in Buddhism. Is it the prodding of a castrated water buffalo?29 Is it the prodding of an iron ox?30 Is it the prodding of a mud ox?31 Should a whip32 do the prodding? Should the whole universe do the prodding? Should the whole mind do the prodding? Should the marrow be beaten flat? Should a fist33 do the beating? There should be fist beating fist, and there should be ox beating ox.34

118b    [20] Daijaku makes no reply, a state that we should not idly overlook.

It is “throwing away a tile and pulling in a jewel”;35 it is “turning the head and changing the features.”36 Nothing at all can filch this state of no reply.

[21] Nangaku teaches further, “Your learning sitting dhydna3 is learning sitting buddha.” Investigating these words, we should grasp them as just the pivotal essence38 of the ancestral patriarchs. We were not aware of an exact definition of “learning zazen,” but [now] we have seen that it is “learning sitting buddha.” How could anyone but the child and grandchild of rightful successors assert that “learning zazen” is “learning sitting buddha”? Truly, we should know that a beginner’s zazen is the first zazen; and the first zazen is the first sitting buddha.

[21]    Describing zazen, he says, “When we are learning sitting dhyana, that dhyana is beyond sitting and lying down.” What he is saying now is that zazen is zazen, not sitting or lying down. After we have received the one-to-one transmission of [the teaching] that [zazen] is beyond sitting and lying down, unlimited instances of sitting and lying down are ourself. Why should we seek life-blood in the familiar or unfamiliar? Why should we discuss delusion and realization? Who wishes to pursue an intellectual conclusion?

[22]    Nangaku says, “When you are learning sitting buddha, buddha is beyond any set form.” When we want to say what these words say, [the expression] is like this. The reason sitting buddha appears as one buddha and a second buddha is that it is adorned with “transcendence of any set form.” [Nangaku’s] saying now that “buddha is beyond any set form” expresses the form of buddha; and because it is buddha beyond any set form, it is utterly impossible for it to escape [the form of] sitting buddha. In sum, because buddha is adorned with transcendence of any set form, when it is learning sitting dhyana it is just sitting buddha.

[23]    Who, in the nonabiding Dharma,39 could have preference or aversion for not being buddha or preference or aversion for being buddha? Because it has dropped off [preference and aversion even] before the moment of preference and aversion, [sitting buddha] is sitting buddha.

118c    [24] Nangaku says, “When you are [practicing] sitting buddha, that is

just killing buddha.” This says further that when we are investigating sitting buddha, the virtue of killing buddha is present. The very moment of sitting buddha is the killing of “buddha.” If we want to explore the good features

and the brightness of killing buddha, they are always present in sitting buddha. The word “to kill” is as [used by] the common person, but we should not blindly equate [its usage here] with that of the common person. Further, we should investigate the state in which sitting buddha is killing buddha, [asking:] “What forms and grades does it have?” Taking up [the fact] that, among the virtues of buddha, killing buddha is already present, we should learn in practice whether we ourselves are killing a person or not yet killing a person.

[25] “To attach to the sitting form is not to have attained the principle of that [sitting].” This “to attach to the sitting form” means to reject the sitting form and to defile the sitting form. The fundamental principle here is that when we are already practicing sitting buddha, it is impossible not to be attached to the sitting form. Because it is impossible not to be attached to the sitting form, although attachment to the sitting form is something brilliant, it may be “not to have attained the principle of that [sitting].” Effort like this is called “the dropping off of body and mind.” Those who have never sat do not possess this state of truth. It exists in the moment of sitting, it exists in the person who is sitting, it exists in the buddha that is sitting, and it exists in the buddha that is learning sitting. The sitting that is performed only as the sitting and reclining of human beings is not this state of sitting buddha. Even if human sitting naturally appears to be sitting buddha, or a buddha sitting, it may be a case of a human being becoming buddha,40 or a case of a human being of becoming buddha.41 There are human beings of becoming buddha, but all human beings are not of becoming buddha. Buddha is not a state of all human beings. All buddhas are not simply all humanity. Therefore, a human being is not always a buddha, and buddha is not always a human being. Sitting buddha also is like this, and Nangaku and Kozei, excellent master and stout disciple, are like this. Sitting buddha realizes the experience of becoming buddha: this is Kozei5s case. For the benefit of becoming buddha, sitting buddha is demonstrated: this is Nangaku’s case. In Nangaku’s order there is effort like this. In Yakusan’s order there are the assertions [quoted] previously. Remember, what has been described as “the pivotal essence of every buddha and every patriarch” is just sitting buddha. Those who are already the buddhas and the patriarchs used this pivotal essence. Those who have never [used it] have simply never seen it, even in a dream.

119a

[28] In general, in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, that the Buddha-Dharma has been transmitted has always meant that sitting buddha has been transmitted. That is because [sitting buddha] is the pivotal essence. When the Buddha-Dharma has not been transmitted, sitting dhyana (zazen) has not been transmitted. What has been transmitted and received from rightful successor to rightful successor is only this principle of zazen. Those who have not received the one-to-one transmission of this principle are not Buddhist patriarchs. Without illuminating this one dharma, we do not illuminate the myriad dharmas, and do not illuminate the myriad deeds. Those who have not illuminated each dharma, dharma by dharma, cannot be called clear-eyed, and they are not the attainment of the truth; how could they be Buddhist patriarchs of the eternal past and present? Therefore, we should be absolutely certain that the Buddhist patriarchs have, in every case, received the one-to-one transmission of zazen. To be illuminated by the presence of the Buddhist patriarchs’ brightness is to exert oneself in the investigation of this sitting in zazen. Stupid people mistakenly think that the Buddha’s state of brightness might be like the brightness of the sun and the moon, or like the luminance of a pearl or a flame. The brilliance of the sun and moon is only karmic manifestation of the turning of the wheel through the six worlds; it cannot compare to the Buddha’s state of brightness at all. “The Buddha’s 119b brightness” means accepting, retaining, and hearing a single phrase; maintaining, relying on, and upholding a single dharma; and receiving the one-to-one transmission of zazen. If [people] are not able to be illuminated by the brightness, they lack this state of maintenance and reliance and they lack this belief and acceptance. This being so, even since ancient times, few people have know that zazen is zazen. On the mountains of the great kingdom of Song today, leaders of top-ranking temples who do not know zazen and who do not learn of it are many; there are some who know [zazen] clearly, but they are few. In many temples, of course, times for zazen are laid down, and everyone from the abbot to the monks regards sitting in zazen as the main task. When recruiting students, too, they urge them to sit in zazen. Even so, those abbots who know [zazen] are rare. For this reason, while there have been, from ancient times to recent generations, one or two old veterans who have written Zazenmei42 (“Mottoes of Zazen”), and one or two old veterans who have edited Zazengi43 (“Standard Methods of Zazen”), and one or two

old veterans who have written Zazenshin4 (“Maxims of Zazen”), the “Mottoes of Zazen” are all devoid of any redeeming feature, and the “Standard Methods of Zazen” remain unclear as to its actual performance. They were written by people who do not know zazen, and who have not received the one-to-one transmission of zazen. [I refer to] the “Maxims of Zazen” in the Keitokuden-toroku,45 the “Mottoes of Zazen” in the Kataifutoroku,46 and so on. It is pitiful that [such people] spend a lifetime passing in succession through the monasteries of the ten directions, and yet they have not experienced the effort of one sitting. Sitting is not in them; their effort does not meet with themselves at all. This is not because zazen hates their own body and mind, but because they do not aspire to the genuine effort [of zazen], and they are quickly deluded. Their collections seem only to be about getting back to the source or returning to the origin, about vainly endeavoring to cease thought and become absorbed in serenity. That is not equal to the stages of reflection on. training in, assuming the fragrance of, and cultivation of [dhydna] ;47 it is not equal to views on the ten states and the balanced state of truth:48 how could [those people] have received the one-to-one transmission of the zazen of the buddhas and the patriarchs? Chroniclers of the Song dynasty were wrong to have recorded [their writings], and students in later ages should discard them and should not read them. As a maxim for zazen, the one written by Zen Master Wanshi Shogaku49 of Tendokeitokuji on Daibyakumyozan50 in Kyo-genfu51 City in the great kingdom of Song, and this alone, is the patriarchs, is a [true] needle for zazen, and is a fit expression of the truth. Only his is the brightness [that illuminates both] outside and inside of the Dharma world. He is a Buddhist patriarch among the Buddhist patriarchs of the eternal past and present. Former buddhas and later buddhas continue to be spurred by this needle. Through this needle, patriarchs of the present and patriarchs of old are realized. The Zazenshin in question is as follows:

[34] Zazenshin

119c

Written by Shogaku, who was posthumously titled, by imperial decree, Zen Master Wanshi

Pivotal essence of every buddha,

Essential pivot of every patriarch.

Not touching things, yet sensing.

Not opposing circumstances, yet being illuminated.

Not touching things, yet sensing:

The sensing is naturally subtle.

Not opposing circumstances, yet being illuminated:

The illumination is naturally fine.

The sensing is naturally subtle:

There has been no discriminating thought.

The illumination is naturally fine:

There has been not the slightest dawning.

There has been no discriminating thought:

The sensing, without any duality, is singular.

There has been not the slightest dawning:

The illumination, without any grasping, is complete.

The water is clean right to the bottom,

Fishes are swimming, slowly, slowly.

The sky is wide beyond limit,

And birds are flying, far, far away.

[35] The point52 of this needle for zazen is that “the Great Function is already manifest before us,” is “the dignified behavior that is ascendant to sound and form,”53 is a glimpse of “the time before our parents were born,”54 is that “not to insult the Buddhist patriarchs is good,” is “never to have avoided losing body and life,” and is “the head being three feet long and the neck being two inches.”55

[37] “Pivotal essence of every buddha•” “Every buddha” without exception sees “buddha at every moment”56 as “the pivotal essence•” That “pivotal essence” has been realized: it is zazen.

[37] “Essential pivot of every patriarch•” “The late master did without such words”57—this principle itself is “every patriarch•” The transmission of Dharma and the transmission of the robe exist. In general, every instance58 of “turning the head and changing the features” is the pivotal essence of 120a every buddha. And every individual case59 of changing the features and turning the head is the essential pivot of every patriarch.

[38]    “Not touching things, yet sensing.” “Sensing” is not sense perception; sense perception is small-scale. Neither is it intellectual recognition; intellectual recognition is intentional doing. Therefore, “sensing” is “beyond touching things,” and that which is “beyond touching things” is “sensing.” We should not consider speculatively that it is universal awareness, and we should not think narrowly that it is self-awareness. This “not touching things” means “When a clear head comes, a clear head does. When a dull head comes, a dull head does”;60 it means “to break by sitting the skin that our mothers bore.”

[39]    “Not opposing circumstances, yet being illuminated.” This “being illuminated” is not the illumination of enlightened understanding and is not spiritual illumination. “Not to oppose circumstances” is described as “being illuminated.” Illumination does not merge into circumstances^because circumstances are just illumination. The meaning of “non-opposition” is “the whole universe never having been hidden,” is “a broken world not showing its head,” is “the subtle,” is “the fine,” and is “[the state beyond] complicated and uncomplicated.”

[40]    “The sensing is naturally subtle: There has been no discriminating thought.” The state in which “thought” is “sensing” is not always reliant on external assistance. “The sensing” is concrete form, and concrete form is mountains and rivers. These mountains and rivers are “subtlety.” This “subtlety”61 is “the fine.”62 When we use [this state] it is totally vigorous. When we become a dragon, whether we are inside or outside the Dragon Gate63 is irrelevant. To use even one mere instant of the present “sensing” is to garner the mountains and rivers of the whole universe and, exerting total effort, to “sense” them. Unless our own “sensing” is in the state of direct familiarity with mountains and rivers, there cannot be a single instance of sensing or half an instance of understanding. We should not grieve about “discriminating thought” being late in arriving. “Every buddha,” in the state of already having discrimination, has already been realized. The “nonexistence of what has occurred”64 is “already” having occurred, and “already having occurred”65 is realization. In sum, “there having been no discrimination” is [the state of] “not meeting a single person.”66

[41]    “The illumination is naturally fine: There has been not the slightest dawning.” “The slightest”67 means the whole universe. Still, [the illumination] is naturally the fine itself and is naturally illumination itself, and for

120b this reason it seems never to have fetched anything to itself. Do not doubt the eyes, but do not necessarily trust the ears.68 The state of “You must directly clarify the fundamental outside of principles; do not grasp for standards in words”69 is illumination. For this reason “there is no duality” and for this reason “there is no grasping.” While having dwelled in and retained this state as “singularity” and having maintained and relied upon it as “completeness,” [those descriptions] I still doubt.

[42] “The water is clean right to the bottom. Fishes are swimming, slowly, slowly.” As to the meaning of “the water is clean,”70 water suspended in space71 is not thoroughly72 “clean water.” Still less is water that becomes deep and clear in the vessel world,73 the water of “he water is clean.” [Water] that is not bounded by any bank or shore: this is “water that is clean right to the bottom.” When fish move through this water, “swimming” is not nonexistent.74 “Swimming,” for however many tens of thousands of distances it progresses, is unfathomable and is unlimited. There is no bank from which to survey it, there is no air to which it might surface, and there is no bottom to which it might sink. Therefore, there is no one who can fathom it. If we want to discuss its measurements, [we say] only that “the water is clean right to the bottom.” The virtue of sitting in zazen is like this swimming of fishes: who can estimate it on a scale of thousands or tens of thousands? The course of action that penetrates to the bottom is the whole body not following the way of the birds.75

[44] “The sky is wide beyond limit. And birds are flying, far, far away.” “The sky is wide” does not describe what is suspended in the firmament.76 The sky suspended in the firmament is not “the wide sky.” Still less is that which pervades that place and this place universally77 “the wide sky.” [The sky] not hidden or revealed by any outside or inside: this is “the wide sky.” When birds fly through this sky, flying in the sky is the undivided Dharma. Their action of flying in the sky cannot be measured. Flying in the sky is the whole universe— because the whole universe is flying in the sky. We do not know the extent of this “flying,” but in expressing it with words which are beyond the realm of estimation, we describe it as “far, far away.” “Straightaway, there should be no strings under the feet.”78 When the sky is flying away, the birds also are flying away; and when the birds are flying away, the sky also is flying away.

120c Words that express mastery of flying away are “It only exists at this concrete place.” This is a needle for the still-still state. Tens of thousands of distances traveled vie to tell us, “It only exists at this concrete place.”

[46] Such is the Zazenshin of Zen Master Wanshi. Among [the maxims of] veteran patriarchs through the ages, there has never been a Zazenshin like this one. If stinking skinbags in all directions wished to express the like of this Zazenshin, even if they exhausted the effort of a lifetime or of two lifetimes, they would not be able to express it. Through all directions today, we do not find [any other]: there is this maxim alone. When my late master held formal preaching in the Dharma hall, he would constantly say, “The eternal buddha Wanshi!” He never spoke like this of other men at all. When we have the eyes to know a person, we can also know the sound of a Buddhist patriarch. Truly we have seen that in [the lineage of] Tozan, a Buddhist patriarch exists.79 Now it is eighty years or so since [the death of] Zen Master Wanshi. Admiring his Zazenshin, I have written the following Zazenshin. Now it is the eighteenth day in the third lunar month in the third year of Ninji.80 When I count [the years] between this year and the eighth day of the tenth lunar month in the twenty-seventh year of Shoko,81 it is only eighty-five years. The Zazenshin that I have written now is as follows:

[47] Zazenshin

Pivotal essence of every buddha,

Essential pivot of every patriarch.

Beyond thinking, realizing,

Beyond complication, realization.

Beyond thinking, realizing:

The realizing is naturally immediate.

Beyond complication, realization:

The realization is naturally a state of experience.

The realizing is naturally immediate:

There has been no taintedness.

The realization is naturally a state of experience:

There has been no rightness or divergence.

There has been no tainting of the immediacy:

That immediacy is without reliance yet it gets free.

There has been no rightness or divergence in the experience:

That state of experience is without design yet it makes effort.

The water is clean, right down to the ground,

Fishes are swimming like fishes.

The sky is wide, clear through to the heavens,

And birds are flying like birds.

[49] The Zazenshin of Zen Master Wanshi is never imperfect in expression, but I would like to express it further like this. In sum, children and grandchildren of the Buddhist patriarchs should unfailingly learn in practice that sitting in zazen is the one great matter. This is the authentic seal that is received and transmitted one-to-one.

121a

Shobogenzo Zazenshin

Written at Koshohorinji on the eighteenth day of the third lunar month in the third year of the Ninji era.82

Preached to the assembly at Kippo Temple in the Yoshida district of Esshu,83 in the eleventh lunar month, during the winter of the fourth year of the same era.84

Notes

1 Master Yakusan Igen (745-828), successor of Master Sekito Kisen.

2 Gotsu-gotsu-chi. Gotsu, repeated for emphasis, literally means “high and level,” “lofty,” or “motionless.” The word originally suggests a table mountain, and hence something imposing and balanced.

3    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 14; Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2, no. 24.

4    Gotsu-za. See note 2.

5    The state is unthinkable at each moment.

6    Kojo means “ascending” or “being beyond.” (See Chapter Twenty-eight, Butsu-kojo-no-ji.) Sitting in stillness is ascendant to, or beyond, both thinking and not thinking.

7    Zusan, lit., “composed by Zu, or To,” means slipshod, careless, unreliable. Zu, To stands for To Moku, a Chinese poet who ignored literary conventions.

8    Kyokin [nobuji. Kyokin means bosom, heart, or mind. Buji means peacefulness, or absence of incident. The words imply a sweeping negation of thinking, based on the idealistic view.

9    Yoki, “pivotal essence.” The same characters appear later in this chapter in the Zazen-shin of Master Wanshi and Master Dogen. See also note 38.

10    The words in quotemarks are quoted from the Shodoka by Master Yoka Genkaku.

11    “Beginner” is shoshin, lit., “beginning mind” or “beginner’s mind,” and is the usual term for a beginner himself or herself.

12    Master Baso Doitsu (704-88), successor of Master Nangaku Ejo. Kosei (Jiangxi) is the name of a province in southeast China where Master Baso lived. Zen Master Daijaku is his posthumous title.

13    Shin-in. In Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), Zanmai-o-zanmai, Master Dogen identifies the buddha-mind-seal with the full lotus posture.

14    Master Nangaku Ejo (677-744), successor of Master Daikan Eno. Nangaku is the name of the mountain on which he had his order. Zen Master Daie is his posthumous title.

15    The original story is quoted in the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 5; and in Shinji-shobo-genzo, pt. 1, no. 8. Master Dogen quoted the first half of the story at the end of Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Kokyo.

16    Choryu, “carved dragon,” symbolizes representation or explanation of zazen. Shinryu, “real dragon,” symbolizes zazen itself. Master Dogen emphasizes the need for both kinds of dragons.

17    On, “remote” or “distant,” suggests, for example, sutras recorded in India many centuries ago.

18    Kin, “close,” means, for example, our own experience in zazen.

19    In general, eyes suggests seeing concrete things, or the perceptive function, and ears suggest hearing words, or the intellectual function.

20    Sabutsu [ohaka[ru], or tosabutsu. To, haka[ru] means 1) to aim or to plan to do something, and 2) to make effort in line with an aim or plan. Sa, tsuku[ru], na[su] means to make, to make something into something, to become, or to do.

21    Katto suru. Katto, which literally means “[the entanglement of] arrowroot and wisteria” and hence “complications” or “the complicated,” is the title of Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III). Simply thinking, we become buddha when we are free of intention. In this paragraph, however, Master Dogen suggests that the real relation between intention (aiming) and liberated action (becoming buddha) is complicated.

22    Sa, na[su], as in sabutsu, “becoming buddha,” and sa-somo, “doing what.”

23    Kokyo, “eternal mirror,” and meikyo, “clear mirror,” allude to a story quoted at length in Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Kokyo.

24    If a river is running alongside a cart, or a cart is moving alongside a lake, because the water and the cart are in mutual relation, it is not possible to say that one element is moving and one element is not moving.

25    Action (flowing) transcends relative movement.

26    Time is a series of instants (see Chapter Eleven [Vol. I], Uji). In each instant there is no movement, but the progression from instant to instant is continuous movement.

27    A method of prodding the cart means a method of regulating the physical state, for example, zazen.

28    A method of prodding the ox means a method for motivating the mind, for example, the offering of rewards.

29    Master Enchi Daian said, “I have lived on Isan Mountain for thirty years, eating Isan meals, shitting Isan shit, but not studying Isan Zen. I just watched over a castrated water buffalo. . . .” Keitokudentoroku, chapter 10. See Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajo.

30    Master Fuketsu Ensho said, “The mind-seal of the ancestral masters is like the stuff of a molded iron ox.” Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record), no. 38.

31    Master Ryuzan said, “I saw two mud oxen. They fought and entered the sea. There has been no news of them since.” Quoted in the Ryuzanoku (Ryuzans Record).

32    For discussion of the meaning of a whip, see Chapter Eighty-five (Vol. IV), Shime.

33    Kento, a symbol of action.

34    Gyu-ta-gyu, “ox prods ox” or “ox beats ox,” means ox exists as it is. Ta literally means to strike, beat, prod, etc., but the character often represents action itself, for example in Master Baso’s words shikantaza, “just sitting.”

35    Master Joshu Jushin says, “Tonight I have given the answer. Anyone who understands the question should come forward.” A monk steps forward and prostrates himself. The master says, “Just before I threw away a tile to pull in a jewel, but instead I have drawn out a lump of clay.” (Keitokudentoroku, chapter 10.) Master Dogen suggests that Master Baso’s not saying anything is valuable effort, like that of Master Joshu.

36    Koube [omegura[shiteomote [oka[uru] symbolizes normal behavior.

37    Zazen, lit., “sitting dhyana,” is rendered in Master Dogen’s commentary (and in the chapter title) as “zazen.”

38    Yoki. Yo, kaname, as a noun, means pivot or main point, and as an adjective, means pivotal or essential. Ki means a mechanism (of a machine) or (human) potentiality, stuff, makings. It also means an opportunity or an occasion, and thus has connotations of a state at the moment of the present.

39    Muju [no] ho, or “abodeless Dharma,” means reality that only exists at the moment of the present.

40    Nin-sabutsu, “a human being making [himself or herself] into buddha.” Negating the naturalistic view, Master Dogen suggests that whether we are in the state of buddha or not depends on our own effort.

41    Sabutsu-nin, “a becoming-buddha human being,” that is, a man or woman of zazen.

42    Zazenmei.

43    Zazengi. Master Dogen recorded his own Zazengi in Chapter Fifty-eight (Vol. III). See also the independent work Fukanzazengi (Vol. I, Appendix Two).

44    Zazenshin, as in the title of the present chapter. Shin means 1) a needle, and by extension, 2) a saying, maxim, or verse that provides a spur, a warning, or an exhortation. Shin has been translated either as “needle” or as “maxim.” Also, in some cases the original term zazenshin has been preferred.

45    The Keitokuden toroku (Keitoku Era Record of the Transmission of the Torch), the first of the Gotoroku (Five Records of the Torch) compiled during the Song era (9601279). It contains records of one thousand and seventy-one Buddhist practitioners from the seven ancient buddhas to Master Hogen Bun’eki. The editing was completed by the monk Sodo Gen, in the first year of the Keitoku era (1004-1008).

46 Kataifutoroku (Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch), the last of the Gotoroku, in thirty chapters, including stories of Buddhist laymen as well as monks. It was completed by Master Raian Kochu in the first year of the Katai era (1201-1205).

47    Kan-ren-kun-ju refers to four stages of zazen taught in the Tendai sect: 1) kanzen, reflecting on dhyana; 2) renzen, training in dhyana; 3) kunzen, assuming the fragrance of dhyana; and 4) shuzen, cultivating dhyana.

48    Refers to the stages accomplished by a bodhisattva on the way to buddhahood.

49    Master Wanshi Shogaku (1091-1157), successor of Master Tanka Shijun. His family name was Li. He became a monk at age eleven, and became a disciple of Master Tanka Shijun at the recommendation of Master Koboku Hojo. He became a head monk at age thirty-one, and at thirty-nine he became the master of Keitokuji on Mount Tendo, where he remained until his death at the age of sixty-six. Zen Master Wanshi is his posthumous title. The Wanshizenjigoroku, a record of Master Wanshi’s words in nine volumes, includes one hundred eulogies to ancient masters. These one hundred articles were published as the Shoyoroku.

50    Daibyakumyozan, lit., “Great White Famous Mountain,” is another name for Tendozan. Keitokuji on Tendozan is the temple where Master Dogen eventually met Master Tendo Nyojo.

51    Present-day Ningbo in northern Zhekiang.

52    Shin. See note 44.

53    A variation of the words of Master Kyogen Chikan. See Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Kei-sei-sanshiki.

54    Fubo-misho-zen, a commonly occurring expression for the eternal past.

55    The Buddha’s body is said by legend to have been sixteen feet long. These measurements derive from that legend: two inches is the distance between the Buddha’s chin and collarbone.

56    Butsu-butsu, translated in the Zazenshin as “every buddha.”

57    Tesshi Kaku, a disciple of Master Joshu, said to Master Hogen Bun’eki, “The late master [Joshu] did without such [abstract] words.” The principle is that the teaching of patriarchs is not only abstract words.

58    Men-men. Men, omote means face or features. At the same time it is used as a counter for flat thin objects (such as mirrors) and for Buddhist patriarchs.

59    To-to. To, kaube means head. At the same time it is used as a counter for concrete individual objects and creatures.

60    Meitorai-meitoda, antorai-antoda. Master Chinshu Fuke (Hotei, the so-called Happy Buddha) said these words as he wandered from place to place with his sack on his back. See Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 22. “Does” is ta, da; see note 34. Meitoda means leaving clear-headedness as it is, and just acting. At the same time da is contrasted with fushoku, “not touching.”

61    Bi means slight, fine, infinitesimal, delicate, faint, subtle.

62    Myo also means subtle, and at the same time mysterious, wondrous, fine, wonderful (as in Myohorengekyo, the full title of the Lotus Sutra). These two characters, bi and myo, often form the compound bimyo, which means subtle, fine, exquisite. In the context of the poem, bi can be interpreted as a description of the mental side of zazen, and myo as the physical side, which is not separate from the mental side. The same pattern is repeated in Master Dogen’s Zazenshin with the separation of the compound genjo, “realization,” into gen, “realizing,” and jo, “being realized,” or “realization.”

63    Umon, U Gate, also known as Ryumon, Dragon Gate, is the name of a set of rapids on the Yellow River in China. Legend says that a fish that swims up through the rapids becomes a dragon.

64    So-mu. The poem says ka[tsute] na[shi], “there has not been” or “there has never been.” Individually, however, the character so, ka[tsute] means what has occurred before and mu expresses nonexistence; therefore, so-mu suggests the nonexistence of what has gone before, that is, the nonexistence of the past.

65    Iso. I means already. So, ka[tsute] means past, formerly, having occurred; grammatically, it represents the present perfect. Iso therefore suggests what is already present, that is, the reality of the moment.

66    In other words, the state of an independent person living in reality.

67    Gokotsu, lit., “one thousandth or one hundred-thousandth,” means an infinitesimal bit.

68    In general, eyes suggest seeing concrete things, or the perceptive function, and ears suggest hearing words, or the intellectual function.

69    Source of quotation not traced.

70    Sui-sei. Sei, kiyo[i] means 1) spiritually pure, 2) physically clear, and 3) clean in the sense of being empty, transparent, without anything.

71    That is, water understood as matter.

72    Seisui ni futettei, or “not right to the bottom as clean water.” Tettei, lit., “getting right to the bottom,” is the usual Japanese term for “thoroughness.”

73    Kikai, “vessel world,” suggests the world as an inclusive or spiritual whole.

74    In other words, the reality of action exists. In the poem, “swimming” is gyo, which means not only to go but also to act—as for example in the title of Chapter Twenty-three, Gyobutsu-yuigi.

75    Chodo, the way of the birds, generally suggests the transcendent state, but in this case Master Dogen contrasted it with the concrete state on the ground.

76    That is, the sky seen from the materialist view.

77    That is, abstract space.

78    The words of Master Tozan Ryokai, quoted in the Keitokudentdroku, chapter 15 (also quoted in Chapter Sixty-two [Vol. III],Hens an). In China captured birds had string tied around their feet to stop them flying away. Having no strings under the feet means being free of all hindrances.

79    Master Wanshi was a Dharma successor of Master Tanka Shijun (d. Ill 9), who was an eighth-generation descendant of Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869). The lineage of Master Dogen and Master Tendo Nyojo, however, is through another of the successors of Master Tanka Shijun, Master Shinketsu Seiryo. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

80    1242.

81    1157.

82    1242.

83    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture.

84 1243.

[Chapter Twenty-eight] Butsu-kdjd-no-ji

The Matter of the Ascendant State of Buddha

Translator’s Note: Butsu means “buddha, ” kojo means “ascend” or “be beyond, ” and ji means “matter, ” so butsu-kojo-no-ji means “the matter beyond buddha ” or “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha. ” These words describe a buddha continuing Buddhist practice after attaining the truth. Attainment of the truth is the practitioner ' recognition that he or she has been buddha since the eternal past. Therefore, even though buddhas have attained the truth, they do not distinctly change their thought, their physical condition, their life, and their practice ofzazen after having attained the truth. They just continue with their lives, practicing zazen each day. Buddhas like this are called “beyond buddha” or “ascendant buddhas” because they are buddhas who do not look like buddhas, and who continue the same usual Buddhist life as the life they had before their enlightenment. Master Dogen revered these ascendant buddhas very much. Ascendant buddhas like these are actual buddhas, and we cannot find buddhas other than they in this world. So in this chapter, Master Dogen explained the matter of ascendant buddhas, quoting the words of many masters.

[51] The founding patriarch, Great Master Gohon1 of Tozan Mountain in Inshu2 is the intimate rightful successor of Great Master Muju3 of Unganzan in Tanshu.4 He is the thirty-eighth patriarch ascending5 from the Tathagata; and [the Tathagata] is the thirty-eighth patriarch ascending from him.

“The great master on one occasion preaches to the assembly, ‘If you physically attain the matter of the ascendant state of buddha, you will truly possess the means to speak a little. ’ A monk then asks, ‘What is such speech?’ The great master says, ‘[For example,] when speaking, acarya, you are not listening.’ The monk says, ‘Does the master himself listen [while speaking], or not?’ The great master says, ‘When I am not speaking, then I listen.’”6

[53] The words spoken now on “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha” have the great master [Tozan] as their original patriarch. Other Buddhist patriarchs, having learned in practice the words of the great master, physically attain “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha.” Remember, the “matter of the ascendant state of buddha” is beyond latent causes and is beyond the fulfillment of effects: even so, we can experience it to the full, by physically attaining the state of “when speaking, not listening.” Without arriving at the ascendant state of buddha, there is no “physical attaining” of the ascendant state of buddha. Without “speaking,”7 we do not physically attain the matter of the ascendant state of buddha. [“Speaking”] is beyond mutual revelation and beyond mutual concealment, and it is beyond mutual 121b give and take. For this reason, when “speaking” is realized, this [“speaking”] is the matter of the ascendant state of buddha. When the matter of the ascendant state of buddha is being realized, “the aca-rya is beyond listening.”8 “The acarya is not listening” means “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha” itself is “not listening.” Thus, “When speaking, the acarya is not listening.” Remember, speaking is neither tainted by listening nor tainted by not listening; therefore it is irrelevant to listening or not listening. The inside of “not listening” contains the aca^a, and the inside of “speaking” contains the acarya; at the same time, [the state] is “beyond meeting a person or not meeting a person”9 and “beyond being like this or being not like this.”10 At “the time when” the dcdrya speaks, just then the dcdrya is not listening. The import of this situation of not listening is that [the state] is beyond listening because it is restricted by the tongue itself;11 it is beyond listening because it is restricted by the ears themselves;12 it is beyond listening because it is pierced by the luminance of the eye; and it is beyond listening because it is plugged up by the body-and-mind. Because it is so, it is “beyond listening.” We should never treat these states as “speaking.” “Being beyond listening” is not exactly the same thing as “speaking”: it is simply that “at the time of speaking,” [the state is] “beyond listening.” In the founding patriarch’s words, “At the time of speaking, the dcdrya is not listening,” the whole expression, from beginning to end, of “speaking,” is like wisteria clinging to wisteria; at the same time, it may be “speaking” entwining with “speaking” or [“speaking”] being restricted by “speaking” itself. The monk says, “Does the master listen himself, or not?” These words do not indicate

that the master might listen to [his own] speaking; for the questioner is not the master at all, and [the question] is not about speaking. Rather, the aim of this monk is to ask whether or not he must learn in practice, while he is speaking, simultaneously to listen. For example, he aims to hear whether speaking is just speaking, and he aims to hear whether listening itself is just listening itself. And although I express it like this, [the expression] is beyond the tongue of that monk himself. We should definitely investigate the words of the founding patriarch Tozan, “At the time when I am not speaking, then I listen.”13 In other words, just at the moment of “speaking,” there is no “simultaneous listening”14 at all. The realization of “just listening” must be at the time of “not speaking.” It is not that [Tozan] idly passes over “the time” of “not speaking,” waiting for “not speaking” [to happen]. At the moment of just listening he does not regard “speaking” as a bystander; for [“speaking”] is truly [only] a bystander.15 It is not that, at the moment of “just listening,” “speaking” has gone off and remained on one side. Nor is it that, at the moment of “speaking,” “just listening” is intimately hiding its body inside the eyes of the “speaking,” then to strike like a thunderbolt. Thus, when, in the case of the dcdrya, “the time of speaking” is “not listening” and, in the case of “I,” “the time of not speaking” is “just listening,” this state is “truly to possess the means to speak a little,” and is “to physically attain the matter of the ascendant state of buddha.” That is, for example, to physically attain the state of “at the time of speaking, just then listening.”16 For this reason [Tozan says,] “At the time when I am not speaking, just then I am listening.” Though described thus, the matter of the ascendant state of buddha is not a matter prior to the Seven Buddhas; it is the matter of the ascendant state of the Seven Buddhas.

[58]    The founding patriarch, Great Master Gohon, preaches to the assembly, “You should know that there are human beings in the ascendant state of buddha.” Then a monk asks, “What is a human being in the ascendant state of buddha?” The great master says, “A non-buddha.” Unmon17 says, “We cannot name it, and we cannot describe it, so we call it ‘non-.’” Hofuku18 says, “Buddha is ‘non-.’” Hogen19 says, “As an expedient,20 we call it ‘buddha.’”21

121c

[59]    In general, one who is a Buddhist patriarch beyond Buddhist patriarchs is the founding patriarch Tozan. The reason [I say] so is that though

other individual buddhas and individual patriarchs are numerous, they have never even dreamed of [Tozan’s] words on the ascendant state of buddha. Even if he explained it to the likes of Tokusan and Rinzai, they would not be able to realize it in their own experience. The likes of Ganto and Seppo,22 though they pulverized their own bodies,23 were unable to taste the fist [of a practical teacher]. The sayings of the founding patriarch, such as “If you physically attain the matter of the ascendant state of buddha, you will truly possess 122a the means to speak a little” and “You should know that there are human beings in the ascendant state of buddha,” cannot be mastered in real experience only through the practice-and-experience of one, two, three, four, or five24 triple-asamkheyas of hundred-great kalpas. The means are present [only] in those who have truly experienced learning in practice of the profoundly secret path. We should know that “there are human beings in the ascendant state of buddha.” [The state] is, in other words, the vigorous activity of playing with the soul.25 That being so, we can know it by taking up [the study of] eternal buddhas, and we can know it by holding up a fist. Having gained insight like this, we know “a human being in the ascendant state of having buddha,”26 and we know “a human being in the ascendant state of being without buddha.”27 The present preaching to the assembly is not that we should become a human being in the ascendant state of buddha, and not that we should meet with a human being in the ascendant state of buddha; it is simply that we should, for the present, know that there are human beings in the ascendant state of buddha. When we acquire command of this pivot-point, we “do not know”28 a human being in the ascendant state of having buddha, and we “do not know” a human being in the ascendant state of being without buddha. A human being in those ascendant states of buddha is a “non-buddha.” When prone to doubts as to what “non-buddha” is, we should consider [the following]: [“non-buddha”] is not called “non-buddha” because it is prior to the state of buddha, it is not called “non-buddha” because it is subsequent to the state of buddha, and it is not “non-buddha” because it surpasses the state of buddha. It is “non-buddha” solely because it is the ascendant state of buddha itself. We call it “non-buddha” because it has dropped off the face and eyes of a buddha and it has dropped off the body-and-mind of a buddha.

[63] Zen Master Join Koboku29 of Tokei30 (a successor of Fuyo;31 his monk’s name was Hojo) preaches to the assembly: “Once you know that

there is the matter of the ascendant state of a Buddhist patriarch, you will truly possess the means to talk. Zen friends! Now tell me, what is this matter of the ascendant state of a Buddhist patriarch? There is a child, of an [ordinary] human family, whose six sense organs32 are incomplete and whose seven kinds of consciousness33 are imperfect. He is a great icchantika,34 without the seeds of buddha-nature. When he meets buddha, he kills buddha. When he meets patriarchs, he kills patriarchs. Heaven cannot accept him, and even hell has no gate that would take him in. Monks! Do you know this person or not?” After a good while, he says, “The one facing you now is not [a man of] saindhava?5 He sleeps a lot and talks a lot in his sleep.”36

[65] This “six sense organs being incomplete” describes “someone having switched the eyeballs with black beads,37 someone having switched the nostrils with bamboo tubes, and someone having borrowed the skull to make a shit-scooper . . . what is the truth of this state of switching?”38 For this reason, “the six sense organs are incomplete.” Because of the incompleteness of his six sense organs, after passing through the inside of a furnace he has become a golden buddha, after passing through the inner depths of the great ocean he has become a mud buddha, and after passing through the inside of flame he has become a wooden buddha.39 “The seven kinds of consciousness being imperfect” describes a broken wooden dipper. Though he kills buddha, he does meet with buddha; it is because he has met with buddha that he kills buddha. If he aimed to enter heaven, heaven would collapse at once. If he made for hell, hell would be instantly torn asunder. For this reason, when he is facing [others], his face [simply] breaks [into a smile], without any trace at all of saindhava. He sleeps a lot, and talks a lot in his sleep too. Remember, the truth of this is that “all mountains, and the whole earth, both are friends who know him well; and his whole body of jewels and stone is smashed into a hundred bits and pieces.”40 We should quietly investigate and consider the preaching to the assembly of Zen Master Koboku. Do not be hasty about it.

122b

[67] Great Master Kokaku41 of Ungozan visits Founding Patriarch Tozan. [To]zan asks him, “What is the acarya's name?” Ungo says, “Doyo.” The founding patriarch asks further, “Say again, in the ascendant state.” Ungo says, “When I express it in the ascendant state, it is not named Doyo.” Tozan says, “When I was in Ungan’s42 order, our exchange was no different.”43

[68]    The present words of master and disciple we should without fail examine in detail. This “In the ascendant state it is not named Doyo,” is the ascendant state of Doyo. We should learn in practice that in what has hitherto been [called] “Doyo” there exists an ascendant state of “not being named Doyo.” Having realized the principle of “in the ascendant state not being named Doyo,” he is really Doyo. But do not say that even in the ascendant state he might be “Doyo.” Even if [Master Ungo Doyo], when he hears the

122c founding patriarch’s words “Say again in the ascendant state,” offers [another] account of his understanding, which he perfectly communicates as “In the ascendant state I am still named Doyo,” those [also] would just be words in the ascendant state. Why do I say so? Because, in a moment, Doyo springs in through his brain and conceals himself in his body. And while concealed in his body, he conspicuously reveals his figure.

[69]    Zen Master Sozan Honjaku44 visits Founding Patriarch Tozan. [To]zan asks him, “What is the acarya's name?” Sozan says, “Honjaku.” The founding patriarch says, “Say again in the ascendant state.” Sozan says, “I do not say.” The founding patriarch says, “Why do you not say?” The master says, “It is not named Honjaku.” The founding patriarch affirms this.45

[70]    To comment: in the ascendant state words are not nonexistent; they are just “I do not say.”46 “Why does he not say?” Because he is “beyond the name Honjaku.” So words in the ascendant state are “I do not say,” and “not saying” in the ascendant state is “the not named.”47 Honjaku, “not named,” is expression of the ascendant state. For this reason Honjaku is “he not named.”

So there is non-Honjaku,48 there is “the not named” that has dropped [all things] off, and there is Honjaku who has dropped [all things] off.

[71]    Zen Master Banzan Hoshaku49 says, “Even a thousand saints do not transmit the ascendant single path.”50

[71] These words “the ascendant single path” are the words of Banzan alone. He neither speaks of the matter of the ascendant state nor speaks of human beings in the ascendant state; he speaks of “a single path” as the ascendant state. The point here is that even if a thousand saints come vying head-to-head, the ascendant single path is “beyond transmission.” That it is “beyond transmission” means that a thousand saints [each] preserves an individual standing that is beyond transmission. We can study it like this. Still, there is something further to say: namely, a thousand saints and a thousand

sages are not nonexistent and yet, saints and sages though they may be, “the ascendant single path” is beyond the orbit of saints and sages.

[72]    Zen Master Koso51 of Chimonzan on one occasion is asked by a monk, “What is the matter of the ascendant state of buddha?” The master says, “The head of the staff hoists up the sun and moon.”52

[73]    To comment: the staff being inextricably bound to the sun and moon is the matter of the ascendant state of buddha. When we learn the sun and moon in practice as a staff, the whole cosmos fades away:53 this is the matter of the ascendant state of buddha. It is not that the sun and moon are a staff. “The [concreteness of the] head of the staff”54 is the whole staff.

123a

[74]    In the order of Great Master Musai of Sekito,55 Zen Master Dogo of Tennoji56 asks, “What is the Great Intent of the Buddha-Dharma?” The master says, “It is beyond attainment, beyond knowing.” Dogo says, “In the ascendant state, is there any further variation, or not?” The master says, “The wide sky does not hinder the flying of the white cloud.”57

[75]    To comment: Sekito is the second-generation descendant of Sokei.58 Master Dogo of Tennoji is Yakusan’s59 younger brother [in Sekito’s order]. On one occasion he asks, “What is the Great Intent of the Buddha-Dharma?” This question is not one with which beginners and late learners can cope. When [someone] asks about “the Great Intent,” they speak at a time when they might already have grasped “the Great Intent.” Sekito says, “It is beyond attainment, beyond knowing.” Remember, in the Buddha-Dharma “the Great Intent” exists in the very first moment of sincere mind, and “the Great Intent” exists in the ultimate state. This Great Intent is “beyond attainment.” Establishment of the mind, training, and acquiring of experience are not nonexistent: they are “beyond attainment.” This Great Intent is “beyond knowing.” Practice-and-experience is not nonexistence and practice-and-experience is not existence: it is “beyond knowing” and it is “beyond attainment.” Again, this Great Intent is “beyond attainment, beyond knowing.” The noble truths and practice-and-experience are not nonexistent: they are “beyond attainment, beyond knowing.” The noble truths and practice-and-experience are not existent: they are “beyond attainment, beyond knowing.” Dogo says, “In the ascendant state is there any further variation, or not?” If it is possible for this “variation” to be realized, the ascendant state is realized. A “variation” signifies an expedient means.60 An expedient means signifies the buddhas and the

patriarchs. In the expressing of such [expedient means], the state should be “there being [something] further.”61 Though it may be “there being something further,” at the same time “there being nothing further”62 should not be allowed to leak away but should be expressed. “The wide sky does not hinder the 123b flying of the white cloud” are the words of Sekito. “The wide sky”63 is utterly beyond hindering the wide sky, and the wide sky is beyond hindering the flying of the wide sky; at the same time, “the white cloud”64 is utterly beyond hindering itself, the white cloud. “The flying”65 of the white cloud is beyond hindrance. And the flying of the white cloud does not hinder the flying of the wide sky at all. What is beyond hindering others is beyond hindering itself. It is not necessary that individuals “do not hinder” each other, and it cannot be that individual objects “do not hinder” each other. For this reason, [each] is beyond hindrance, and [each] displays the essence and form of “the wide sky not hindering the flying of the white cloud.” At just such a moment, we raise the eyebrows of these eyes of learning in practice and glimpse a buddha coming or meet a patriarch coming. We meet ourself coming and meet the other coming. This state has been called the truth of “asking once, being answered ten times.” In the “asking once, being answered ten times” of which I now speak, [the one who] asks once must be a true person and [the one who] answers ten times must be a true person.

[78]    Obaku66 says, “People who have left family life should know that there is a state which is the matter that has come [to us] from the past. For instance, Great Master Hoyu67 of Gozu who was a pupil of the Fourth Patriarch,68 though his preaching was fluent in all directions, still never knew the pivotal matter of the ascendant state. If you have the eyes and brain of this state, you will be able to tell the false from the true among religious groups.”69

[79]    The matter that has come from the past which Obaku expresses like this is the matter that has been authentically transmitted from the past by the buddhas and the patriarchs, buddha-to -buddha and patriarch-to-patriarch. It is called “the right-Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana.” Though it is present in the self, it may be “necessary to know.”70 Though it is present in the self, it is “still never known.”71 For those who have not received the authentic transmission from buddha to buddha, it is never realized, even in a dream. Obaku, as the Dharma child of Hyakujo,72 is even more excellent than Hyakujo, and as the Dharma grandchild of Baso73 is

even more excellent than Baso. In general, among the ancestral patriarchs of [those] three or four generations, there is none who stands shoulder-to-shoulder with Obaku. Obaku is the only one to have made it clear that Gozu was missing a pair of horns;74 other Buddhist patriarchs have never known it. Zen Master Hoyu of Gozusan was a venerable master under the Fourth Patriarch. “His preaching was fluent in all directions”: truly, when we compare him with sutra teachers and commentary teachers, between the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, he is not to be seen as insufficient. Regrettably, however, he never knew the pivotal matter of the ascendant state, and he never spoke of the pivotal matter of the ascendant state. If [a person] does not know the pivotal matter that has come [to us] from the past, how could he discern the true and the false in the Buddha-Dharma? He is nothing more than a man who studies words. Thus, to know the pivotal matter of the ascendant state, to practice the pivotal matter of the ascendant state, and to experience the pivotal matter of the ascendant state are beyond the scope of ordinary folk. Wherever true effort is present, [the state] is inevitably realized. What has been called “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha” means having arrived at the state of buddha, progressing on and meeting buddha75 again. It is just the same state as that in which ordinary people meet buddha. That being so, if meeting buddha is on the level of ordinary people’s meeting buddha,76 it is not meeting buddha. If meeting buddha is like ordinary people’s meeting buddha, meeting buddha is an illusion. How much less could it be the matter of the ascendant state of buddha? Remember, the matter of the ascendant state of which Obaku speaks is beyond the comprehension of the unreliable people of today. To be sure, there are those whose expressions of Dharma are below the level of Hoyu, and there are the occasional few whose expressions of Dharma are equal to Hoyu, but they [all] may be Hoyu’s older and younger brothers in Dharma; how could they know the pivotal matter of the ascendant state? Others, such as [bodhisattvas in] the ten sacred stages and three clever stages, do not know the pivotal matter of the ascendant state at all. How much less could they open and close the pivotal matter of the ascendant state? This point is the very eyes of learning in practice. Those who know the pivotal matter of the ascendant state are called human beings in the ascendant state of buddha; they physically attain the matter of the ascendant state of buddha.

123c

Preached to the assembly at Kannondorikosho-horinji on the twenty-third day of the third lunar month in the third year of Ninji.77

Notes

1    Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869). Great Master Gohon    is his posthumous title.

2    A district of Jiangxi province in southeast China.

3    Master Ungan Donjo (782-841), successor of Master Yakusan Igen. Great Master Muju is his posthumous title.

4    A district in Hunan province in southeast China.

5    Kojo, as in the title of the chapter.

6    Shinji-shobogenzd, pt. 1, no. 12; Keitokudentoroku, chapter    15. Master Tozan,s words

are also discussed in the chapter entitled Butsu-kojo-no-ji    contained in the twenty-

eight-chapter Himitsu-shobogenzo (see Vol. IV, Appendix One, Editions of the Shobo-genzo).

7    Gowa represents concrete action.

8    Fumon, “not listening” or “being beyond listening,” is an    expression of the state of

buddha itself.

9    Hojin, “meeting a person,” and fuhojin, “not meeting a person” (see the end of paragraph 40 in Chapter Twenty-seven, Zazenshin), are both descriptions of the state of realization. The formula “A-not-A” suggests transcendence of both affirmative and negative expressions.

10    Inmo-fu-inmo alludes to the words of Master Sekito Kisen. See Chapter Twenty-nine, Inmo.

11    Zetsu-kotsu, literally, “tongue-bone.”

12    Jiri, literally, “the inside of the ears.”

13 Waga-fugowa [no] ji [o] ma[tsu], sunawa[chi] ki[kan], literally, “Waiting for my time of not speaking, then I will listen.” The usage of matsu is discussed in Chapter Thirty-five, Hakujushi.

14    Sokumon. Soku, sunawa[chi] can function as an adjective, “simultaneous,” “instantaneous,” or as an adverb “immediately” or “just.” In Master Tozan5s words, as an adverb, sunawa[chi] means “just then.”

15    Bdkan, “onlooker,” means a party who is not involved in the action, or who is irrelevant. Master Tozan is living in the moment of the present, and so when he is just listening his own speaking is forgotten.

16    Up to here Master Dogen has described the state at the moment of the present in terms of the independence of speaking and listening. Here his description is opposite: he describes both speaking and listening occurring in the same moment. The reversal suggests the difficulty of describing the state in words.

17    Master Unmon Bun’en (864-949), a successor of Master Seppo Gison.

18    Master Hofuku Juten (?-928), also a successor of Master Seppo Gison.

19    Master Hogen Bun’eki (885-958), successor of Master Rakan Keichin.

20    Hoben, from the Sanskrit updya, as in the title of the second chapter of the Lotus Sutra. The chapter explains that the Buddha used expedient methods, or skillful means—for example, parables—to teach what is impossible to teach directly.

21    A slightly different version is recorded in the Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 72.

22    Master Ganto Zenkatsu (828-887) and Master Seppo Gison (822-907) were both successors of Master Tokusan Senkan (780-865). Although Master Dogen often praised Master Seppo, he was sometimes critical of Master Tokusan Senkan (see, for example, Chapters Eighteen and Nineteen [Vol. I], Shin-fukatoku). In general, Master Dogen naturally revered his own lineage, which passed from Master Sekito Kisen (700-790) to Master Tozan Ryokai, more than other lineages—such as the lineage that passed from Master Sekito to Master Tokusan, or the lineage that passed from Master Nangaku Ejo to Master Rinzai.

23    Symbolizing dogged effort in pursuit of the truth.

24    In the Tenzokyokun (Instructions for the Cook), Master Dogen relates the story of how he asked the chief cook of the temple on Mount Ikuo, “What are written characters?” The cook replied “One, two, three, four, five.” The question invited a more abstract explanation, but the cook simply gave the most basic examples of written Chinese characters, for the numerals 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5.

25    Rozeikon means action in the state that is free of body and mind. In Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge, Master Dogen says that rozeikon means just sitting in zazen and dropping off body and mind.

26    U-butsu-kojo-nin. The same five characters appear in Master Tozan’s words, but by using the object particle “o ” instead of the quotation particle “to ” before the verb shiru (to know), Master Dogen changed the meaning of u, a[ru]. In Master Tozan’s words a[ru] means “there are.” Here u, “having” or “existence,” forms a compound with butsu. The concept u-butsu, “having buddha[-nature]” or “the real state of buddha, which is existence,” is explained in Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho.

27    Mubutsu-kojo-nin. Mubutsu, “being without buddha[-nature]” or “the real state of buddha, which is being without,” is also explained in detail in Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho. In the context of this chapter, “being without buddha” describes a buddha who is without self-consciousness of being a buddha.

28    Fu-chi suru means not to know intellectually, or to transcend intellectual understanding.

29    Master Koboku Hojo, (1071-1128).

30    In present-day Hunan province in east central China.

31    Master Fuyo Dokai (1043-1118), successor of Master Tosu Gisei and the forty-fifth patriarch in Master Dogen,s lineage.

32    Rokkon: eyes, ears, nose, tongue, skin, and mind.

33    Shichi-shiki. The first five kinds of consciousness correspond to the consciousnesses of eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin. The sixth and seventh can be interpreted as centers of proprioception (motor sense) and intellectual thought, respectively.

34    The Sanskrit word icchantika means “one who pursues desires to the end,” and therefore who has no interest in pursuing the truth (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). Here Master Koboku suggests transcendence of intentional, or intellectual, pursuit of the truth.

35    The Sanskrit word saindhava means “products of the Indus valley.” A parable in the Mahdparinirvdna-sutra tells of an intelligent servant who can guess which product— salt, a bowl, water, or a horse—the king wants, on hearing only the king’s request of “saindhava•” Hence, a person of saindhava means someone who is quick and sensitive. See Chapter Eighty-one (Vol. IV), O-saku-sendaba.

36    Kataifutoroku, chapter 5; Rentoeyo, chapter 29.

37    Having black beads for eyeballs represents the state of non-emotion. “Black beads” refers to the stone of the fruit of Aphananthe aspera (called muku no ki in Japanese). These stones, which are hard and black, were used as rosary beads. Aphananthe aspera is a large spreading tree, with big leaves resembling those of wisteria; in summer it produces yellow and white blossoms.

38    The phrases in quotemarks are in the form of a quotation from Chinese, but the source has not been traced.

39    A golden buddha is an ideal image, a mud buddha is a non-ideal image, and a wooden buddha is an everyday common object.

40    Gyokuseki-zenshin, “the whole body of jewels and stones,” suggests the ascendant state of buddha as the combination of invaluable buddha-nature like jewels, and physical matter like stones. Hyaku-zassai, “smashed into a hundred bits and pieces,” is Master Gensha’s description of the eternal mirror manifesting concrete, real forms as they are (see Chapter Twenty [Vol. I], Kokyo).

41    Master Ungo Doyo (?-902), successor of Master Tozan and the thirty-ninth patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage. Great Master Kokaku is his posthumous title.

42    Master Ungan Donjo (782-841), successor of Master Yakusan Igen and the thirty-seventh patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage.

43    Keitokuden toroku, chapter 17.

44    Master Sozan Honjaku (840-901), a successor of Master Tozan. His posthumous title is Great Master Gensho.

45    Keitokuden toroku, chapter 17.

46    Fudo, i[wa]zu. The original words have no subject. They can be interpreted either as “I do/will not say” or as “it is beyond words.”

47    Fumyo, nazu[ke]zu in the story means “is not named,” but here suggests that which cannot be named, the ineffable state. Not to say anything, in the case of buddha, is the ineffable state.

48    Hi-honjaku, as in hi-butsu, “non-buddha,” in paragraph 58.

49    Master Banzan Hoshaku (dates unknown), successor of Master Baso Doitsu (709788). His posthumous title is Great Master Gyojaku.

50    Keitokuden toroku, chapter 7.

51    Master Chimon Koso (dates unknown), successor of Master Kyorin Choon and a seventh-generation descendant of Master Seigen Gyoshi. Master Setcho Juken was a later master in Master Chimon’s lineage.

52    The Bukkagekisetsuroku, last volume, chapter 4, no. 7. This record contains Master Engo Kokugon’s discussions of Master Setcho Juken’s eulogies of past masters.

53    Jinkenkon kurashi. Jin means all or whole. Kenkon means northwest and southwest, representing all points of the compass. Kurashi literally means to be dark. When we find the reality of concrete things, abstract inclusive concepts (such as “the whole cosmos”) fade away.

54    Shujd-tdjo. Shujo means “staff.” To means “head” and at the same time it is a symbol of a concrete thing. Jo means “upper” and also “on the basis of.,,So shujd-tdjo suggests the concrete top of the staff, or the staff on the basis of concreteness.

55    Master Sekito Kisen (700-790), successor of Master Seigen Gyoshi and thirty-fifth patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage. Great Master Musai is his posthumous title. Sekito (lit., “on top of the rock”)is the place where he built a hut.

56    Master Tenno Dogo (748-807), a successor of Master Sekito. He became a monk at the age of twenty-five. He was first a disciple of Master Kinzan Kokuitsu, then of Master Baso Doitsu, before eventually entering Master Sekito’s order.

57    Keitokuden toroku, chapter 14; Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 2 no. 91.

58    Master Daikan Eno (638-713), who transmitted the Dharma to Master Seigen Gyoshi (660-740), who transmitted the Dharma to Master Sekito.

59    Master Yakusan Igen (745-828) was, like Master Dogo, a successor of Master Seki-to Kisen.

60    Hoben. See note 20.

61    Ko-u. In Master Dogo’s words, these characters mean “is there . . . further.”

62    Ko-mu. In Master Dogo’s words, these characters mean “further .. . or not.” Master Dogen described the same state from two sides.

63    Choku, lit., “long sky,” represents the subject.

64    Hakuun, “white cloud,” represents the object.

65    Hi, “flying,” represents action.

66    Master Obaku Kiun (d. ca. 855), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai. He authored a book called Denshinhoyo (The Pivot of Dharma on Transmission of the Mind). His posthumous title is Zen Master Dansai.

67    Master Gozu Hoyu (594-657). He lived and practiced zazen on Gozusan, and is said to have realized the truth when Master Daii Doshin, the Fourth Patriarch, visited him there.

68    Master Daii Doshin (580-651), successor of Master Kanchi Sosan.

69    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 9.

70    Suchi. In Master Obaku’s words, read as subekara[ku] shi[rubeshi], these characters mean “you should know.” They express a state that must be realized through effort.

71    In other words, it is beyond intellectual recognition.

72    Master Hyakujo Ekai (749-814), successor of Master Baso Doitsu.

73    Master Baso Doitsu (709-788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejo.

74    Gozu is literally “Bull’s Head.”

75    Kenbutsu, “meeting buddha,” is described in Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Kenbutsu, as the state of living in reality.

76    Ordinary people are living in reality, but they understand meeting buddha as something other than simply living in reality. In that sense, they are not living in reality. In other words, their meeting buddha is not really meeting buddha.

77    1242.

[Chapter Twenty-nine]

Inmo

It

Translator’s Note: Inmo is a colloquial word in Chinese, meaning “it,,’ “that,,’ or “what.,’ We usually use the words “it,,’ “that,,’ or “what,’ to indicate something we do not need to explain. Therefore Buddhist philosophers in China used the word inmo to suggest something ineffable. At the same time, one of the aims of studying Buddhism is to realize reality, and according to Buddhist philosophy, reality is something ineffable. So the word inmo was used to indicate the truth, or reality, which in Buddhist philosophy is originally ineffable. In this chapter Master Dogen explained the meaning of inmo, quoting the words of Master Ungo Doyo, Master Samghanandi, Master Daikan End, Master Sekito Kisen, and others.

[85] Great Master Kokaku1 of Ungozan is the rightful heir of Tozan,2 is the thirty-ninth-generation Dharma descendant of Sakyamuni Buddha, and is the authentic patriarch of Tozan’s lineage. “One day he preaches to the assembly, ‘If you want to attain the matter that is it,3 you must be a person who is it. Already being a person who is it, why worry about the matter that is it?’”4 [86] In other words, those who want to attain “the matter that is it” must themselves be “people who are it.” They are already “people who are it”: why should they worry about [attaining] “the matter that is it”?5 The point of this is that “directing oneself straight for the supreme truth of bodhi” is described, for the present, as “it.”6 The situation of this supreme truth of bodhi is such that even the whole universe in ten directions is just a small part of the supreme truth of bodhi: it may be that the truth of bodhi abounds beyond the universe. We ourselves are tools that it possesses within this universe in ten directions. How do we know that it exists? We know it is so because the body and the mind both appear in the universe, yet neither is ourself. The body, already, is not “I.” Its life moves on through days and months, and we cannot stop it even for an instant. Where have the red faces

[of our youth] gone? When we look for them, they have vanished without a trace. When we reflect carefully, there are many things in the past that we 124b will never meet again. The sincere mind,7 too, does not stop, but goes and comes moment by moment. Although the state of sincerity does exist, it is not something that lingers in the vicinity of the personal self. Even so, there is something that, in the limitlessness, establishes the [bodhi-]mind. Once this mind is established, abandoning our former playthings we hope to hear what we have not heard before and we seek to experience what we have not experienced before: this is not solely of our own doing. Remember, it happens like this because we are “people who are it.” How do we know that we are “people who are it”? We know that we are “people who are it” just from the fact that we want to attain “the matter that is it.” Already we possess the real features of a “person who is it”; we should not worry about the already-present “matter that is it.” Even worry itself is just “the matter that is it,” and so it is beyond worry. Again, we should not be surprised that “the matter that is it” is present in such a state. Even if “it” is the object of surprise and wonderment, it is still just “it.” And there is “it” about which we should not be surprised. This state cannot be fathomed even by the consideration of buddha, it cannot be fathomed by the consideration of the mind, it cannot be fathomed by the consideration of the Dharma world, and it cannot be fathomed by the consideration of the whole universe. It can only be described “Already you are a person who is it: why worry about [attaining] the matter that is it?” Thus, the “suchness” of sound and form may be “it”; the “suchness” of body-and-mind may be “it”; and the “suchness” of the buddhas may be “it.” For example, the time of “falling down on the ground”8 we understand, as it is, as “it”; and at the very moment, when we “get up, inevitably relying on the ground,” we do not wonder that the “falling down” was “on the ground.” There are words that have been spoken since ancient times, have been spoken from the Western Heavens, and have been spoken from the 124c heavens above. They are: “If we fall down on the ground, we get up again on the ground. If we seek to get up apart from the ground, that is, in the end, impossible.”9 In other words, those who fall down on the ground inevitably get up on the ground, and if they want to get up without relying on the ground, they can never do so at all. Taking up what is described thus, we have seen it as the beginning of attainment of great realization, and we have made it

into the state of truth that sheds body and mind. Therefore, if someone asks “What is the principle of the buddhas’ realization of the truth?” we say “It is like someone who falls to the ground getting up on the ground.” Mastering this [principle], we should penetrate and clarify the past, we should penetrate and clarify the future, and we should penetrate and clarify the very moment of the present.10 “Great realization and nonrealization; returning to delusion and losing the state of delusion; being restricted by realization itself and being restricted by delusion itself”: each of these is the truth that someone who falls to the ground gets up relying on the ground. It is an expression of the truth in the heavens above and everywhere under the heavens, is an expression of the truth in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, is an expression of the truth in the past, present, and future, and is an expression of the truth of old buddhas and new buddhas. This expression of the truth is never imperfect in expression, and it does not lack anything in expression. Even so, it seems [to me] that only to understand the words like that, without also understanding them in a way which is not like that, is to fail to master these words. Although the expression of the truth of an eternal buddha has been transmitted like that, still, when [eternal buddha] listens as eternal buddha to the words of the eternal buddha, there should be an ascendant state of listening. Though never spoken in the Western Heavens and never spoken in the heavens above, there is another truth to be expressed. It is that if those who fall down on the ground seek to get up by relying on the ground, even if they spend countless kalpas, they will never be able to get up. They can get up by means of just one vigorous path. That is, those who fall down through reliance on the ground inevitably get up relying on the void,11 and those who fall down through reliance on the void inevitably get up by relying on the ground. Unless it is like this, getting up will, in the end, be impossible. The buddhas and the patriarchs were all like this. Suppose a person asks a question like this: “How far apart are the void and the ground?” If someone asks a question like this, we should answer that person like this: “The void and the ground are one hundred and eight thousand miles12 apart! “When we fall down through reliance on the ground, we inevitably get up relying on the void, and if we seek to get up apart from the void, it will be impossible at last. When we fall down through reliance on the void, we inevitably get up by relying on the ground, and if we seek to get up apart from the ground,

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it will be impossible at last.” Someone who has never spoken such words has never known, and has never seen, the dimensions of the ground and the void in Buddhism.

[93]    The seventeenth ancestral patriarch, Venerable Samghanandi,13 whose Dharma successor in due course is Geyasata,14 on one occasion hears bells hung in a hall ringing when blown by the wind; and he asks Geyasata, “Is it the sound of the wind? Is it the sound of the bells?” Geyasata says, “It is beyond the ringing of the wind and beyond the ringing of the bells, it is the ringing of my mind.” Venerable Samghanandi says, “Then what is the mind?” Geyasata says, “The reason [it is ringing] is that all is still.” Venerable Samghanandi says, “Excellent! Excellent! Who else but you, disciple, could succeed to my truth.” Eventually, he transmits [to Geyasata] the right-Dharma-eye treasury.15

[94]    Here, in the state beyond the ringing of the wind, we learn “my 125b mind ringing.” In the time beyond the ringing of the bells, we learn “my

mind ringing.” “My mind ringing” is “it”; at the same time, “all is still.” Transmitted from the Western Heavens to the Eastern Lands, from ancient times to the present day, this story has been seen as a standard for learning the truth, but many people have misunderstood it [as follows]: “Geyasata’s words ‘It is neither the ringing of the wind nor the ringing of the bells, it is the ringing of the mind’ mean that there is in the listener, at just the moment of the present, the occurrence of mindfulness, and this occurrence of mindfulness is called ‘the mind. ’ If this mindfulness did not exist, how could the sound of ringing be recognized as a circumstance? Hearing is realized through this mindfulness, which may be called the root of hearing, and so he says ‘the mind is ringing.’...”

This is wrong understanding. It is like this because it is devoid of the influence of a true teacher. For example, it is like interpretations by commentary teachers on “subjectivism”16 and “proximity.”17 [Interpretation] like this is not profound learning of the Buddha’s truth. Among those who have learned under rightful successors to the Buddha’s truth, on the other hand, the supreme state of bodhi and the right-Dharma-eye treasury are called “stillness,” are called “being free of doing,” are called “samMhi,” and are called “dharanT” The principle is that if only one dharma is still, the ten thousand dharmas are all still. The blowing of the wind being still, the ringing of

the bells is still, and for this reason he says “all is still.” He is saying that “the mind ringing” is beyond the ringing of the wind, “the mind ringing” is beyond the ringing of the bells, and “the mind ringing” is beyond the ringing of the mind.18 Having pursued to the ultimate the close and direct state like this, we may then go on to say that it is “the wind ringing,” it is “the bells ringing,” it is “the blowing ringing,” and it is “the ringing ringing.” The state like this exists not on the basis of “Why should we worry about the matter that is it?” It is like this because “How can the matter that is it be related [to anything]?”19

[97]    The thirty-third patriarch, Zen Master Daikan,20 before having his head shaved, is lodging at Hosshoji in Koshu. Two monks there are having a discussion. One monk says, “The flag is moving.” The other monk says, “The wind is moving.” As the discussion goes endlessly back and forth like this, the Sixth Patriarch says, “It is beyond the wind moving and beyond the flag moving. You are the mind moving.”21 Hearing this, the two monks are instantly convinced.22

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[98]    These two monks had come from India. With these words, then, the Sixth Patriarch is saying that “the wind” and “the flag” and “the moving” all exist as “the mind.” Even today, although [people] hear the Sixth Patriarch’s words they do not know the Sixth Patriarch’s words: how much less could they express the Sixth Patriarch’s expression of the truth? Why do I say so? Because, hearing the words “you are the mind moving,” to say that “you are the mind moving” just means “your minds are moving,” is not to see the Sixth Patriarch, is not to know the Sixth Patriarch, and is not to be the Dharma descendants of the Sixth Patriarch. Now, as the children and grandchildren of the Sixth Patriarch, speaking the truth of the Sixth Patriarch, speaking with the physical body, hair, and skin of the Sixth Patriarch, we should say as follows: The words “You are the mind moving” are fine as they are, but we could also express it as “You are moving.” Why do we say so? Because “what is moving” is “moving,” and because “you” are “you.” We say so because “[you] already are people who are it.”

[99]    In his former days the Sixth Patriarch is a woodsman in Shinshu. He knows the mountains well and knows the waters well. Through his effort under the green pines he has eradicated roots, but how could he know of the eternal teachings that illuminate the mind, when one is at one’s ease, by a

bright window?23 Under whom could he learn cleaning and sweeping? In 126a the marketplace he hears a sutra: this is not something that he himself has expected, nor is it at the encouragement of anyone else. Having lost his father as a child, he has grown up looking after his mother, never knowing that in his [woodsman’s] coat lies hidden a pearl that will light up the cosmos. Suddenly illuminated [by the Diamond Sutra], he leaves his old mother and goes in search of a counselor—it is an example of behavior rare among men. Who can make light of kindness and love? [But] attaching weight to the Dharma, he makes light of his debt of gratitude and so is able to abandon it. This is just the truth of “Those who have wisdom, if they hear [the Dhar-ma],/Are able to believe and understand at once.”24 This “wisdom” is neither learned from other people nor established by oneself: wisdom is able to transmit wisdom, and wisdom directly searches out wisdom. In the case of the five hundred bats,25 wisdom naturally consumes their bodies: they have no body and no mind [of their own] at all. In the case of the ten thousand swimming fishes,26 due neither to circumstances nor to causes, but because wisdom is intimately present in their bodies, when they hear the Dharma they “understand at once.” It is beyond coming and beyond entering: it is like the spirit of spring27 meeting springtime, for example. Wisdom is beyond intention and wisdom is beyond no intention. Wisdom is beyond consciousness and wisdom is beyond unconsciousness. How much less could it be related to the great and the small? How much less could it be discussed in terms of delusion and realization? The point is that although [the Sixth Patriarch] does not even know what the Buddha-Dharma is, never having heard it before and so neither longing for it nor aspiring to it, when he hears the Dharma he makes light of his debt of gratitude and forgets his own body; and such things happen because the body-and-mind of “those who have wisdom” is already not their own. This is the state called “able to believe and understand at once.” No one knows how many rounds of life-and-death [people] spend, even while 126b possessing this wisdom, in futile dusty toil. They are like a stone enveloping a jewel,28 the jewel not knowing that it is enveloped by a stone, and the stone not knowing that it is enveloping a jewel. [When] a human being recognizes this [jewel], a human being seizes it. This is neither something that the jewel is expecting nor something that the stone is awaiting: it does not require knowledge from the stone and it is beyond thinking by the jewel.29 In other

words, a human being and wisdom do not know each other, but it seems that the truth is unfailingly discerned by wisdom. There are the words, “Those who are without wisdom doubt,/Thus losing it forever.”30 “Wisdom” is not necessarily related to “having” and “wisdom” is not necessarily related to “being without”; at the same time, there is “existence”31 in the spring pines at one moment, and there is [the real state of] “being without”32 as the autumn chrysanthemums. At the moment of this “wisdom” as “being without,”33 the whole truth of sambodhi34 becomes “doubt,” and all dharmas are “doubt.”35 And at this moment, “to lose forever is just to act.”36 Words that should be heard, and Dharma that should be experienced, are totally “doubt.” The entire world, which is not me, has no hidden place; it is a single iron track, which is not anyone, for ten thousand miles.37 While, in this way, twigs bud, “In the buddha lands of the ten directions,/There only exists the One-Vehicle Dharma.”38 And while, in this way, leaves fall, “The Dharma abides in its place in the Dharma,/And the form of the world is constantly abiding.”39 Because “this already exists”40 as “the matter that is it,” it exists in “having wisdom” and in “being without wisdom,” and it exists as the face of the sun and as the face of the moon. Because he is “a person who is it,” the Sixth Patriarch is illuminated. Consequently, he goes directly to Obaizan and prostrates himself to Zen Master Daiman,41 who lodges him in the servants’ hall. He pounds rice through the night for eight short months, then once, late into the night, Daiman himself secretly enters the pounding room and asks the Sixth Patriarch, “Is the rice white yet or not?” The Sixth Patriarch says, “It is white, but not yet sifted.” Daiman pounds the mortar three times, and the Sixth Patriarch sifts the rice in the winnowing basket three times. This is said to be the time when the state of truth becomes consonant between master and disciple. They do not know it themselves, and it is beyond the understanding of others, but the transmission of the Dharma and the transmission of the robe are just at “that” exact moment.

[105] Great Master Musai42 of Nangakuzan, on one occasion, is asked by Yakusan,43 “The three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching44 I roughly know. [But] I have heard that in the south there is direct pointing at the human mind, realizing the nature and becoming buddha. Frankly, I have not clarified [this] yet. I beg you, Master, out of compassion, to teach me.”45

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[106] This is Yakusan’s question. Yakusan in the past had been a lecturer; he had thoroughly understood the meaning of the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching. So it seems there was no Buddha-Dharma at all that was unclear to him. In those days different sects were never established; just to clarify the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching was accepted as the customary way of learning the teaching. That many people today, out of stupidity, individually establish principles and suppose the Buddha-Dharma, is not the legitimate standard in Buddhism. The great master says, “To be like that is impossible.46 Not to be like that is impossible. To be like that or not to be like that is altogether impossible. What do you make of it?” These are the words spoken by the great master for Yakusan. Truly, because “to be like that or not to be like that is altogether impossible,” “to be like that is impossible” and “not to be like that is impossible.” “Like that” describes “it.” It is not [a matter of] the limited usefulness of words and not [a matter of] the unlimited usefulness of words: we should learn “it” in the state of impossibility, and we should inquire into “impossibility” in the state of “it.” It is not that this concrete “it,” and “the impossible,” are 127a relevant only to the consideration of buddhas. To understand it is impossible. To realize it is impossible.

[108] Zen Master Daikan47 of Sokeizan, on one occasion, teaches Zen Master Daie48 of Nangaku, “This is something49 coming like this.”50 These words say that being like this is beyond doubt, for it is beyond understanding. Because “this is something,” we should realize in experience that all the myriad things are truly “something.” We should realize in experience that every single thing is truly “something.” “Something” is not open to doubt: “it comes like this.”

Shobogenzo Inmo

Preached to the assembly at Kannondorikosho-horinji on the twenty-sixth day of the third lunar month in the third year of Ninji.51

Notes

1    Master Ungo Doyo (?-902). Great Master Kokaku is his posthumous title.

2    Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869), successor of Master Ungan Donjo.

3    Inmo [no] ji, or “the matter of the ineffable.” Master Dogen uses these words of Master Ungo Doyo in the Fukanzazengi.

4    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 17.

5    In these sentences Master Dogen explained the Chinese characters of the story using a combination of Chinese characters (in quotemarks) and Japanese kana.

6    Inmo is used not only as a noun representing the state that is the subject of the chapter (“it,” “suchness,” “the ineffable”), but also as a common adverb, adjective, or pronoun (“so,” “like this,” “like that,” “such,” “such a state,” “as it is,” “the very [moment],” “in such a way,” “thus,” etc.); many instances of these latter cases of the term inmo occur throughout this chapter. Though in some sense incidental, this frequent usage has the effect of emphasizing the inconspicuous, ever-present, and normal nature of the state Master Dogen is describing.

7    Sekishin, lit., “red mind,” means naked mind or sincere mind.

8    Chi [ni] _yo[rite] taoruru mono originates in the words of Master Upagupta, the fourth patriarch in India. The Saiikiki (History of Western Lands), a widely-read Chinese book on the history of countries west of China, contains the following: Vasubandhu, (the twenty-first patriarch) first made fun of the Mahayana on the basis of the Hinayana. His elder brother, Asanga, pretended to be sick in order to get Vasubandhu to visit him, and then he opened [a sutra of] Mahayana teachings and said, “Someone who disparages what he has not read is a non-Buddhist.” So Vasubandhu tried reading the Garland Sutras, and he was convinced by them. He joked, “I should cut off my tongue with a sword to atone for my wrongness.” Asanga said, “Someone who falls down on the ground also stands up relying on the ground. The tongue that slandered in the past can sing the praises of the state of repentance that you have now.” Eventually [Vasubandhu] went into the mountains, opened and read [the teachings of] the Mahayana, and made the Jujiron (Commentary on the Ten States).

Master Dogen picked up the words to explain the ineffable state of reality as a very concrete situation in daily life. The ground symbolizes that which is concrete.

9    Direct quotation of Master Upagupta’s words from the Keitokuden toroku, chapter 1.

10    Shoto-inmo-ji, “at this very moment” or “at just such a moment,” is a phrase that appears in most chapters of the Shobogenzo.

11    Ku means “emptiness,” “space,” “the immaterial,” “bareness,” “the sky,” etc. In this context, ku, “the void,” means that which is devoid of material substance, the immaterial—in other words, ideas—as opposed to chi, “the ground” which represents the concrete, that which has material substance.

12    Juman-hassen-ri. One ri is equal to 2.44 miles. We are expecting a philosophical answer, so Master Dogen surprises us with a big concrete distance.

13    Master Samghanandi, successor of Master Rahulabhadra.

14    Master Geyasata, the eighteenth patriarch in India.

15    The original story (written in Chinese characters only) is quoted in the Keitokuden-toroku, chapter 2. This is an indirect quotation written in Japanese.

16    Eshu, lit., “reliance on the subject,” is one of the roku-rigo-shaku, or “six interpretations of separation and synthesis.”

17    Ringon, “proximity,” is another of the six interpretations. In contrast to the subjective method of interpretation, it proceeds opportunistically by examining objective facts close at hand.

18    Shinmei, “the mind ringing,” is a direct suggestion of the state of reality in zazen— in which there is no separation of agent and action.

19    Master Dogen replaced ure[en], “worry about getting,” in Master Ungo’s words with kan[sen], “be related with.” Master Ungo’s words include a denial of subjective attempts to relate to the state. Master Dogen went one step further and suggested that the state described by Master Geyasata transcends all relations.

20    Master Daikan Eno (638-713), successor of Master Daiman Konin. Master Daikan Eno is the thirty-third patriarch counting Master Mahakasyapa as the first, and the Sixth Patriarch counting Master Bodhidharma as the First Patriarch in China. He is usually called the Sixth Patriarch.

21    Jinsha shindo. In Master Dogen’s interpretation, these characters mean “you are the mind moving”—a description of the reality that is the mind. The alternative interpretation is that jinsha shindo means “your minds are moving”—a criticism of the monks.

22    Tenshokotoroku, chapter 7.

23    A bright window suggests a good place for reading sutras. Master Daikan Eno was free of wrongness and illusions, but he was not familiar with verbal Buddhist teaching and he did not have a human teacher.

24    The Lotus Sutra, Yakuso-yu (“Parable of the Herbs”): The Dharma King who breaks “existence,”/Appears in the world/And according to the wants of living beings,/

Preaches the Dharma in many ways... ./The wise if they hear it,/Are able to believe and understand at once,/The unwise doubt and grieve,/Thus losing it forever. (LS 1.272.)

25    The Saiikiki tells the tale of a merchant who, passing near the southern sea, stayed the night at the foot of a big withered tree. He lit a fire because it was cold, and began to read the Abidharma commentaries. The fire set light to the tree, but five hundred bats inside the tree chose to burn to death rather than to miss hearing the reading of the Abidharma.

26    In Hoku Ryo ’s (Northern Liang dynasty) translation of the Konkomydkyo, ten thousand fishes who heard the reading of a Buddhist sutra were reborn as angels in Tusita Heaven.

27    Tokun, lit., “Eastern Lord,” is the god of spring. The spirit of spring meeting spring suggests a fact at one moment of the present, as opposed to a process.

28    The jewel symbolizes wisdom and the stone symbolizes the layers of interference that surround the state of wisdom.

29    Realization in zazen, for example, is the innate function of a human being; it is prior to learned mental faculties such as expectation, knowledge, and thinking.

30    Lotus Sutra, Yakuso-yu (LS 1.272). The edition of the Lotus Sutra (Hokkekyo) published by Iwanami has gike, “doubt and grieve,” but here Master Dogen has written gike, “doubt and wonder,” or “doubt.”

31    U in the phrase uchi means “having [wisdom],” but here it means real existence.

32    Mu in the phrase muchi means “being without [wisdom],” but here it means the real state that is called mu, “being without.” See also Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho.

33    Muchi. In the Lotus Sutra mu is a preposition, “without,” and chi is a noun, “wisdom”; but in Master Dogen’s interpretation mu and chi are two nouns in apposition: “the state of being without, wisdom.”

34    The Sanskrit word sambodhi means the inclusive and integrated state of truth.

35    “Doubt” here suggests the truth as the unknown.

36    The Lotus Sutra says sunawa[chi] kore yo-shitsu, literally, “which is to lose forever.” Master Dogen changed the order of the characters, saying yo-shitsu soku i, “to lose forever is just to act”to be rid of all hindrances is the state of just sitting.

37    Banri-ichijotetsu, “a single iron track for ten thousand miles,” means a unified entity.

38    Lotus Sutra, Hoben (“Expedient Means”). See LS 1.106. “Twigs bud” suggests the manifestation of miscellaneous concrete phenomena, which is opposed to the eternal situation of the Dharma described in the Lotus Sutra.

39    ILotus Sutra, Hoben (“Expedient Means”). See LS 1.120.

Kize, as in Master Ungo’s words “Already being [a person who is it]....”

Master Daiman Konin (688-761), successor of Master Daii Doshin and the Fifth Patriarch in China.

Master Sekito Kisen (700-790), successor of Master Seigen Gyoshi.

Master Yakusan Igen (745-828), successor of Master Sekito Kisen.

Sanjo junibun-kyo, the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching, are explained in detail in Chapter Twenty-four, Bukkyo.

Rentoeyo, chapter 19.

Inmo-futoku.

Master Daikan Eno (638-713), the Sixth Patriarch.

Master Nangaku Ejo (677-744), successor of Master Daikan Eno.

Shimo-butsu. Shimo means “what” and butsu means “thing.” Master Daikan Eno’s

What is it that comes like this?”

be interpreted as a question: chapter 8; Shinji-shobogenzo,

words can also Tenshdkotoroku, 1242.

pt. 2, no. 1.

[Chapter Thirty]

Gydji

[Pure] Conduct and Observance [of Precepts]

Part One

Translator's Note: Gyo means deeds, actions, or conduct; ji means observance of precepts. So gyoji means “pure conduct and observance of precepts.,’ In short, we can say that Buddhism is a religion of action. Gautama Buddha recognized the importance of action in our life, and he established an ultimate philosophy dependent on action. In sum, the solution to all problems relies upon the philosophy of action, and therefore Master Dogen esteemed action highly. In this chapter he quoted many examples of pure conduct and observance of precepts by buddhas and patriarchs. The contents of this chapter are thus very concrete, and encourage us in practicing our Buddhist life and observing the Buddhist precepts.

[111] In the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, there is always [pure] conduct and observance [of precepts]1 above which there is nothing. It continues in an unbroken cycle, so that there is not the slightest interval between establishment of the mind, training, bodhi, and nirvana: conduct and observance is a continuing cycle. For this reason, it is not doing that is forced from ourselves and it is not doing that is forced from outside; it is conduct and observance that “has never been tainted.”2 The virtue of this conduct and observance maintains ourselves and maintains the external world. The import is that in the moment of my conduct and observance the whole earth and whole sky through the ten directions are totally covered by the virtue [of my conduct and observance]. Others do not know it, and I do not know it, but it is so. Thus, through the conduct and observance of the buddhas and the patriarchs, our own conduct and observance is realized and our own great state of truth is penetrated; and through our conduct and observance, the conduct and

127b observance of the buddhas is realized and the buddhas’ great state of truth is penetrated. It is due to our own conduct and observance that the virtue of this cycle exists. Through this means, every buddha and every patriarch abides as buddha, transcends as buddha, realizes the mind as buddha, and is realized as buddha, without any interruption. Through this conduct and observance, the sun, moon, and stars exist; through this conduct and observance, the earth and space exist; through this conduct and observance, object-and-subject, body-and-mind exist; through this conduct and observance, the four elements and five aggregates exist. Conduct and observance is not loved by worldly people but it may be the real refuge of all human beings. Through the conduct and observance of the buddhas of the past, present, and future, the buddhas of the past, present, and future are realized. Sometimes the virtue of this conduct and observance is evident, so the will arises, and we practice it. Sometimes this virtue is not apparent, so we neither see, nor hear, nor sense it. Although it is not apparent, we should learn in experience that it is not concealed—for it is not tainted by concealment and revelation or by continuance and disappearance. That, in the actual hiddenness of the present moment, we do not understand what dependently originated dharmas there are in the practice of the conduct and observance that is realizing ourself, is because the grasping of conduct and observance is never a special state in a new phase.3 Dependent origination is conduct and observance: we should painstakingly consider and learn in practice that this is because conduct and observance does not originate dependently.4 The conduct and observance that realizes such conduct and observance is just our own conduct and observance in the present moment. The present moment of conduct and observance is not the original possession or the original abode of self. The present moment of conduct and observance does not depart from and come to, or leave and enter, self. The words “the present moment” do not describe something that exists prior to conduct and observance: the realization of conduct and observance itself is called “the present moment.” Therefore, one day of conduct and observance is the seed of all the buddhas and is the conduct and obser-127c vance of all the buddhas. To fail to practice this conduct and observance by which the buddhas are realized and by which their conduct and observance is practiced, is to hate the buddhas, is to fail to serve offerings to the buddhas, is to hate conduct and observance, is to fail to live together with and die

together with the buddhas, and is to fail to learn with them and experience the same state as them. The opening flowers and falling leaves of the present are just the realization of conduct and observance. There is no polishing of mirrors or breaking of mirrors5 that is not conduct and observance. Therefore, if we aim to set aside conduct and observance, disregarding conduct and observance in the hope of concealing the wrong mind that wants to avoid practicing conduct and observance, even this is conduct and observance. On those grounds, [however,] intentionally to aim for conduct and observance, even though it may look like the will to conduct and observance, is to become the wretched son who threw away treasure in the homeland of his true father, and wandered astray through foreign lands.6 During his time of wandering astray, the winds and waters did not cause him to lose body and life; nonetheless, he should not have thrown away the treasure of his true father—for that is to lose, or to misunderstand, the Dharma treasure of the true father. Thus, [pure] conduct and observance [of precepts] is Dharma that is not to be neglected even for an instant.

[117] The benevolent father, the great teacher, Sakyamuni Buddha, practiced [pure] conduct and observance [of precepts] deep in the mountains from the nineteenth year of the Buddha’s lifetime to the thirtieth year of the Buddha’s lifetime, when there was conduct and observance that realized the truth simultaneously with the earth and [all] sentient beings. Into the eightieth year of the Buddha’s lifetime, still he maintained the practice in the mountains and forests, and maintained the practice in monasteries, never returning to the royal palace, never assuming control over the wealth of his land. He retained as his clothing7 a cotton samghdtirobe;8 throughout his life in the world he did not replace it—as, while in the world, he did not replace his one bowl. He did not stay alone for a single hour or a single day. He did not refuse offerings idly served to him by human beings and gods. He patiently endured the insults of non-Buddhists. In sum, his whole life of teaching was conduct and observance. The forms practiced by the Buddha, washing the robe and begging for food, are all nothing other than conduct and observance.

[119] The eighth patriarch,9 Venerable Mahakasyapa, was the rightful successor of Sakyamuni. Throughout his life he devotedly maintained the practice10 of the twelve dhutas,11 never tiring of them at all. The twelve dhutas are as follows: 1) Not to accept people’s invitations, but to go begging for

food every day; also, not to accept the money for [even] a single meal for a monk. 2) To lodge on a mountain, not to lodge in someone’s house, a populated district, or a village. 3) Never to beg clothes from people, and not to accept clothes that people offer, but to take the clothes of dead people that have been discarded by gravesides, and to mend [these clothes] and wear them. 4) To lodge under a tree in the countryside. 5) To eat one meal a day—this is called, for instance, “sunkasunnai. ”12 6) Not to lie down in the daytime or the nighttime, but only to sit, and when sleepy to walk about13—this is called, for instance, “sunnaisashakyu. ”14 7) To have three robes, not to have other robes, and not to sleep in bedclothes. 8) To stay among graves, not in Buddhist temples and not in human society. Looking at the skulls and bones of dead people, to sit in zazen and pursue the truth. 9) Only to want to live alone, not to want to meet people, and not to want to sleep together with people. 10) First to eat fruit and then to eat a meal, but never to eat fruit after finishing a meal. 11) Only to want to sleep in the open, not sheltering under a tree. 12) Not to eat meat or dairy produce,15 and not to apply herbal oil to the body. These are the twelve dhutas. Venerable Mahakasyapa did not regress and did not stray from them throughout his life. Even when he received the authentic transmission of the Tathagata’s right-Dharma-eye treasury, he never relented in these dhutas. Once the Buddha said, “You are already an old man, you should eat a monk’s meal.” Venerable Mahakasyapa said, “If I had not met with the Tathagata’s appearance in this world, I would have been apratyekabuddha, living in mountains and forests all my life. Fortunately, I met with the Tathagata’s appearance in the world, and I have experienced the Dharma’s goodness. Nevertheless, I will not eat a monk’s meal in the end.” The Tathagata praised him. On another occasion, Mahakasyapa’s body had become emaciated because of his practice of the dhutas, and it seems that many monks looked on him with disdain. Then the Tathagata warmly summoned him and offered Mahakasyapa half of his seat;

128b and Venerable Mahakasyapa sat on the Tathagata’s seat. [So] remember, Mahakasyapa was the senior member of the Buddha’s order. We could not enumerate all the examples of [pure] conduct and observance [of precepts] that he practiced through his life.

[123] The tenth patriarch,16 Venerable Parsva, [swore] “through my life, my side will not touch a bed.” Although this was the pursuit of the truth of an old man of eighty, he thereupon quickly succeeded to the one-to-one

transmission of the great Dharma. Because he never let time go to waste, in only three years of effort, he received the one-to-one transmission of the right eye of sambodhi}1 The Venerable One had spent sixty years in the womb, and he left the womb with his hair already white. “He vowed never to sleep like a corpse, and so was called ‘Kyo Sonja,’ the Side Saint. Even in the dark, his hands radiating brightness, he could pick up the sutras of the Dharma.” This was a mysterious trait with which he was born.

[124] The Side Saint was approaching the age of eighty when he left home and dyed the robe. A young man of the region, having invited him [for the midday meal], said, “Foolish fellow! Doddering old man! How can you be so dim? In general, those who have left family life have two practices: first they practice the balanced state; second they recite the sutras. [But] now you are [already] a feeble old man. There is nowhere for you to progress. Your footprints will dirty pure streams. You will know the satisfaction of meals to no avail.” At that time, hearing the denunciations, the Side Saint duly thanked the people present, and vowed to himself, “Until I understand the meaning of the Tripitaka,18 eradicate the desires of the triple world, attain the six mystical powers, and accomplish the eight kinds of release,19 my side shall not touch a bed.” After that, he practiced walking about and sitting in stillness without missing a single day, and he meditated while standing still. In the daytime he studied and learned theory and teaching, and at night he quieted his thoughts and concentrated his mind. In three years of continuous effort, he mastered the Tripitaka, eradicated the desires of the triple world, and attained the wisdom of the three kinds of knowledge. People of the time, out of respect, therefore called him the Side Saint.20

[126] So the Side Saint was in the womb sixty years before first leaving the womb. Might he not have been making his effort even in the womb? After leaving the womb, he was nearly eighty when he first sought to leave family life and learn the state of truth—^one hundred and forty years after he was conceived! Truly, he was an outstanding individual; at the same time, this doddering old man must have been more doddering and old than anyone—he reached old age inside the womb, and reached old age outside the womb as well. Nonetheless, paying no attention to the scorn of people of the time, he single-mindedly and unrelentingly kept his vow, and thus his pursuit of the truth came to realization in only three years. Who could feel at ease looking at his wisdom

128c

and thinking of emulating him? Do not worry about old age. It is hard to know what this life is, whether it is a life or not a life, whether it is old or not old. The four views, [as we have seen] already,21 are different; and the views of all kinds of beings are different. Concentrating our resolve, we should just strive in pursuit of the truth.22 We should learn in practice that in pursuing the truth we are as if meeting life-and-death [itself]; it is not that we pursue the truth in life and death. People today imagine that they will set aside the pursuit of the truth when they reach fifty or sixty, or reach seventy or eighty: this is extremely stupid. We are conscious of having lived for so many years and months, but this is just the restless activity of the human soul, not the state of learning the truth. Do not notice whether you are in your prime or past it; determine solely to learn the state of truth and pursue the ultimate: emulate the Side Saint. Do not be particularly concerned about becoming a pile of dirt in a graveyard; give it no special consideration. If you do not singlemindedly strive to be saved, who will be inspired by whom? When we are vainly wandering in the wilds, skeletons without a master, we should realize right reflection—as if making an eye.

[129]    The Sixth Patriarch23 was a woodsman in Shinshu district. It would be difficult to call him an intellectual. He had lost his father in infancy and had been brought up by his old mother; he made a living as a woodsman in

129a order to support her. After hearing one phrase of a sutra at a town crossing, he left his old mother at once and went in search of the great Dharma. He was a man of great makings, rare through the ages. His pursuit of the truth was in a class by itself. To cut off an arm may be easy, but this severance from love must have been enormously difficult; this abandoning of obligation could not have been done lightly. Having devoted himself to the order of Obai,24 he pounded rice day and night, without sleep or respite, for eight months. In the middle of one night, he received the authentic transmission of the robe and the bowl. Even after getting the Dharma, he still carried the stone mortar on his travels, and continued his rice-pounding for eight years. Even when he manifested himself in the world25 and preached the Dharma to deliver others, he did not set aside the stone mortar. This was maintenance of practice26 rare through the ages.

[130]    Baso of Kozei27 sat in zazen for twenty years and he received the intimate seal of Nangaku. It has never been said that he neglected zazen

when, having received the Dharma, he saved others. When students first came to him, he unfailingly caused them intimately to receive the mind-seal.28 He was always first to go to communal work. Even into old age he did not let up. [Followers of] Rinzai today are in Kozei’s stream.

[131]    Master Ungan29 learned in practice alongside Dogo30 in the order of Yakusan. Having made a pledge together, [Ungan and Dogo] did not put their sides to a bed for forty years; with one taste, they investigated the state in experience. [Ungan] transmitted the Dharma to Great Master Gohon of Tozan.31 Tozan said, “Wanting to realize wholeness,321 have sat in zazen and pursued the truth, for twenty years already.” Now that truth has been transmitted far and wide.

[132]    Great Master Kokaku of Ungozan33 in former days resided in a hut on Sanpo Mountain,34 at which time he was served meals from the gods’ kitchen.35 The great master on one occasion, while visiting Tozan, decisively attained the great state of truth, after which he returned once more to his hut. When the angels came again to serve food to the master, they searched for three days but could not find him. No longer expecting heavenly cuisine, he saw the great state of truth as his sustenance. We should try to imagine his determination.

129b

[133]    Zen Master Daichi36 of Hyakujozan in former years was the attendant monk of Baso; from then until the evening he entered nirvana, he never had a day when he did not labor for the benefit of the monks and for the benefit of other people. Thankfully, the traces remain of his “A day without work is a day without food”—Zen Master Hyakujo was already an old man, with many years as a monk behind him, but in the communal work he still exerted himself alongside those in the prime of life. The monks felt sorry for him. Though people pitied him, the master would not quit. In the end, at work time they hid his work tools, and when they would not give the master [his tools], the master did not eat all day. His motive was that he was unhappy not to be able to join in with the work of the monks. This is called the tale of Hyakujo’s “A day without work is a day without food.” The profound customs of the Rinzai sect which have swept through the great kingdom of Song today, and those of monasteries in all directions,37 are in many cases the practice, as conduct and observance, of Hyakujo’s profound customs.

[134]    When Master Kyosei38 lived as master of [Kyosei] Temple, the local deities could not see the master’s face; for they had no means of doing so.39

[135] Zen Master Gichu40 of Sanpeizan in former times had been served meals from the kitchen of the gods. After he met Daiten, [however,] when the gods tried to find the master again, they could not see him.

[135]    The later master of Daii Mountain41 said, “For twenty years421 have been on Isan Mountain. I have eaten Isan meals, I have shat Isan shit; but I have not studied the way of Isan.43 I have only been able to raise44 a castrated water buffalo. All day long it is in a state of conspicuous brightness.” Remember, the one castrated water buffalo was raised by twenty years of conduct and observance on Isan Mountain. This master had previously learned in practice in Hyakujo’s order. Quietly reflect on his state during those twenty years, and never forget it. Though there are people “who study the way of

129c Isan,” there may be few examples of conduct and observance that is “not to study the way of Isan.”

[136]    Master Jushin,45 [titled] Great Master Shinsai, of Kannon-in Temple in Joshu46 first established the will to pursue the truth when he was sixty-one years old. Carrying a canteen and a traveling staff,47 he set out on foot to visit masters in all directions, constantly telling himself, “If there is a child of seven who is superior to me, I shall question him or her at once. If there is an old man of a hundred who is inferior to me, I shall teach him at once.”48 With this attitude, he strove to learn Nansen’s way for twenty years. When he was eighty, he first took residence as master of Kannon-in Temple to the east of Joshu City, then taught and guided human beings and gods for forty years. He never petitioned donors with a single letter, and so the monk’s hall was not large: there was no front hall49 and no rear stand.50 Once a leg of the [zazen] platform broke. He roped to it a charred piece of burned wood and carried on practicing for years and months. The temple officers asked to replace this leg of the platform, but Joshu did not allow it. We should recognize here the usual customs of an eternal buddha. Joshu lived in Joshu from the age of eighty onward—after he had received the Dharma. He had received the authentic transmission of the right Dharma, and people called him “the eternal buddha.” Others, who have never received the authentic transmission of the right Dharma, must be less important than the master. [At the same time] people other than he, not having reached the age of eighty, are likely to be stronger than the master. How might we, who are in our prime yet unimportant, equal him, the old man who is profoundly venerable? We must spur

ourselves to pursue the state of truth and to practice conduct and observance! For those forty years, they kept no worldly goods and in the stores there was no rice and grain. Sometimes they would gather chestnuts or sweet acorns for food; sometimes they would spin out a meal again and again. Truly, these were the usual customs of the dragons and elephants of the past, regulated conduct that we should love and admire.

[139] Once [Joshu] preached to the assembly, “If you spend your whole life not leaving the monastery,51 not talking for ten years or for five years, no one will be able to call you a mute. Afterwards, how could even the buddhas do anything to you?”52 This preaches conduct and observance. Remember, by not talking for ten years or for five years we might seem to be stupid but even if, by virtue of the effort of not leaving the monastery, we are beyond talk, we are not mutes. The Buddha’s state of truth is like this. Those who do not hear the voice of the Buddha’s state of truth can never possess the truth that is a non-mute53 being beyond talk. So the finest example of conduct and observance is “not to leave the monastery.” “Not to leave the monastery” is complete talk, in the state of liberation. The extremely stupid neither know themselves as non-mutes nor let themselves be known as nonmutes; no one prevents them, but they do not let themselves be known [as non-mutes]. Those who will not hear that to be a non-mute is to have attained the ineffable, and who do not know that [to be a non-mute] is to have attained the ineffable, are pitiful individuals. Quietly practice the conduct and observance of “not leaving the monastery”: do not blow east and west with the east and west winds. Even if “for ten years or for five years” the spring breezes and autumn moons go unrecognized, the state of truth will be present, transparently free of sound and form. Expressing the truth in this state is beyond our own knowing and beyond our own understanding. We should learn in practice how valuable is each minute54 of conduct and observance. Do not wonder whether not-talking might be vacuous. Entry is one monastery. Getting out is one monastery. The way of the birds is one monastery. The entire universe is one monastery.55

130a

[141] Daibaizan is in the city of Kyogenfu. Goshoji was established on this mountain, and its founder was Zen Master Hojo.56 The Zen master was a man of the Joyo district.57 In former days, when visiting Baso’s order, he asked, “What is buddha?” Baso said, “The mind here and now is buddha.”58

Hearing these words, Hojo realized the great state of realization under their influence. Consequently he climbed to the summit of Daibaizan, away from human society, and lived in solitude in a thatched hut, eating pine nuts and wearing clothes made from lotus leaves: there was a small pond on the mountain, and many lotuses grew in the pond. He sat in zazen and pursued the truth for more than thirty years. He saw and heard absolutely nothing of human affairs and he lost track of the passing years, only seeing the mountains all around go from green to yellow. One pities to imagine what the winds and frosts were like. In zazen, the master placed an eight-inch iron tower on his head, as if he were wearing a crown. By endeavoring to keep this tower from dropping to the ground, he did not fall asleep. The tower remains in the temple today; it is listed in the records of the temple storehouse. This is how he pursued the truth until his death, never tiring of the effort. He had been living like this for years and months when a monk from Enkan’s59 order happened to come onto the mountain looking for a staff. [The monk] lost his way on the mountain and unexpectedly came upon the site of the master’s hut. When, to [the monk’s] surprise, he saw the master, he asked, “Master, how long have you been living on this mountain?” The master said, “I have only seen the mountains all around go from green to yellow.” The monk asked further, “What is the way down from the mountain?” The master said, “Follow the stream down.” The monk was struck. When he returned and told Enkan what had happened, Enkan said, “In former days when I was in Kozei60 I once met a certain monk, and I do not know what happened to him after that. This couldn’t be that same monk, could it?” Eventually [Master Enkan] sent the monk to extend an invitation to the master, but [the master] would not leave the mountain. He replied with a verse:

A withered tree, broken and abandoned, in a cold forest,

130b

However many times it meets spring, it does not change its mind.

Passing woodsmen do not even look back.

Why should popular entertainers61 be keen to search it out?

In the end he did not go. Later, when he decided to move even deeper into the mountains, he made the following verse:

I shall never outwear the lotus leaves in the pond.

The flowers of a few pines are more than a meal.

Now my abode has been discovered by people in the world.

I shall move my shack deeper into seclusion.

Finally, he moved his hut further into the mountains.

[145] Once Baso sent a monk especially to ask [Daibai Hojo], “Master, when you visited Baso in former days, what truth did you attain and then come to live on this mountain?” The master said, “Baso told me, ‘The mind here and now is buddha. ’ Then I came to live on this mountain.” The monk said, “These days his Buddha-Dharma is different.” The master said, “How is it different?” The monk said, “Baso says, ‘It is neither the mind nor buddha.’” The master said, “That old man! If he is out to disturb others, I will have no sympathy for him. Never mind about ‘neither the mind nor buddha. ’ For me, it is just that the mind here and now is buddha.” [The monk] reported these words to Baso. Baso said, “The fruit of the Plum62 is matured.” This story is known to all human beings and gods. Tenryu63 was an excellent disciple of the master, and Gutei64 was the master’s Dharma grandchild. Kachi65 of Korea, retaining the transmission of the master’s Dharma, became the first patriarch of that country. So the many masters in Korea today are the master’s distant descendants. As long as he lived he was served and attended in everyday life by a tiger and an elephant66 who never vied against each other. After the master’s death, the tiger and elephant carried rocks and carried mud to build the master a stupa. The stupa still stands today at Goshoji. The master’s maintenance of [pure] conduct is praised by [good] counselors of the past and present alike. People of inferior wisdom do not know that they should praise him. To hold to the pretense that the Buddha-Dharma can exist amid greed for fame and love of gain is the small and stupid view.

[147] Zen Master Hoen67 of Goso Mountain68 said, “When my master’s master69 first took up residence on Yogi Peak, the rafters of the old roof were broken and the mischief of the wind and rain was severe, for it was the end of winter. The temple buildings and halls were all run down and the monks’ hall was especially dilapidated: snow and hail covered the platforms so that there was nowhere to sit. Even the most aged veterans, snowy hair bristling on their crowns, swept away the snow, and monks of venerable years, with their graying eyebrows, seemed to harbor sorrow in their wrinkled brows. None of the monks could practice zazen in comfort. One patch-robed individual requested with utmost sincerity that [the monk’s hall] be repaired, but

131a

the old master refused, saying, ‘Our Buddha has said that this is the kalpa of dissolution and even high cliffs and deep valleys are changing and inconstant. How can we expect to have everything as we please, and seek to call ourselves satisfied? The sacred people of olden times usually walked about under a tree or out in the open; this is an excellent example from the past, it is a profound custom of those who tread in bareness. Even though you have all left family life and are learning the truth, the movements of your hands and feet are not yet harmonized. This [life as a monk] is only forty or fifty years. Who has time to spare for an opulent roof?’ In the end he did not consent. The next day in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, he preached to the assembly, ‘When Yogi first took residence here as master, the roof and walls were barely held together, and the floor was scattered all over with pearls of snow. Our necks contracting, we secretly grumbled. But we remembered the people of old who dwelled under trees.’” Finally [Master Goso Hoen] did not give his permission. Yet patch-robed mountain monks from the four oceans and the five lakes longed to come and hang their traveling staffs in this order. We should be glad that so many people indulged themselves in the state of truth. We should imbue our minds with this state of truth, and should engrave these words on our bodies.

[150] Master [Goso Ho]en once preached, “Conduct is not on a level beyond thinking, and thinking is not on a level beyond conduct.” We should attach importance to these words, considering them day and night, and putting them into practice morning and evening. We should not be as if blowing idly in the east, west, south, and north winds. Still less in this country of Japan— where even the palaces of kings and ministers do not have opulent buildings 131b but only scant and plain ones—^could those who have left home to learn the truth dwell at leisure in opulent buildings. If someone has got an opulent dwelling, it is without fail from a wrong livelihood; it is rarely from a pure one. [A building] that was already there is a different matter, but do not make plans for new buildings. Thatched huts and plain houses were lived in by the ancient saints and loved by the ancient saints. Students of later ages should yearn for their state and learn it in practice, and should never go against it. The Yellow Emperor,70 and [emperors] such as Gyo71 and Shun,72 although secular men, dwelled under roofs of thatch—an excellent example for the world. Shishi73 says, “If we wish to reflect upon the conduct of the Yellow

Emperor, it is [manifest] in Gokyu Palace. If we wish to reflect upon the conduct of Gyo and Shun, it is [manifest] in Sosho Palace. The Yellow Emperor’s hall of brightness74 was thatched with straw, and it was called ‘Gokyu;’ Shun’s hall of brightness was thatched with straw, and it was called ‘ Sosho. ’” Remember, [the palaces called] “Gokyu” and “Sosho” both were thatched with straw. Now when we compare the Yellow Emperor, Gyo, and Shun with ourselves, the difference is beyond that between the heavens and the earth. [But] even these emperors used thatch for their halls of brightness. When even secular people live under thatched roofs, how could people who have left family life hope to live in lofty halls and stately mansions? That would be shameful. People of old dwelled under a tree or dwelled in the forest; these were abodes that both laymen and monks loved. The Yellow Emperor was the disciple of the Daoist Kosei of Kodo.75 Kosei lived [in a cave] inside the crag named “Kodo.” Many of the kings and ministers of the great kingdom of Song today have carried on this profound custom. So even people immersed in dusty toil are like this. How could people who have left family life be inferior to people immersed in dusty toil? How could we be more sullied than people immersed in dusty toil? Among the Buddhist patriarchs of the past, there were many who received the offerings of gods. Yet when they had attained the state of truth, the eyes of gods could not reach them, and demons had no connection to them. We should be clear about this principle. When the celestial hosts and those in the state of demons tread the path of a Buddhist patriarch’s conduct, there is a way for them to approach a Buddhist patriarch. [But] Buddhist patriarchs widely transcend in experience all gods and demons, and gods and demons have no means by which to look up at them; so it is hard [for gods and demons] to draw near to a Buddhist patriarch. Nansen76 said, “The practice of this old monk has been so weak that I have been spotted by a demon.”77 Remember, to be spotted by a demon of no training is due to lacking power in one’s practice.

[154] In the order of Master Shogaku, [titled] Zen Master Wanshi,78 of Daibyakuhozan,79 a guardian deity of the temple said, “I hear that Master [Sho]gaku has lived on this mountain for ten years or so, but whenever I enter the abbot’s reception hall looking for him, I am always unable to proceed and I have never detected him yet.” [Here,] truly, we are meeting the traces of a predecessor who possessed the state of truth. The temple on this mountain,

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Tendozan, was formerly a small one. While Master [Sho]gaku was the resident master there, he cleaned away an assortment of Daoists’nuns’, and scholars’ temples, and established what is now Keitokuji. After the master passed away, a senior mandarin and court secretary called O Hakusho compiled a record of the master’s deeds and achievements, at which time someone said, “You should record the fact that he supplanted the Daoist temple, the nuns’ temple, and the scholars’ temple, and established the present Tendoji.” The court secretary said, “That would not be appropriate. Such matters are not related with a monk’s merits.” Many people at that time praised the court secretary. Remember, the matters described above are secular work, they are not the merits of a monk.

[155] In general, when we enter the Buddha’s state of truth for the very first time, we far transcend the triple world of human beings and gods. We should carefully investigate the fact that we are neither being used by the triple world nor being seen by the triple world. We should consider this and realize it in practice by means of body, speech, and mind, and by means of object and subject. The merit of the Buddhist patriarchs’ conduct and observance originally possesses enormous benefit in leading human beings and gods to salvation, 132a but human beings and gods never sense that they are being saved by the Buddhist patriarchs’ conduct and observance. In practicing and observing now the Buddhist patriarchs’ great state of truth, do not distinguish between great hermits and small hermits,80 and do not discuss sagacity or stupidity. Just throw away fame and gain forever and do not get caught in convoluted circumstances. Do not pass time in vain. [Act as if to] put out a fire burning on your head. Do not expect the great realization. The great realization is everyday tea and meals. Do not aspire to nonrealization. Nonrealization is the pearl in the topknot.81 Simply, those who have homes and homelands should get free from their homes and homelands; those who have loved ones should get free from their loved ones; those who have fame should get away from their fame; those who have gain should get away from their gain; those who have fields and gardens should get away from their fields and gardens; and those who have family should get free from their family. They should also get free from the intention not to have fame, gain, and so on. Given that we get free from having, the principle is evident that we should also get free from not having. This is itself a kind of conduct and observance. To make the throwing away of fame and gain into

the one matter to be practiced and observed as long as one lives is the conduct and observance that has the depth and eternity of the Buddha’s lifetime. This conduct and observance is inevitably practiced and observed by conduct and observance itself. Those in whom this conduct and observance is present should love their own body and mind, and should respect themselves.

[158]    Zen Master Kanchu82 of Daiji said, “Explaining83 one yard is inferior to practicing one foot, and explaining one foot is inferior to practicing one inch.”84 This sounds like an admonition directed to people present at that time who seemed to be negligent in practicing conduct and observance and to have forgotten real penetration of the Buddha’s truth, but it does not mean that to explain a yard is wrong: it means that the merit of practicing a foot is much greater still than the merit of explaining a yard. Why should it be limited to measurements only in yards and feet? There should also be discussion of merits in terms of the difference between far-off Sumeru and a poppy seed. In Sumeru the whole is present, and in a poppy seed the whole is present: the great integrity of conduct and observance is like this. The present expression of the truth is not Kanchu expressing himself; it is the natural expression of Kanchu.85

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[159]    Great Master Gohon86 of Tozan Mountain said, “I explain what I am unable to practice and practice what I am unable to explain.”87 This is the saying of the founding patriarch. The point is that practice illuminates a way through to explanation, and there are ways in which explanation leads through to practice. This being so, what we preach in a day is what we practice in a day. The point is, then, that we practice what is impossible to practice and preach what is impossible to preach.

[160]    Great Master Kokaku88 of Ungozan, having totally penetrated this teaching, said, “In the time of explanation there is no trace of practice; in the time of practice there is no trace of explanation.” This expression of the truth is that practice-and-explanation is not nonexistent: the time of explanation is “a lifetime without leaving the monastery,”89 and the time of practice is “washing the head and going before Seppo.”90 We should neither disregard nor disarrange [the words that] “In the time of explanation there is no trace of practice, and in the time of practice there is no trace of explanation.”

[162] There is something that has been said by the Buddhist patriarchs since ancient times. It is that “If a person lives one hundred years without

grasping the buddhas’ state of the moment, that is worth less than living one day and being able to realize the state decisively.”91 This was not said by one buddha or by two buddhas; this has been expressed by all the buddhas and has been practiced by all the buddhas. In a hundred thousand myriad kalpas of reciprocal life and death, one day of conduct and observance is the bright pearl in the topknot, is the eternal mirror that is born with and dies with [buddhas],92 and is a day to be rejoiced in. The power of conduct and observance rejoices in itself. Those who have neither attained the power of conduct and observance nor received the bones and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs, do not treasure the body-and-mind of the Buddhist patriarchs and 132c do not rejoice in the real features of the Buddhist patriarchs. The real features and bones and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs are beyond going, are thus-gone, are thus-come, and are beyond coming: even so, in one day’s conduct and observance they are unfailingly received. So one day may be very important. Idly to have lived a hundred years is a lamentable waste of days and months; it is to be a pitiable skeleton. Even if we are driven, as slaves to sight and sound, [every] day and month for a hundred years, if we practice conduct and observance for one day among those [years], then we will not only put into practice the whole life of one hundred years but will also save others’ lives of one hundred years. The body and life for this one day is a body and life that should be venerated, a skeleton that should be venerated. Therefore, if our life lasts a single day, if we grasp the buddhas’ state of the moment, this one day is worth more than many lives in vast kalpas of time. For this reason, before you have decisively realized the state, never spend a single day in vain. This one day is an important treasure that you should hate to lose. Do not liken its value to a one-foot gem. Never trade it for the black dragon’s pearl. The sages of old treasured [a day] more than their body and life. We should quietly consider that the black dragon’s pearl can be retrieved, and a one-foot gem also can be regained; but a day in a life of one hundred years, once lost, can never be found again. Is there any skillful means by which to get back a day that has passed? Such a thing has not been recorded in any book of history. Those who do not pass time in vain wrap the days and months in the bag of skin [which is themselves] so that [time] will not leak away. Thus it was that the ancient saints and past sages treasured the days and months, treasured time, more than their own eyes and more than

their national lands. Here, “passing in vain” means sullying oneself and disturbing oneself in the floating world of fame and profit. “Not passing [time] in vain” means acting for the sake of the truth while already in the state of the truth. Once we have realized this state decisively, we should never waste another day. We should solely practice for the sake of the truth, and preach for the sake of the truth. So we have seen the standard by which, since ancient times, the Buddhist patriarchs have not spent a day of effort in vain and we should reflect on it constantly. We should consider it on a slow, slow spring day, sitting by a bright window. We should not forget it in the hushed silence of a rainy night, sitting under a plain roof. How is it that time steals our efforts away from us? It not only steals away single days, it steals the merits of abundant kalpas. Why should time and I be adversaries? Regrettably, my own non-training makes it so—that is, my not being familiar with myself, my bearing a grudge against myself. Even the Buddhist patriarchs are not without their loved ones, but they have already abandoned them. Even the Buddhist patriarchs are not without miscellaneous involvements, but they have already abandoned them. However we treasure the factors and circumstances [that we see] as self and others, they are impossible to hold onto; therefore, if we do not abandon loved ones, it may happen, in word and in deed, that loved ones abandon us. If we have compassion for loved ones, we should be compassionate to loved ones. To be compassionate to loved ones means to abandon loved ones.

[167] Master Ejo,93 [titled] Zen Master Daie of Nangaku, in former days served in the order of Sokei,94 where he attended [the master] through fifteen autumns. Consequently, he was able to receive the transmission of the state of truth and to accept the behavior—as a jug of water is poured into another jug. We should venerate above all else the path of conduct of the ancient ancestors. The winds and frosts of those fifteen autumns must have brought him many troubles. Yet he purely and simply pursued the ultimate; he is an excellent model for students of later ages. In winter, he slept alone in an empty building, without charcoal for the stove. In the cool of a summer night, he would sit alone by a bright window, without a candle to burn. Even if devoid of a single recognition or half an understanding, it was the state beyond study, which is free of doing.95 This may be conduct and observance. In general, once we have privately thrown away greed for fame and love of gain,

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the merit of conduct and observance simply accumulates day by day. Do not forget this principle. “To describe a thing does not hit the target”96 is eight years of conduct and observance. It is conduct and observance that people of the past and present esteem as very rare, and which both the clever and the inept long for.

[169]    Zen Master Chikan of Kyogen [Temple],97 while cultivating the state of truth under Daii,98 tried several times to express the truth in a phrase, but in the end he could not say anything. Out of regret for this, he burned his books and became the monk who served the gruel and rice. He thus passed years and months in succession. Later he went onto Butozan and searched out the former traces of Daisho;99 he built a thatched hut and, abandoning everything, lived there in seclusion. One day he happened to be sweeping the path when a pebble flew up and struck a bamboo; it made a sound that led him suddenly to awaken to the state of truth. Thereafter he lived at Kyo-genji, where he made do in his everyday life with one bowl and one set of clothes, never replacing them. He made his home among oddly shaped rocks and pure springs, and lived out his life in restful seclusion. He was survived at the temple by many traces of his conduct. It is said that in his everyday life he did not come down from the mountain.

[170]    Great Master Esho100 of Rinzai-in Temple was a rightful successor of Obaku.101 He was in Obaku’s order for three years. Pursuing the truth with pure simplicity, three times he asked Obaku, at the instruction of the venerable patriarch Chin102 from the Bokushu district, “What is the Great Intent

133c    of the Buddha-Dharma?,” whereupon he tasted [the master’s] stick again

and again, sixty times in all. Yet his zeal was not diminished. When he went to Daigu103 and realized the great state of realization, this also was at the instruction of the two venerable patriarchs Obaku and Bokushu.104 They say that the heroes of the Patriarch’s order105 are Rinzai and Tokusan,106 but how could Tokusan be equal to Rinzai? Truly, someone like Rinzai is not to be classed with the rabble—and even the rabble of that time are outstanding compared with those who in recent times are outstanding. They say that [Rin-zai’s] “behavior was pure and simple”107 and his conduct and observance outstanding. Even if we tried to imagine how many instances and how many varieties there were of his [pure] conduct and observance [of precepts], we could never hit the mark.

[172]    Master [Rinzai] is in the order of Obaku. While he and Obaku are planting cedars and pines, Obaku asks the master, “Deep in the mountains, what is the use of planting so many trees?” The master says, “First, they will contribute to the beauty of the surroundings of the temple. Second, they will be a signpost for people in future.” Then he strikes his mattock on the ground twice. Obaku holds up his staff and says, “You are like that now, but you have already tasted thirty strokes of my staff!” The master makes the sound of snoring. Obaku says, “In your generation our school will flourish greatly in the world.”108

[173]    So we should know that even after he had attained the state of truth, he took the mattock in his own hands and planted cedars and pines. It may have been because of this that [Obaku said] “In your generation our school will flourish greatly in the world.” It may have been that the ancient traces of the “pine-planting practitioner”109 had been directly transmitted in one straight line. Obaku himself also planted trees alongside Rinzai. In the past Obaku had practiced conduct and observance by leaving an assembly of monks and mixing in with laborers at Daian Temple,110 where he swept and cleaned the temple buildings. He swept and cleaned the Buddha hall. He swept and cleaned the Dharma hall. He did not expect conduct and observance to sweep and clean his mind. He did not expect conduct and observance to sweep and clean his brightness. This was when he met with Prime Minister

Hai.111

[174]    The Tang emperor Senso112 was the second son of Emperor Kenso.113 He was quick-witted and clever from his childhood. He always loved to sit in the full lotus posture, and he would constantly be sitting in zazen in the palace. Emperor Bokusho114 was Senso’s older brother. [Once] during Bokusho’s reign, as soon as government business had finished in the morning,115 Senso playfully ascended the dragon dais116 and assumed a posture of saluting the various retainers. A minister who saw this thought [Senso] was insane, and he said so to Emperor Bokusho. When Bokusho came to see for himself, he patted Senso and said, “My brother is the brains117 of our family.” At the time Senso was just thirteen years old. In the fourth year of Chokei,118 Emperor Bokusho died. Bokusho had three sons. The first [became] Emperor Keiso, the second Emperor Bunso, and the third Emperor Buso. Emperor Keiso119 died three years after acceding to his father’s throne.

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Emperor Bunso120 took the throne for one year, but court officials conspired to remove him. So when Emperor Buso121 came to the throne, Senso, who had not yet come to the throne himself, was living in the kingdom of his nephew. Emperor Buso always called Senso “my stupid uncle.” Buso was emperor during the Esho era122—he was the man who abolished the Buddha-Dharma.

[176] One day Emperor Buso summoned Senso and ordered him to be put to death at once as punishment for climbing onto the throne of [Buso’s] father in the past. He was laid in a flower garden behind the palace but when sewage was thrown over him, he came back to life. In due course [Senso] left his father’s kingdom and secretly entered the order of Zen Master Kyo-gen.123 He had his head shaved and became a sramanera——though he never received full ordination. With Zen Master Shikan124 as a traveling companion, he went to Rozan125 Mountain. The story goes that Shikan made his own verse on the subject of the falls, saying:

Carving out cliffs, passing through rock, never shirking toil,

Lofty origins evident from afar.

By fishing for the sramanera with these two lines, [Shikan] hoped to discover what person this was. The sramanera continued [the verse] as follows:

How can the valley streams hold [the water] still?

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At last it will return to the ocean and make great waves.

Reading these two lines, [Shikan] knew that the sramanera was no ordinary man. Later [the sramanera] went to the order of National Master Enkan Saian126 of Koshu district, where he was assigned as clerk to the head monk:127 at the time Enkan’s head monk was Zen Master Obaku,128 and so [the sra-manera-clerk] was next to Obaku on the [zazen] platform. Once Obaku was in the Buddha hall doing prostrations to the Buddha when the clerk came in and asked, “We do not seek out of attachment to Buddha. We do not seek out of attachment to Dharma. We do not seek out of attachment to Sangha.129 Venerable Patriarch, what are you prostrating yourself for?” When he asked this question, Obaku just slapped the sramanera-clerk and told him, “I do not seek out of attachment to Buddha. I do not seek out of attachment to Dharma. I do not seek out of attachment to Sangha. I always do prostrations like this.” Having spoken thus, he gave [the clerk] another slap. The clerk said, “What an extremely rude person!” Obaku said, “This is just the place where something ineffable exists. What else is there to explain as rude or refined?” He gave the clerk another slap. The clerk then desisted. After the demise of Emperor Buso, the clerk duly returned to secular society and acceded to the throne. Emperor Buso had initiated the abolition of the Buddha-Dharma, but Emperor Senso immediately restored the Buddha-Dharma. From the time he assumed the throne, and all the time he was on the throne, Emperor Senso always loved to sit in zazen. Before he assumed the throne, when he had left his father’s kingdom and was traveling along the valley streams of a distant land, he had purely and simply pursued the truth. They say that after he assumed the throne he sat in zazen day and night. Truly, with his father the king already dead and then his brother also dying, and with his being put to death by his nephew, he might have looked like a pitiful destitute son.130 But his zeal did not waver and he kept striving in pursuit of the truth. It was an excellent example, rare through the ages. It must have been heaven-sent conduct and observance.

[180]    Master Gison of Seppozan, [titled] Great Master Shinkaku,131 after he had established the [bodhi-]mind sat day and night in zazen, without flagging and without aversion to the place—though there were long journeys between the monasteries where he hung his traveling staff, and between the lodgings on the way. Until Seppo first disclosed the state of imposing majesty, he practiced tirelessly, and he died together with zazen. In former days, in his quest to serve under [true teachers] “he nine times climbed Tozan Moun-tain”132 “and three times visited Tosu Mountain”133—pursuit of the truth that was rare through the ages. When people today are encouraging others to be pure and stern in their conduct and observance, they often cite Seppo’s noble conduct. Seppo’s uncertainty was like that of other people, but Seppo’s sharpness was beyond other people. Conduct and observance is like that. People of the truth today should unfailingly learn Seppo’s purity.

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[181]    When we quietly look back upon Seppo’s muscular exertion in learning in practice under [masters in] all directions, truly, his virtue might be that of having long possessed the sacred in his bones. Today, when we are attending the order of a master who has the state of truth and we really want to request and to partake in [the master’s teaching], it is extremely difficult to find an opportunity to do so. [The order] is not only twenty or thirty individual bags

of skin; it is the [nameless] faces of hundreds or thousands of people. Each wishes to find his or her real refuge, so days on which the [master’s] hand is imparted134 soon darken into night, and nights of pounding the mortar135 soon brighten into day. Sometimes, during the master’s informal preaching we have no ears or eyes, and so we vainly pass by [chances] to see and hear. By the time our ears and eyes are in place, the master has finished speaking. While old drills—veteran patriarchs of venerable years—are already clapping their hands and laughing out loud, there seem to be precious few opportunities for us—as newly ordained juniors—even to get onto the edge of the mat. There are those who enter the inner sanctum and those who do not enter, those who hear the master’s conclusions and those who do not hear. Time is swifter than an arrow, the dewdrop life more fragile than a body. There is the anguish of having a teacher but being unable to partake in [the teaching], and there is the sadness of being ready to partake in [the teaching] but being unable to find a 135a teacher—I have personally experienced such matters. Great good counselors unfailingly possess the virtue of knowing a person, but while they are striving to cultivate [their own] state of truth, opportunities to get sufficiently close to them are rare. When Seppo in ancient times climbed Tozan Mountain, and when he climbed Tosu Mountain, he too must surely have endured such troubles. We should be inspired by his Dharma gymnastics of conduct and observance; not to research them in experience would be a shame.

Part Two

[185] The First Patriarch in China136 came from the west to the Eastern Lands at the instruction of Venerable Prajnatara.137 For the three years of frosts and springs during that ocean voyage, how could the wind and snow have been the only miseries? Through how many formations of clouds and sea mist might the steep waves have surged? He was going to an unknown country: ordinary beings who value their body and life could never conceive [of such a journey]. This must have been maintenance of the practice realized solely from the great benevolent will “to transmit the Dharma and save deluded emotional beings.”138 It was so because “the transmission of Dharma” is [Bodhidharma] himself; it was so because the transmission of Dharma is the entire universe; it was so because the whole universe in ten directions is the real state of truth; it was so because the whole universe in ten directions is

[Bodhidharma] himself; and it was so because the whole universe in ten directions is the whole universe in ten directions. What conditions surrounding [this] life are not a royal palace? And what royal palace is prevented from being a place to practice the truth? For these reasons, he came from the west like this.139 Because “the saving of deluded emotional beings” is [Bodhi-dharma] himself, he was without alarm and doubt and he was not afraid. Because “saving deluded emotional beings” is the entire universe, he was not alarmed and doubting and he was without fear. He left his father’s kingdom forever, made ready a great ship, crossed the southern seas, and arrived at the port of Koshu.140 There would have been a large crew, and many monks [to serve the master] with towel and jug, but historians failed to record this. After [the master] landed, no one knew who he was. It was the twenty-first day of the ninth lunar month in the eighth year of the Futsu era141 during the Liang dynasty.142 The governor of Koshu district, who was called Shogo, received [the master] displaying the proper courtesies of a host. He then duly wrote a letter notifying Emperor Bu,143 for Shogo was assiduous in fulfilling his duties. When Emperor Bu read the missive he was delighted, and he dispatched a messenger with an imperial edict inviting [the master] to visit him. It was then the first day of the tenth lunar month of that same year.

[188] When the First Patriarch arrived at the city of Kinryo144 and met with the Liang Emperor Bu, the emperor asked him, “It would be impossible to list all the temples built, all the sutras copied, and all the monks delivered since I assumed the throne. What merit have I acquired?”

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The master said, “No merit at all.”

The emperor said, “Why is there no merit?”

The master said, “These things are only the trivial effects of human beings and gods, and the cause of the superfluous. They are like shadows following the form: though they exist, they are not the real thing.”

The emperor said, “What is true merit?”

The master said, “Pure wisdom being subtly all-encompassing; the body being naturally empty and still. Virtue like this is not sought by the worldly.” The emperor asks further, “What is the paramount truth among the sacred truths?”

The master said, “It is [that which is] glaringly evident, and without anything sacred.”

The emperor said, “Who is the person facing me?”

The master said, “I do not know.”

The emperor did not understand. The master knew that the time was not right.145

So, on that nineteenth day of the tenth lunar month [the master] quietly left, traveling north up the [Yangzi] River. On the twenty-third day of the eleventh month of the same year he arrived at Rakuyo.146 He accepted the makeshift accommodation of Shorinji on Suzan Mountain, where he sat facing the wall in silence all day long. But the ruler of the Wei147 dynasty also was too inept to recognize [the master], and he did not even know that this was cause for shame. The master was of the ksatriya caste in South India; he had been the crown prince of a great nation. He had long ago acquired familiarity with the ways of a royal palace in a great nation. In the vulgar customs of a small country there were habits and views that might be shameful 135c to the prince of a great nation, but the mind of the First Patriarch was not moved: he did not abandon the country and he did not abandon the people. At that time, he neither prevented nor hated the slander of Bodhiruci;148 and the evil mind of the precepts teacher Kozu149 [he considered] neither worthy of resentment nor even worth noticing. Despite [the master’s] abundance of such virtue, people of the Eastern Lands considered him the equal of mere ordinary scholars of the Tripitaka150 and teachers of sutras and commentaries. This was extremely stupid; [they thought so] because they were trivial people. Some thought that [the master] was proclaiming a peculiar lineage of the Dharma called the “Zen sect,” and that the sayings of other teachers—com-mentary teachers and the like—might amount to the same as the right Dharma of the First Patriarch. They were vermin who disturbed and dirtied the Buddha-Dharma. The First Patriarch was the twenty-eighth rightful successor from Sakyamuni Buddha. He left his father’s great kingdom to rescue the living beings of Eastern Lands: whose shoulders could come up to his? If the First Patriarch had not come from the west, how could the living beings of Eastern Lands have seen and heard the Buddha’s right Dharma? They would only have worried in vain over the sands and stone that are names and forms. Even those who have clothed themselves in fur and worn horns on their head, in a remote and distant land like ours, have now become able to hear our fill of the right Dharma. Now even peasants and plowmen, old country folk and

village children, see and hear. It is totally due to the ancestral master’s maintenance of the practice in crossing the seas that we have been saved. The natural climate of India was vastly superior to that of China, and there were also great differences in the rightness and wrongness of local customs. [China] was not a place to which a great saint who had received and retained the Dharma treasury would go, unless he were a man of great benevolence and great endurance. A suitable place of practice, where [the master] might live, did not exist, and the people who could know a person were few. So he hung his traveling staff at Suzan Mountain for a spell of nine years. People called him “the brahman who looks at the wall.” Historians recorded his name in lists of those learning Zen meditation, but it was not so. The right-Dharma-eye treasury transmitted from buddha to buddha and from rightful successor to rightful successor, was simply the ancestral master alone.

[193] Sekimon’s151 Rinkanroku152 says:

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Bodhidharma first went from the land of the Liang dynasty to the land of the Wei dynasty. He passed along the foot of Suzan Mountain, and rested his staff at Shorin [Temple]. He just sat in stillness facing the wall, and only that—he was not practicing Zen meditation. For a long time no one could understand the reason for that [sitting], and so they saw Bodhidharma as training in Zen meditation. Now, [the practice of] dhyana153 is only one among many forms of conduct: how could it be all there was to the Saint? Yet because of this [practice], the people of that time who made chronicles subsequently listed him among those who were learning Zen meditation: they grouped him alongside people like withered trees and dead ash. Nevertheless, the Saint did not stop at [the practice of] dhyana; and at the same time, of course, he did not go against [the practice of] dhyana—just as the art of divination emerges from yin and yang without going against yin and yang. When the Liang Emperor Bu first met Bodhidharma, he asked at once, “What is the paramount sacred truth?” [The master] replied, “It is [that which is] glaringly evident, and without anything sacred.” [The emperor] went on to say, “Who is the person facing me?” Then [the master] said, “I do not know.” If Bodhidharma had not been conversant with the language of that region, how could [their conversation] have taken place as it did at that time?

[195] Thus, it is evident that [the master] went from the Liang kingdom to the Wei kingdom. He passed along154 Suzan Mountain and rested his staff at Shorin [Temple]. He sat in stillness facing the wall, but he was not learning Zen meditation. Though he had not fetched with him a single sutra or text, he was the true authority who had brought with him the transmission of the right Dharma. Chroniclers, however, not being clear, listed him in sections about learning Zen meditation—this was extremely stupid and regrettable. While [the master] thus continued practicing155 on Suzan Mountain, there were dogs who barked at the great ancestor:156 they were pitiful and extremely stupid. How could any who has a heart think light of [the master’s] merciful kindness? How could any who has a heart not hope to repay this kindness? There are many people who do not forget even worldly kindness but appreciate it deeply: these are called human beings. The great kindness of the ancestral master is greater even than [the kindness of] a father and mother—so do not compare the benevolent love of the ancestral master even with [the love of] a parent for a child. When we consider our own lowly position, we might be alarmed and afraid. We are beyond sight of the civilized lands.157 We were 136b not born at the center of civilization. We do not know any saints. We have not seen any sages. No person among us has ever ascended beyond the celestial world. People’s minds are utterly stupid. Since the inception [of Japan], no person has edified the common people: we hear of no period when the nation was purified. This is because no one knows what is pure and what is impure. We are like this because we are ignorant of the substance and details of the two spheres of power158 and the three elements:159 how much less could we know the rising and falling of the five elements?160 This stupidity rests upon blindness to the phenomena before our very eyes. And we are blind because we do not know the sutras and texts, and because there is no teacher of the sutras and texts. There is no such teacher means that no one knows how many tens of volumes there are in “this sutra,” no one knows how many hundreds of verses and how many thousands of sayings there are in “this sutra”: we read only the explanatory aspect of the sentences, not knowing the thousands of verses and tens of thousands of sayings. Once we know the ancient sutras and read the ancient texts, then we have the will to venerate the ancients. When we have the will to venerate the ancients, the ancient sutras come to the present and manifest themselves before us. The founder

of the Han dynasty161 and the founder of the Wei dynasty162 were emperors who clarified the verses spoken by astrological phenomena and who interpreted the sayings of geological forms. When we clarify such sutras as these, we have gleaned some clarification of the three elements. The common folk [of Japan], never having been subjected to the rule of such noble rulers, do not know what it is to learn to serve a ruler or what it is to learn to serve a parent, and so we are pitiful even as subjects of a sovereign and pitiful even as members of a family. As retainers or as children,163 we vainly pass by [valuable] one-foot gems and vainly pass by [invaluable] minutes of time. There is no [Japanese] person who, having been born into an ancestry like this, would give up an important national office; we even cling to trivial official positions. This is how it is in a corrupt age: in an age of purity, [such things] might be rarely seen or heard. Living in a remote land like this and possessing lowly bodies and lives like these, if we had the opportunity to hear our fill of the Tathagata's right Dharma how could we have any hesitation about losing these lowly bodies and lives on the way? Having clung to them, for what purpose could we relinquish them later? Even if [our bodies and lives] were weighty and wise, we should not begrudge them to the Dharma. How much less [should we begrudge] bodies and lives that are lowly and mean. Lowly and mean though they are, when we ungrudgingly relinquish them for the truth and for the Dharma, they may be more noble than the highest gods and more noble than the wheel[-turning] kings. In sum, they may be more noble than all celestial gods and earthly deities and all living beings of the triple world. The First Patriarch, however, was the third son of the king of Koshi in South India. He was, to begin with, an offspring of the imperial lineage of India, a crown prince. His nobility and venerability were such that [people] in a remote nation in the Eastern Lands never knew even the forms of behavior by which they should serve him: there was no incense; there were no flowers; his seat and mat were scant; the temple buildings were inadequate. How much worse it would have been in our country, a remote island of sheer cliffs. How could we know the forms by which to revere the prince of a great nation? Even if we imitated them, they would be too intricate for us to understand: there might be different forms for lords and for the emperor, and courtesies large and small, but we would not be able to tell the difference. When we do not know how high or low we are, we do not maintain

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and rely upon the self. When we are not maintaining and relying upon the self, the most important thing to clarify is how high or low we are.

[202] The First Patriarch was the twenty-eighth successor to the Dharma 137a of Sakyamuni. The longer he remained in the state of truth, the weightier he became. That even a great and most venerable saint like this, following his master’s instruction, did not spare body and life, was in order “to transmit the Dharma” and in order “to save the living.” In China, before the First Patriarch came from the west, no one had seen a disciple of Buddha who had received the one-to-one transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor, no patriarch had given the face-to-face transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor, and no meeting buddha had ever taken place. After that time also, no [patriarchs] other than the distant descendants of the First Patriarch ever came from the west. The appearance of an udumbara flower is an easy matter: one can count the years and months of waiting [for it to happen].164 The First Patriarch’s coming from the west will never happen again. Nevertheless, even people calling themselves the distant descendants of the First Patriarch—intoxicated [like] the great fool of the kingdom of So165 and never knowing the difference between a jewel and a stone—have thought that teachers of sutras and teachers of commentaries might stand shoulder-to-shoulder with [the First Patriarch]. That is due to small knowledge and meager understanding. People who lack the right seeds of long-accumulated prajna do not become the distant descendants of the Patriarch’s truth; we should pity those who have idly wandered astray on the wrong path of names and forms. Even after the Futsu era of the Liang dynasty166 there were some who went to India. What was the use of that? It was the most extreme stupidity. Led by bad karma, they wandered astray through foreign lands. With every step they were proceeding along the wrong path of insulting the Dharma; with every step they were fleeing from their father’s homeland. What was to be gained by their going to India? Only hardship and privation in the mountains and the waters. They did not study the principle that the Western Heavens had come to the east and they did not clarify the eastward advance of the Buddha-Dharma, and so they uselessly lost their way in India. They have reputations as seekers of the Buddha-Dharma but they did not have any will to the truth with which to pursue the Buddha-Dharma, and so they did not meet a true teacher even in India. They only met fruitlessly with teachers of sutras

and teachers of commentaries. The reason is that they did not have the right state of mind with which to pursue the right Dharma, and so—even though authentic teachers were still present in India—those [wanderers] did not get their hands upon the authentic Dharma. Some who went to India claimed to have met true teachers there [but] no mention was ever heard of who those teachers were. If they had met true teachers, they would naturally name some names. There was no [meeting] and so there has been no naming.

[205] Again, there have also been many monks in China, since the ancestral master came from the west, who have continued to rely upon understanding of sutras and commentaries and so failed to investigate the authentic Dharma. They open and read sutras and commentaries but are blind to the meaning of the sutras and commentaries. This black conduct is due not only to karmic influence of conduct today but also to bad karmic influence from past lives. If, in this life, they ultimately do not hear the true secrets of the Tathagata’s teaching, and do not meet the Tathagata’s right Dharma, and are not illuminated by the Tathagata’s face-to-face transmission, and do not use the Tathagata’s buddha-mind, and do not learn the usual customs of the buddhas; then their life must be a sad one. During the Sui, Tang, and Song dynasties167 people like this abounded. Only people possessing the seeds of long-accumulated prajna have become the distant descendants of the ancestral master, some entering the gate of initiation without expectation and some liberating themselves from sand-counting,168 but all having intelligence, superior makings, and the right seeds of a right person. The stupid multitude have continued for long years to dwell only in the straw shacks of sutras and commentaries. That being so, [even the First Patriarch] did not assert that he would not retreat in the face of such severe difficulties. Even today, as we admire the profound attitude of the First Patriarch in coming from the west, if we spare the stinking bags of skin that are ourselves, in the end what will be the use of that?

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[207] Zen Master Kyogen169 said:

Making a hundred calculations and a thousand plans only for the sake of [our own] body,

We forget that the body will become dust in a grave.

Never say that the white-haired170 speak no words:

They are just the people to tell us of the underworld.

137c    So although we make hundreds of calculations and thousands of plans

to spare [the body], eventually it nonetheless turns into a pile of dust in a grave. Worse still is to be fruitlessly scampering east and west in the employ of the king and citizens of a small nation, and therein being made to suffer countless hardships through innumerable bodies and minds. Those who think light of their own body and life because of a sense of loyalty seem unable to forget the custom of ritual suicide following the death of a lord. The way ahead for those driven by [such] obligation is only dark clouds and mists. Many people since ancient times have been used by small vassals and have thus thrown away their bodies and lives in the world of common folk. These were human bodies that should have been treasured, because they could have become vessels for the state of truth. Now we have met the right Dharma, we should learn the right Dharma in practice, even if it means throwing away bodies and lives as countless as the sands of the Ganges. For what is it worth relinquishing body and life: some futile small person, or the wide, great, profound, and eternal Buddha-Dharma? There can be no cause for either the wise or the inept to vacillate between advancing and retreating. We should quietly consider that before the right Dharma has spread through the world, even if people want to abandon their body and life for the right Dharma, they cannot do so: they might dearly love to be in our place today, meeting with the right Dharma. If, having met the right Dharma, we failed to abandon body and life, we would have cause to be ashamed of ourselves: if we were ever ashamed of anything, we would have to be ashamed of this fact. So the way to repay the great kindness of the ancestral master is with one day’s conduct and observance. Have no regard for your own body and life. Do not cling to love, which is more dumb than that of birds and beasts—even if you feel love and attachment, it will not stay with you over long years. Do not remain content to rely upon family standing, which is equal to rubbish— even if you remain content at this, you will ultimately not enjoy a quiet life.

138a The Buddhist patriarchs of old were wise: they all abandoned the seven treasures and thousands of children; they speedily relinquished jeweled palaces and red-lacquered buildings, seeing them as equal to spit and tears or seeing them as equal to filth and soil. This is the manner in which the Buddhist patriarchs of the past have always recognized the kindness and repaid the kindness of the Buddhist patriarchs of the past. Even the sick sparrow did not forget

the favor it had received and was able to return the favor with [the gift of] three rings of public office.171 Even the stricken turtle did not forget the favor it had received and was able to return the favor with the seal of the office of Yofu.172 How sad it would be, while having human faces, to be more stupid than animals. Our meeting Buddha and hearing Dharma in the present is benevolence that has come from the conduct and observance of every Buddhist patriarch. If the Buddhist patriarchs had not passed on the one-to-one transmission, how could it have arrived at the present day? We should repay the kindness contained in even a single phrase. We should repay the kindness contained in even a single dharma. How then could we fail to repay our debt of gratitude for the great blessing of the right-Dharma-eye treasury, the supreme great method. We should desire to forsake, in a single day, bodies and lives as countless as the sands of the Ganges. To the dead body we have abandoned for the sake of the Dharma, we ourselves will return in age after age to make prostrations and serve offerings; and it will be venerated, honored, guarded, and praised by all gods and dragons—for the truth [of abandonment for the Dharma] is inexorable. Rumors have long been heard, from India in the west, of the brahmans’ custom of selling skulls and buying skulls: they honor the great merit in the skull and bones of a person who has heard the Law. If we fail now to abandon body and life for the truth, we will not attain the merit of hearing the Dharma. If we listen to the Dharma without regard for body and life, that listening to the Dharma will be fulfilled, and this very skull will deserve to be honored. Skulls that we do not abandon today for the truth will some day lie abandoned in the fields, bleaching in the sun, but who will do prostrations to them? Who would want to sell or buy them? We might look back with regret upon the spirit [that we showed] today. There are the examples of the demon that beat its former bones, and the god that prostrated itself to its former bones.173 When we think on to the time when we will turn emptily to dust, those who are without love and attachment now will gain appreciation in future—the emotion aroused might be something akin to a tear in the eye of a person looking on. Using the skull that will turn emptily to dust, and which may be abhorred by people, fortunately we can practice and observe the Buddha’s right Dharma. So never fear the cold. Suffering from the cold has never destroyed a person. Suffering from the cold has never destroyed the truth. Only be afraid of not training. Not training

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destroys a person and destroys the truth. Not training can destroy a person and can destroy the truth. Never fear the summer heat. The summer heat has never destroyed a person. The summer heat has never destroyed the truth. Not training can destroy a person and can destroy the truth. The acceptance of barley,174 and the gathering of bracken175 are excellent examples from the Buddhist world and the secular world. We should not be like demons and animals, thirsting after blood and thirsting after milk. Just one day of conduct and observance is the actual practice of the buddhas.

[214] Taiso, the Second Patriarch in China,176 [titled] Great Master Shoshu Fukaku, was a teacher of lofty virtue and a man of erudition, adored by both gods and demons, and esteemed by both monks and laymen. He lived for many years between the rivers Yi and Raku,177 during which time he widely read various books. He was considered to be one of the country’s rare individuals, [the like of] whom a person could not easily meet. Because of his eminence in Dharma and the weight of his virtue, a mystical being suddenly appeared and told the patriarch, “If you want to reap the fruit [of your efforts], why do you linger here? The great truth is not far away. You must go south!” The next day he suffered a sudden headache, a stabbing pain. His master, Zen Master Kozan Hojo178 of Ryumon Mountain in Rakuyo, was about to cure the pain when a voice from the sky said, “This is to change 138c the skull, it is not an ordinary pain.” Then the patriarch told the master about his meeting with the mystical being. When the master looked on top of [the patriarch’s] skull, lumps had swelled up like five mountain peaks. [Master Kozan] said, “Your physiognomy is a good omen; you will surely attain realization. The reason the mystical being told you to go south must be that the great man Bodhidharma of Shorinji is destined to become your master.”

[216] Hearing this advice, the patriarch left at once to visit Shoshitsuho Peak. The mystical being was a truth-guarding deity that belonged to [the patriarch’s] own long practice of the truth. At that time it was December, and the weather was cold. They say it was the night of the ninth day of the twelfth month. Even if there had been no great snowfall, we can imagine that a high peak deep in the mountains, on a winter night, was no place for a man to be standing on the ground outside a window: it would have been dreadful weather at that time of year, [cold enough] even to break the joints of bamboo. Nevertheless, with a great snow covering the earth, burying the

mountains and submerging the peaks, [Taiso Eka] beat a path through the snow—how severe should we suppose it was? Eventually he arrived at the patriarch’s room, but he was not allowed to enter. [The patriarch] seemed not to notice him. That night he did not sleep, did not sit, and did not rest. He stood firm, unmoving, and waited for dawn. The night snow fell as if without mercy, gradually piling up and burying him to his waist, while his falling tears froze one by one. Seeing the tears, he shed more tears; he reflected upon himself and reflected upon himself again. He thought to himself, “When people in the past sought the truth, they broke their own bones to take out the marrow,179 they drew their own blood to save others from starvation,180 they spread their own hair over mud,181 and they threw themselves off cliffs to feed tigers.182 Even the ancients were like this, and who am I?” As he thought such thoughts, his will became more and more determined. Students of later ages also should not forget what he says here: “Even the ancients were like this, and who am I?” When this is forgotten, even for an instant, there are eternal kalpas of depression. As [Taiso Eka] thought thus to himself, his determination to pursue the Dharma and to pursue the state of truth only deepened—perhaps he was like this because he did not see the means of purity as a means.183 To imagine what it was like that night, as dawn approached, is enough to burst one’s gallbladder. The hair on one’s flesh simply bristles with cold and fear. At dawn, the First Patriarch took pity on him and asked, “What are you after, standing there in the snow for such a long time?” Questioned thus, his tears of sorrow falling in ever greater profusion, the Second Patriarch said, “Solely I beg, Master, that out of compassion you will open the gate to nectar and widely save all beings.” When [Taiso Eka] had spoken thus, the First Patriarch said, “The buddhas’ supreme and wondrous state of truth is to persevere for vast kalpas to become able to practice what is hard to practice, and to endure what is beyond endurance. How can one hope to seek the true vehicle with small virtue and small wisdom, and with a trivial and conceited mind? It would be futile toil and hardship.” As he listened then, the Second Patriarch was by turns edified and encouraged. Secretly he took a sharp sword and severed his left arm. When he placed it before the master, the First Patriarch could then see that the Second Patriarch was a vessel of the Dharma. So he said, “When in the beginning the buddhas pursued the truth, they forgot their own bodies for

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the sake of the Dharma. Now you have cut off your arm before me. In your pursuit also there is something good.”

[220] From this time forward he entered the [master’s] inner sanctum. He served and attended [the master] for eight years, through thousand myriads of exertions: truly he was a great rock beneath human beings and gods and a great guiding teacher of human beings and gods. Exertion like his was unheard of even in the Western Heavens: it happened for the first time in the Eastern Lands. We learn the face breaking into a smile from the ancient [saint],184 but we learn getting the marrow under [this] patriarch.185 Let us quietly reflect: no matter how many thousand myriads of First Patriarchs had come from the west, if the Second Patriarch had not maintained the practice, there could be today no satisfaction in learning and no handling of the great matter. Now that we today have become people who see and hear the right Dharma, we should unfailingly repay our debt of gratitude to the patriarch. Extraneous methods of repayment will not do: bodies and lives are not sufficient, and nations and cities are not important. Nations and cities can be plundered by others and bequeathed to relatives and children. Bodies and lives can be given over to the impermanent;

139b they can be committed to a lord or entrusted to false ways. Therefore, to intend to repay our gratitude through such means is not the way. Simply to maintain the practice day by day: only this is the right way to repay our gratitude. The principle here is to maintain the practice so that the life of every day is not neglected, and not wasted on private pursuits. For what reason? [Because] this life of ours is a blessing left over from past maintenance of the practice; it is a great favor bestowed by maintenance of the practice, which we should hasten to repay. How lamentable, how shameful, it would be, to turn skeletons whose life has been realized through a share of the virtue of the Buddhist patriarchs’ maintenance of the practice into the idle playthings of wives and children, to abandon them to the trifling of wives and children, without regret for breaking [precepts] and debasing [pure conduct]. It is out of wrongness and madness that [people] give over their body and life to the demons186 of fame and profit. Fame and profit are the one great enemy. If we are to assign weight to fame and profit, we should really appreciate fame and profit. Really to appreciate fame and profit means never to entrust to fame and profit, and thereby cause to be destroyed, the body and life that might become a Buddhist patriarch. Appreciation of wives, children, and relatives also should be like this. Do not

study fame and profit as phantoms in a dream or flowers in space:187 study them as they are to living beings. Do not accumulate wrongs and retribution because you have failed to appreciate fame and profit. When the right eyes of learning in practice widely survey all directions, they should be like this. Even a worldly person who has any human feeling, on receiving charity through gold, silver, or precious goods, will return the kindness. The friendliness of gentle words and a gentle voice spurs, in all who have a heart, the goodwill to return the kindness. What kind of human being could ever forget the great blessing of seeing and hearing the Tathagata’s supreme right Dharma? Never to forget this [blessing] is itself a lifelong treasure. A skeleton or a skull that has never regressed or strayed in this maintenance of the practice has—at the time of life and at the time of death equally—such virtue that it deserves to be kept in a stupa of the seven treasures, and to be served offerings by all human beings and gods. Having recognized that we hold such a great debt of gratitude, we should without fail, without letting our life of dew-on-grass fall in vain, wholeheartedly repay the mountainlike virtue [of the Second Patriarch]. This is maintaining the practice. The merit of this maintaining the practice is already present in us who are maintaining the practice as patriarch or buddha. In conclusion, the First Patriarch and the Second Patriarch never founded a temple; they were free from the complicated business of mowing undergrowth,188 and the Third Patriarch and the Fourth Patriarch were also like that. The Fifth Patriarch and the Sixth Patriarch did not establish their own temples, and Seigen189 and Nangaku190 were also like that.

[225]    Great Master Sekito191 lashed together a thatched hut on a big rock and he sat upon the rock in zazen. He went without sleep day or night: there was no time when he was not sitting. He did not neglect miscellaneous chores; at the same time, he was always practicing zazen through the twelve hours.192 That Seigen’s school has now spread throughout the land, and that it is benefiting human beings and gods, is due to Sekito’s mighty firmness in maintaining the practice. Those present-day [followers of] Unmon193 and Hogen194 who have clarified something are all the Dharma descendants of Great Master Sekito.

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[226]    Zen Master Daii,195 the thirty-first patriarch, after meeting at the age of fourteen the great master who was the Third Patriarch,196 labored in his service for nine years. Having already succeeded to the ancestral customs of the Buddhist patriarchs, he regulated the mind197 and went without sleep, his side never touching a bed for a small matter of sixty years. He spread his influence over friend and foe, and his virtue pervaded [the worlds of] human beings and gods. He was the Fourth Patriarch in China.

[227] In the [seventeenth] year of Jokan,198 Emperor Taiso, admiring from afar the master’s taste of the truth, and desiring to see for himself [the master’s] style and color, issued an edict for him to come to the capital. Three times altogether the master offered to the throne letters of humble apology, eventually declining by citing ill health. The fourth time [the emperor] ordered his messenger: “If he will not come in the end, bring me his head.” The messenger went to the mountain and warned of the [emperor’s] command. The master at once stretched out his neck toward the sword, his spirit and his complexion unblenched. The messenger was astonished at this. He returned and issued his report. The emperor’s admiration grew all the stronger. He bestowed on [the master] a gift of precious silk, and let him have his own way.199

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[228] Thus, the Zen master the Fourth Patriarch did not see his body and life as his body and life. The conduct and observance that he maintained in not being close to kings and ministers200 is a singular example, encountered once in a thousand years. Emperor Taiso was a righteous ruler. A meeting with him might not have been a bore; nevertheless, we should learn in practice that the conduct and observance of our illustrious predecessors was like this. Even as a ruler of men, [the emperor] still admired a man who would stretch out his neck toward the sword, not fearing to lose body and life. This [behavior] was not without reason: [the master] valued time and was exclusively devoted to conduct and observance. Offering letters [of refusal] to the throne three times is an example rare through the ages. In present degenerate times, there are [many monks] who positively want to meet with the emperor.201 On the fourth day of the intercalary ninth lunar month in the [second] year of Eiki202 in the reign of Emperor Koso,203 [the master] suddenly bestowed upon his disciples the following exhortation: “All the dharmas of the universe are totally liberated. You must each remember this, and spread the influence of the teaching into the future.” When he had finished speaking, he sat still and died. He was seventy-two years of age. They enshrined him at the temple. On the eighth day of the fourth lunar month of the following year, the door of the shrine opened by itself, for no [apparent] reason, and the [master’s] form seemed to be alive. After that his disciples did not dare to shut the door again.

[230]    Remember, “all the dharmas of the universe are totally liberated.” Dharmas are not empty, and dharmas are not anything other than dharmas; they are dharmas that are totally liberated. Here the Fourth Patriarch has his maintenance of the practice before entering the stupa, and he has his maintenance of the practice while already in the stupa. To see and hear that the living are inevitably mortal is the small view. To be of the opinion that the dead are without thinking and perception is small knowledge. In learning the truth, do not learn such shallow knowledge and small views. There may be those among the living who are immortal, and there may be those among the dead who have thinking and perception.

[231]    Great Master Gensha Shuitsu204 of Fuzhou205 had the Dharma name of Shibi. He was from Binken county in Fuzhou. His family name was Sha. From his childhood he liked fishing. He sailed a small boat on the Nantai River, and got along with all the fishing folk. At the beginning of the Kantsu era206 of the Tang dynasty, when he was just over thirty years old, he suddenly desired to leave the [world of] dust. Abandoning his fishing boat at once, he devoted himself to the order of Zen Master Reikun207 of Fuyozan, and shed his hair. He received full ordination from Precepts Teacher Dogen of Kaigenji in Yosho.208 With patched clothes and straw shoes, and with barely enough food to sustain him, he would always be sitting in stillness all day long. All the monks thought him peculiar. From the beginning he was on good terms in that Dharma order with Seppo Gison;209 their closeness was like that between master and disciple. Seppo called [Gensha’s] hard practice “dhUta.”2m One day Seppo asked, “What is the substance of Bi of the dhutaT” The master replied, “In the end I just cannot be deceived by others.” On another day Seppo called him over and said, “Bi of the dhuta, why do you not go exploring?”211 The master said, “Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands. The Second Patriarch did not go to the Western Heavens.” Seppo approved of this.212 Eventually [Gensha] climbed Zokutsuzan213 and he and the master pooled their efforts to bind and build [a humble temple], where a group of profound individuals came together. The master [Seppo] allowed them to enter his room and glean his conclusions no matter whether

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it was dawn or dusk. If, among the students of the profound who came from all directions, there were any who had an unresolved problem, they would inevitably turn to the master and ask for his teaching. In such cases Master Seppo would say, “Ask Bi of the dhuta!” Master [Gensha], in his charity, would then duly apply himself to the task unremittingly. Such behavior would have been impossible if it were not for his outstanding conduct and observance. His conduct and observance of “sitting in stillness all day long” is a rare example of conduct and observance. There are many who vainly run after sounds and forms but few people who practice “sitting in stillness all day long.” Now, as students of later ages, and fearing that time is running out, we should practice “sitting in stillness all day long.”

[234]    Master Chokei Eryo214 was a venerable patriarch in the order of Seppo. Going back and forth between Seppo and Gensha, he learned in practice for a small matter of twenty-nine years. In those years and months he

140c sat through twenty round cushions. People today who love zazen cite Chokei as an excellent example of an adorable ancient—many adore him but few equal him. His thirty years of effort, then, were not in vain: once while he was rolling up a summer reed screen, he suddenly realized the state of great realization. In thirty years he never returned to his home country, never visited his relatives, and never chatted with those on either side of him: he just directed his effort singlemindedly.215 The master’s maintenance of the practice was for thirty years. For thirty years, he saw his doubts and hesitation as doubts and hesitation: he should be called one of steadfast sharp makings, and should be called one of great qualities. Tidings of [such] firmness of resolve are heard “sometimes following the sutras.” If we desire what we should desire and are ashamed of what we should be ashamed of, then we may be able to meet with Chokei. Honestly speaking, it is only because [people] lack the will to the truth, and lack skill in regulating their conduct, that they remain idly bound by fame and gain.

[235]    Zen Master Daien216 of Daiizan, after receiving Hyakujo’s affirmation, went directly to the steep and remote slopes of Isan Mountain and, befriending the birds and beasts, he tied together [a hut of] thatch and continued his training. He never shrank from the wind and snow. Small chestnuts served him for food. There were no temple buildings, and no provisions. Yet [here] he was to manifest his conduct and observance for forty years. Later, when the temple

had become famous throughout the country, it brought dragons and elephants tramping to it. Even if you do want to establish a place for pure conduct,217 do not set your human sentiments in motion: just be firm in your conduct and observance of the Buddha-Dharma. A place where there is training but no building is the practice place of eternal buddhas. We have heard from afar rumors of practice done on open ground or under a tree. These places have become sanctuaries218 forever. If a place contains the conduct and observance of just one person, it will be transmitted as a practice place of the buddhas. We should never let ourselves be wasted, as the stupid people of a degenerate age, on the futile construction of buildings. The Buddhist patriarchs never desired buildings. Those who have not yet clarified their own eyes and yet vainly construct temple halls and buildings are absolutely not serving offerings of Buddhist buildings to the buddhas: they are making their own dens of fame and gain.

[238] We should quietly imagine conduct and observance on Isan Mountain in those days of old. “Imagining” means thinking what it would be like for us now to be living on Isan Mountain: deep in the night, the sound of rain with such force that it might not only cut through moss but even drill through rocks. On a snowy winter night, birds and wild animals would be few and far between; how much less might smoke from human chimneys be able to know us? It was a vigorous existence that could not have been so without conduct and observance in which [Master Isan] thought light of his own life and assigned weight to the Dharma. He was in no hurry to mow the undergrowth; he did not busy himself with construction work: he solely trained himself in conduct and observance, and strove in pursuit of the state of truth.219 It is pitiable that an authentic patriarch who had received and maintained the right Dharma was troubled in the mountains by so much steep and rocky hardship. They say that Isan Mountain has ponds and streams, so the ice and fog must have been thick. It was a life of seclusion beyond a human being’s endurance. Nevertheless, it is evident that his Buddhist state of truth and the profound solitude merged into one reality~we see and hear expressions of the truth that he practiced and observed in this state. We should not hear [these expressions] in a nonchalant posture. At the same time, conduct and observance does not recognize the debt of gratitude that we must strive to repay. That being so, even if we were listening nonchalantly, when we imagine

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the Isan Mountain of those days as if it were before our eyes in the present, how could any human-hearted student of later ages fail to be moved? Through the bodhi-power and the teaching influence of this conduct and observance on Isan Mountain, the wheel of wind220 does not move, the world is not broken, 141b the palaces of gods are peaceful, and human nations are preserved. Even to those who are not the distant descendants of Isan, Isan may be an ancestral patriarch. Latterly, Kyozan221 came there and served him. Kyozan himself had been, in the order of the late master Hyakujo,222 a Sariputra223 with a hundred answers for every ten questions. Yet he waited upon Isan, spending a further three years of effort watching over a buffalo.224 This was conduct and observance that in recent times has become extinct: it is nowhere to be seen or heard. The three years of watching over the buffalo made it needless for him to ask any person to speak an expression of the truth.

[241] Patriarch [Do]kai225 of Fuyozan was solely a font of realization of conduct and observance. When the ruler of the nation bestowed upon him the title of Zen Master Josho and a padded purple226 garment, the patriarch did not accept them; he wrote letters to the throne in which he politely refused them. The king was reproachful, but the master did not accept them in the end. His diluted gruel227 has transmitted to us the taste of Dharma. When he made his hut on Fuyozan, the monks and laymen who flocked there numbered in the hundreds, but on a daily ration of one bowl of gruel, many withdrew. The master, according to his vow, did not go to meals offered by donors. On one occasion he preached to the assembly as follows:

In general, because those who have left family life dislike dusty (secular) toil, and seek to get free of life and death, we rest the mind, cease mental images, and cut off ensnaring involvements; therefore we are called those who have left family life. How could we regard offerings lightly and use them to indulge in a common life? We should straightaway let go of duality, and abandon the middle too. When we meet sounds and meet sights, we should be like rocks upon which flowers have been planted. When we see advantage and see fame, we should be as if dust has got into our eyes. Moreover, it is not that, since times without beginning, we have never before passed through [such detachment]. Neither is it that we do not know the condition. If we do not go beyond turning the head into a tail, [however,] we remain in that [upside-down] state.228

Why should we suffer the pain of greed and love? If we do not put an end to them here and now, what other time can we expect? Therefore, the saints of the past taught people that it is solely vital to exhaust the moment of the present. When we are able to exhaust the moment of the present, what further problems can there be? When we have got the state in which there are no problems in our mind, even a Buddhist patriarch will be like an enemy. When everything in the world is naturally cool and pale229 we will then accord with the ideal230 for the first time.

Do you not remember Ryuzan,231 who would not see anyone to his dying day. And Joshu,232 who had nothing to tell anyone to his dying day. Hentan233 gathered chestnuts for his meals. Daibai234 used lotus leaves as his clothes. Practitioner Shie235 wore only paper. Veteran monk Gentai236 wore only cotton. Sekiso237 established a withered tree hall238 where he sat and slept with the monks, wanting only to master his own mind. Tosu239 had others take care of the rice, which they boiled together and ate in common: he wanted to be able to concentrate on his own original task. Now, in the saints listed above there is such distinction. If they had been without [such] excellence, how could we delight in them?

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Friends! If you too physically master this state, you will truly be faultless people. If, on the other hand, you fail to experience it directly, I am deeply afraid that in the future you will exhaust your energy in vain. Though there is nothing to attach to in the behavior of this mountain monk,240 I have been privileged to become master of the temple: how could I sit by while our provisions were used up in vain, suddenly forgetting the legacy of the past saints? Now I hope to demonstrate, as best I am able, the attitude in which people of old lived as temple masters. I have discussed it with everyone and we have decided not to go down from the mountain, not to go to meals offered by donors, and not to have a monk in charge of raising donations;241 instead, we will ration the annual produce of the fields of this temple into three hundred and sixty equal parts, and use one ration every day, without increasing or reducing [the ration] according to the [number of] people [in the order]. If there is enough to make boiled rice, then we shall make rice; if there is not enough to make boiled rice, then we shall make gruel; if there is not enough to make gruel, then we shall make rice water. To welcome a newcomer we shall just have [plain] tea, not a tea ceremony. We will simply provide a tearoom, which each person may visit and use individually. We shall do our best to sever involvements and to pursue the state of truth solely.

Still more, vigorous activity surrounds us in abundance. There is no scarcity of beautiful scenery. The flowers know how to laugh, and the birds know how to sing. The timber horses whinny, and the stone bulls gallop. Beyond the sky, the greenness of the mountains fades. Beside our ears, the babbling spring loses its voice. On mountain peaks monkeys are squeaking. Dew moistens the moon in the sky. In the woods cranes call. The wind swirls around the pines in the clear light of dawn. When the spring breezes blow, withered trees sing dragon songs.242 The autumn leaves shrivel and the frozen forest scatters flowers. On the precious-stone steps are laid patchworks of moss. People’s faces have the [mild] air of haze and mist. Sounds are still. Situations are just as they are. In the sheer peace and solemnity, there is nothing to pursue.

Before you all today, this mountain monk is preaching [the traditional teaching of] our lineage, which is just not to attach to expedients. Why should it ever be necessary to ascend [the seat of formal preaching in the Dharma] hall or to have entry into the [master’s] room; or to take up the clapper or stand up the whisk; or to yell to the east and put a staff to the west; or to tense the brows and glare with the eyes, as if having an epileptic fit? That not only dismays veteran monks, it also insults the saints of the past. Do you not remember that Bodhidharma came from the west to the foot of Shoshitsuzan and faced the wall for nine years? And the Second Patriarch, standing in the snow and cutting off his arm, suffered what can only be described as hardship. Still, Bod-hidharma never set down a single word and the Second Patriarch never requested a single phrase. Yet can we say that Bodhidharma did not teach others? Can we say that the Second Patriarch had not wanted to find a teacher? Whenever I come to preach about the behavior of the ancient saints, I always feel that there is nowhere to put myself, so ashamed am I of our weakness as people of later ages. How then could

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we serve each other offerings of exotic and delicious meals of a hundred tastes? We are equipped with the four things,243 and so we must establish the mind at once: having said that, I am only afraid that the behavior of our hands and feet is so imperfect that we will pass remotely through lives and pass remotely through ages. Time is like an arrow, and we should profoundly hate to be losing it.

Although we are like this, still it is a fact that other people, relying upon their merits, have been delivered. This mountain monk is unable to force the teaching upon you, but, my friends, have you ever read the following verse by a person of old?244

Our meal is boiled foxtail millet, reaped from the mountain fields, For vegetables we have faded yellow pickles:

Whether you eat them is up to you.

If you choose not to eat, you are free to go east or west.

With due respect, fellow practitioners, may each of you be diligent. Take good care of yourselves.245

This is the very bones and marrow transmitted one-to-one by the ancestral patriarchs. There are many examples of [this] founding patriarch’s conduct and observance, but for the present I have just cited this one instance. We students of later ages should long for, and learn in practice, the conduct and observance that the founding patriarch Fuyo practiced and refined on Fuyozan. It is just the right standard of behavior [established at] Jetavana Park.246

[250] Zen Master Daijaku247 of Kaigenji in Kozei, in the Koshu district,248 whose name in his lifetime was Doitsu, was from Juppoken county in Kan-shu.249 He served under Nangaku for more than ten years. Once he decided to visit his old home town, and he got halfway there. At half way he returned, and burned incense and performed prostrations, whereupon Nangaku wrote the following verse and gave it to Baso:

I recommend you not to return home,

If you return home the truth will go unpracticed.

Old women in the neighborhood Will call you by your old name.

142b    He gave this Dharma preaching to Baso, who received it with veneration,

and vowed, “I shall never in any life travel toward Kanshu.” Having made this vow, he never walked a single step toward the Kanshu district; he lived in Kozei for the rest of his life, letting [monks from] the ten directions come to him. He expressed the truth only as, “The mind here and now is buddha,” besides which he had not a single word of teaching for others. Even so, he was the rightful heir of Nangaku, and the lifeblood of human beings and gods.

[252]    Just what is “not to return home”? How are we to understand “not to return home”? Returning to and from the east, west, south, and north is only our own selfish falling down and getting up: truly, “when we return home, the truth goes unpracticed.” [But] is the conduct of “returning home” maintained as “the truth going unpracticed”? Is the conduct maintained as beyond “returning home”?250 Why is “returning home, the truth going unpracticed”? Is it hindered by non-practice? Is it hindered by self? [Nangaku] is not arguing that “Old women in the neighborhood will call you by your old name.” [His words] are the expression of the truth of “old women in the neighborhood calling you by your old name.”251 By what means does Nangaku possess this expression of the truth? By what means does Baso grasp these words of Dharma? The truth in question is that when we are going south, the whole earth similarly is going south. For other directions also the same must be true. To doubt that it is so, using Sumeru or the great ocean as a scale, and to hesitate, using the sun, moon, and stars as benchmarks: this is the small view.

[253]    The thirty-second patriarch, Zen Master Daiman,252 was from Obai. His secular name was Shu: this was his mother’s surname. The master was born fatherless, as for example was Laozi.253 He received the Dharma at seven years of age,254 after which, until the age of seventy-four, he exactly dwelled in and maintained the Buddhist patriarchs’ right-Dharma-eye treasury. His secret transmission of the robe and the Dharma to the laborer Eno255 was conduct and observance in a class by itself. He did not let Jinshu256 know

142c about the robe and the Dharma but transmitted them to Eno, and because of this, the lifetime of the right Dharma has been uninterrupted.

[254]    My late master Tendo257 was from the Etsu area.258 When he was nineteen he abandoned philosophical study for learning in practice, after

which he did not regress at all, even into his seventies. He was given a purple robe and a master’s title259 from the emperor260 during the Kajo era,261 but he did not accept them at last. He wrote letters to the throne declining and expressing thanks. Monks in the ten directions all revered him deeply for this. The wise, far and near, all rejoiced. The emperor himself was delighted and presented him with a gift of tea. Those who knew what had happened praised the event as rare through the ages. Truly, this was real conduct and observance. The reason is that to love fame is worse than to break the precepts. To break the precepts is a momentary wrong: love of fame is a lifetime encumbrance. Do not, out of stupidity, fail to abandon [fame], and do not, out of ignorance, accept it. Not to accept it is conduct and observance. To abandon it is conduct and observance. That the six ancestral masters262 each has a master’s title is, in every case, because an emperor decreed it after their death, not because they loved fame while they were in the world. So we should swiftly abandon the love of fame which is [the cause of suffering in] life and death, and we should aspire to the conduct and observance of the Buddhist patriarchs. Do not, through rapacious love, be equal to the birds and beasts. Greedily to love the trivial self is an emotion possessed by the birds and beasts, a mental state possessed by animals. Even among human beings and gods, abandonment of fame and gain is considered unusual. But no Buddhist patriarch has ever failed to abandon them. Some have said that greed for fame and love of profit can work to the benefit of living beings, but their argument is grossly mistaken: they are non-Buddhists attaching themselves to the Buddha-Dharma; they are a band of demons who malign the right Dharma. If what they say is true, does it mean that the Buddhist patriarchs, having no greed for fame and profit, are of no benefit to living beings? That is laughable, laughable. There are [people other than Buddhist patriarchs], also, who benefit the living without greed—is it not so? Those who do not study such limitlessly many instances of benefiting the living, and who describe as “benefiting the living” what does not benefit the living, I say again: they may be demons. Living beings benefited by them might be beings destined to fall into hell. They should lament that they have spent their whole life in darkness; they should never claim that their stupidity benefits the living. Thus, though the master’s title was the emperor’s benevolent gift, writing a letter to decline it is an excellent example from the eternal past, and it may be

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research for students of later ages. I met the late master in person: it was to meet a human being. From the age of nineteen, when my late master left his home district to go in search of teachers, he had striven in pursuit of the truth to the age of sixty-five,263 without regressing and without straying at all. He did not get close to emperors and he was not seen by emperors. He was not on intimate terms with ministers and he was not on intimate terms with officials. Not only did he decline the purple robe and the master’s title but also, his whole life through, he never wore a kasaya of patterned cloth. For formal preaching in the Dharma hall, or for [accepting] entry into the master’s room, he always wore a black kasaya and black monk’s robes. He instructed the monks as follows:

In practicing [za]zen264 and learning the truth, the most important thing is to have the will to the truth: it is the starting point of learning the truth. For two hundred years now, the truth of the ancestral master has been falling into disuse—it is lamentable. Needless to say, then, that skinbags who have expressed the truth, in even a single phrase, are few and far between.

[259] In former days I hung my traveling staff at Kinzan Moun-tain,265 at which time the head of the table was Ko Bussho.266 In formal preaching in the Dharma hall he said, “In the Buddha-Dharma, the Way of Zen, you need not seek the words of others. Let each of you grasp the principle by yourself!” So saying, he paid no attention whatsoever to what happened inside the monks’ hall. The monks, senior and junior, also were totally unconcerned; they were only interested in meeting and courting official guests. Bussho was singularly ignorant of the pivot of the Buddha-Dharma; he only craved fame and loved gain. If we could each grasp the principle of the Buddha-Dharma by ourself, how could there be old drills who went looking for teachers and searching out the truth? Truly, Ko Bussho never experienced [za]zen267 at all. Old veterans in all directions today who have no will to the truth are solely the offspring of Ko Bussho. How can the Buddha-Dharma exist in their hands? It is so regrettable, so very regrettable.

When he spoke like this, Bussho’s children and grandchildren would often be listening, but they did not resent him.

[261] Again [Master Tendo] said, “Practicing [za]zen is the dropping off of body and mind. We need not burn incense, do prostrations, recite the Buddha’s name, confess, or read sutras. When we are just sitting, we have attainment from the beginning.”

In truth, through all directions of the great kingdom of Song today, the skinbags who profess to be Zen practitioners, and who call themselves the descendants of the ancestral founders, number not only one or two hundred: they are [as numerous as] rice, flax, bamboos, and reeds. Nevertheless, we hear no rumor at all of any who recommends sitting for the purpose of sitting. Between the four oceans and the five lakes, only my late master Tendo did so. [Monks in] all directions praised Tendo with one voice, but Tendo did not praise [the monks of] all directions. At the same time, there were leaders of great temples who did not know of Tendo at all. This was because, although they were born in China as the center of civilization, they might be a lower species of bird or beast, who did not serve where they should have served but idly squandered their time. It is pitiful that people who never knew Tendo mistook the clamor of outlandish preaching and confused assertions for the traditional customs of the Buddhist patriarchs. My late master would usually say in his informal preaching:

From the age of nineteen, I widely visited monasteries in all directions, but there was no master who could teach people. Since the age of nineteen, I have not passed a single day or a single night without flattening the round cushion. Before the time when I took residence [as master] of a temple, I did not converse with the people of villages, because time is too precious. At places where I hung my traveling staff, I never entered or saw inside a hut or dormitory.268 How much less could I expend effort on outings and jaunts among the mountains and waters? Besides sitting in zazen in the cloud hall and the common areas, I would sit in zazen at quiet and convenient places, going alone to an upper floor or in search of some secluded spot. I always carried a round cushion inside my sleeve,269 and sometimes I would even sit in zazen at the base of a crag. I always felt I would like to sit through the diamond seat270—that was the end which I hoped to gain. There were times when the flesh of my buttocks swelled up and burst. At these times, I liked zazen all the more. This year I am sixty-five. My bones are old and my brain is dull;

I do not understand zazen. Even so, out of compassion for my brothers in the ten directions, I have become abbot of this temple, so as to counsel those who come from [all] quarters and to transmit the truth to the monks of the assembly. How can the Buddha-Dharma exist in the orders of the old veterans in all directions? So I preach like this in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, and I preach like this in my informal preaching.

Further, he would not accept gifts of personal salutation from the monks who came from all directions.

[264] Minister Cho271 was of the ancestral line of the sacred sovereign272 of the Kajo era;273 he was a general of the Minshu274 army, and the District Envoy for Promotion of Agriculture. When he invited my late master to come to the capital of the district and to ascend the seat of formal preaching, he presented a donation of ten thousand pieces of silver. After my late master had finished his formal preaching, he thanked the minister and said, “As is the custom, I have left my temple and ascended the seat of formal preaching, and I have proclaimed the right-Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, in order respectfully to offer happiness to your late father in the realm of the departed. But I would not dare to accept this silver. Monks have no need for this kind of thing. With thousands and tens of thousands of thanks for your generosity, I will humbly return [the silver] as it formerly was.” The minister said, “Master, this humble officer is fortunate to be the relative of his majesty the emperor, so I am honored wherever I go, and I have riches in veritable abundance. Today is the day to celebrate my late father’s happiness in the next world, and so I wished to contribute something to the realm of the departed. Master, why will you not accept? This has been a day of abundant happiness. In your great kindness and great compassion, retain without further ado this small donation.”275 My late master said, “Minister! Your order is a very grave matter, and I dare not decline. I only have [the following] excuse. When I ascended the seat of formal preaching and preached the Dharma, was the minister able to hear me clearly or not?” The minister said, “This humble officer listened with pure joy.” My late master said, “Minister, you have appreciated my words sagaciously, and I cannot hide my awe. I would like to ask further, while you graced us with your kind attendance, conferring great happiness, and this mountain monk was upon the lecture seat, what Dharma was I able to preach? Try to express it yourself. If you are able to express it, I shall respectfully accept the ten thousand pieces of silver. If you are unable to express it, then let your emissaries keep the silver.” [Cho] Teikyo rose and said to my late master, “With respect, Master, this morning your Dharma presence, your movement and stillness, were full of health and happiness.” My late master said, “That is [only] the state that I manifested. What state did you get by listening?” The minister faltered. My late master said, “The happiness of the departed has been roundly realized. Let us leave the contribution to the decision of your late father himself.” So saying, [the master] took his leave and [Cho] Teikyo said, “I do not resent your not accepting [the gift]. I am very glad to have met you.” With these words, he saw my late master off. Many monks and laypeople, east and west of the Setsu River,276 praised this event, which was recorded in the diary of the attendant monk Hei. Attendant monk Hei said, “This old master is a person [whose like] cannot be found. How could he be easily met anywhere else?” Is there any among people in all directions who would not have accepted the ten thousand pieces of silver? A person of old said, “When we see gold, silver, pearls, and jewels, we should see them as filth and soil.” Even if we see them as gold and silver, it is the traditional custom of monks not to accept them. In my late master this observance was present. In other people this observance was absent. My late master always used to say, “There has not been a counselor like me for three hundred years. You must all painstakingly strive in pursuit of the truth.”

[269] In the order of my late master, there was a certain Dosho, a man from the Minshu district of the western province of Shoku,277 who belonged to the Daoist tradition. He was in a group of five companions who together made the following vow: “In our lifetimes we shall grasp the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, or else we shall never return to our home country.” My late master was especially delighted at this, and he let them walk and practice the truth278 as one with the monks. When arranging them in order, [however,] he positioned them below the bhiksunis219——an excellent example, rare through the ages.280 In another case, a monk from Fukushu,281 whose name was Zennyo, made the following vow: “Zennyo shall never in this life travel one step toward the south282 but shall solely partake in the Buddhist

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patriarchs’ great truth.” There were many such characters in the order of my 144b late master—I saw them with my own eyes. Though absent from the orders of other masters, this was the conduct and observance of the [true] order of monks in the great kingdom of Song. It is sad that this attitude of mind is absent among us [Japanese]. We are like this even in an age when we can meet the Buddha-Dharma: in an age when we could not meet the Buddha-Dharma, our bodies and minds would be beyond even shame.

[271] Let us quietly consider: a lifetime is not so long, [and yet] if we are able to speak the words of a Buddhist patriarch—even if three and three [words] or two and two—we will have expressed the state of truth of the Buddhist patriarchs themselves. Why? [Because] the Buddhist patriarchs are the oneness of body and mind, and so the one word or the two words will be totally the warm body-and-mind of a Buddhist patriarch. That body-and-mind comes to us and expresses as the truth our own body-and-mind. At just the moment of speaking, the state of expressing the truth comes and expresses our own body-and-mind. It may be that “with this life we can express the body that is the accumulation of past lives.”283 Therefore, when we become buddha or become a patriarch, we go beyond being buddha and go beyond being a patriarch.284 Words spoken by conduct and observance, [even if only] three and three or two and two, are like this. Do not chase after the empty sounds and forms of fame and gain. Not to chase them may be the conduct and observance transmitted one-to-one by the Buddhist patriarchs. I recommend you, whether you are a great hermit or a small hermit,285 a whole person or half a person, throw away the ten thousand things and the myriad involvements, and maintain the practice of conduct and observance in the state of the Buddhist patriarchs.

Shobogenzo Gyoji

Written at Kannondorikoshohorinji, on the fifth day of the fourth lunar month in the third year of Ninji.286

Notes

1    Gyoji. Gyo, “conduct” or “practice,” can be interpreted as standing for bongyo, which represents the Sanskrit brahmacarya, “pure conduct.” Ji, “maintaining” or “keeping,” can be interpreted as standing for jikai, “keeping the precepts” or “observing the rules of discipline.” The phrase jikai-bongyo appears, for example, in Chapter One (Vol. I), Bendowa, paragraph 51. Alternatively, gyoji can be interpreted as “maintaining the practice.”

2    Katsu[te] zenna [se] zu means there has been no separation of means and end. Master Dogen’s Zazenshin, in Chapter Twenty-seven, says “There has been no taintedness.”

3    Grasping of conduct and observance is a state of action, not a state of intellectual enlightenment.

4    In other words, conduct and observance is reality; “dependent origination” is only an explanation of reality.

5    Makyo, “polishing a mirror,” means practice in the Buddhist state (see, for example, Chapter Twenty [Vol. I], Kokyo). Hakyo, “breaking a mirror,” means getting free of idealism.

6    Alludes to the parable in the Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”) chapter of the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.236.

7    Eji su. In this compound, e, “clothing,” functions as object and ji, “retain,” functions as verb.

8    The large robe. See Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Kesa-kudoku.

9    Counting Sakyamuni Buddha as the seventh of the seven ancient buddhas.

10    “Maintained the practice of’ is gyoji su. See notes 1 and 7.

11    Ascetic practices listed, for example, in the Daibikusanzenyuigikyo (Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms for Ordained Monks), and the Bussetsujun izudakyo (Sutra of the Twelve Dhutas Preached by the Buddha). The section in quotes is a direct quotation from the Chinese.

12    Represents the sound of a Sanskrit word; the original word has not been traced.

13    Kinhin, from the Sanskrit cankrama. The traditional rule for kinhin in Japan is issoku-hanpo, “one breath per half-step.”

14    Represents the sound of the Sanskrit naisadyika.

15    Daigo. The Spahn/Hadamitzky Japanese Character Dictionary gives dai as “whey” and go as “a kind of butter-cream.” In Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1 no. 8, Master Baso’s feeling of satisfaction on hearing the teaching of Master Nangaku Ejo is described as “like having drunk daigo. ”

16    Counting Master Mahakasyapa as the first patriarch in India.

17    The inclusive and integrated state of truth.

18    Sanzo, lit., “three stores,” i.e., the Tripitaka, “three baskets”: Sutra, Vinaya (precepts), and Abhidharma (commentaries).

19    Hachi-gedatsu, from the Sanskrit asta vimoksah.

20    The paragraph is in the form of a quotation, written in Chinese characters only, but the source has not been traced.

21    Shiken (“four views”) are the views of human beings, demons, fish, and gods who see water as water, pus, a palace, and a string of pearls, respectively. See, for example, Chapter Three (Vol. I), Genjo-koan; Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I), Sansuigyo.

22    Bendo-kufu means to make effort in zazen.

23    Master Daikan Eno (638-713), successor of Master Daiman Konin.

24    Obai means Master Daiman Konin. Obai was the name of the mountain where he lived.

25    Shusse, “to manifest oneself in the world,” means to become the master of a big temple.

26    Gyoji. See note 1.

27    Master Baso Doitsu (704-788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejo.

28    Shin-in, short for butsu-shin-in, “buddha-mind-seal” which, in Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), Zanmai-o-zanmai, Master Dogen identifies with the full lotus posture.

29    Master Ungan Donjo (782-841), successor of Master Yakusan Igen and the thirty-seventh patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage.

30    Master Dogo Enchi (769-835), also a successor of Master Yakusan Igen.

31    Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869), successor of Master Ungan. Great Master Gohon is his posthumous title.

32    Ippenliterally, “one piece.” In the Fukanzazengi, Shinpitsubon, alluding to these words, Master Dogen teaches: “Forgetting circumstances forever, to naturally realize wholeness. This is the secret of zazen.”

33    Master Ungo Doyo (?-902), successor of Master Tozan and the thirty-ninth patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage. Great Master Kokaku is his posthumous title.

34    Sanpo-an was the name of Master Ungo ’s hut itself. Sanpo is the name of the mountain and an means hut, cell, or hermitage.

35    Legend says that when Buddhist practitioners are pursuing enlightenment, they are served meals by angels, but after they realize the truth the angels do not come any more.

36    Master Hyakujo Ekai (749-814), successor of Master Baso Doitsu. Master Daichi is his posthumous title.

37    Master Hyakujo was instrumental in establishing the customs of Zen monasteries in China. He compiled the Koshingi (Old Pure Criteria), which later formed the basis for the Zen ’enshingia work frequently quoted in the Shobogenzo.

38    Master Kyosei Dofu (864-937), successor of Master Seppo Gison. He later became master of Ryusatsuji.

39    Buddhist practitioners, when they are doing Buddhist practice, are said to be invisible to gods and demons.

40    Master Sanpei Gichu (781-872), successor of Master Daiten Hotsu (d. 819). He first studied under Master Shakkyo.

41    Master Enchi Daian (d. 883), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai. One of his elder brothers in Master Hyakujo’s order was Master Isan Reiyu (771-853). When Isan became the master of Daii Mountain, Master Enchi helped him run the temple; after Master Isan’s death, Master Enchi became the second master of Daii Mountain.

42    The quotation in Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajotaken from the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 9, says thirty years. It is possible that in this chapter Master Dogen was quoting from memory.

43    Ibid., “Isan Zen.”

44    Ibid., “watch over.”

45    Master Joshu Jushin (778-897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan.

46    In present-day Hopeh, in northeast China.

47    Byoshakuthe canteen and staff, are two of the eighteen possessions a monk is supposed to have. Shaku stands for shakujd, lit., “tin and staff,” a wooden staff with a metal top holding metal rings (Sanskrit: khakkhara). The rings are intended to rattle as the monk walks, so as to warn off wild animals.

48    Master Dogen paraphrases the same words of Master Joshu in Chapter Eight (Vol. I), Raihai-tokuzui.

49    Zenka a corridor in front of the zazen hall proper where the temple officers sit.

50    Koka a washstand located behind the zazen hall.

51    Sorin, lit., “thicket-forest,” represents the Sanskritpindavana, which literally means a round mass of forest, a clump of trees, and by extension a gathering of Buddhist practitioners at one place. Usually, sorin suggests a place for Buddhist practice.

52    A slightly different version is quoted in Chapter Thirty-nine, Dotoku. Again, it is possible that Master Dogen was quoting from memory.

53    Fu-akan suggests someone who does not talk about Buddhism but just lives quietly in a Buddhist temple.

54    Sun-in, literally, “an inch of shadow.”

55    The four subjects of these four sentences may be understood as a progression through four phases: 1) nyu, “entry” into Buddhist practice with the ideal of realizing the truth; 2) shutsu, “getting out” of the area of idealism (while remaining in the area of Buddhist practice); 3) realizing choro, “the way of the birds,” that is, the path by which all interferences are transcended; 4) realizing henkai, “the entire universe” or the Dharma itself.

56    Master Daibai Hojo (752-839), successor of Master Baso Doitsu.

57    In present-day Hupei province in east China.

58    Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 3, no. 79.

59    Master Enkan Saian (?-842), also a successor of Master Baso Doitsu.

60    Kozei is where Master Baso had his order.

61    Eijin, “people from Ei,” were renowned as accomplished singers of vulgar songs. Here “people from Ei” suggests Buddhist masters who attracted popularity.

62    The master’s name Daibai means “Great Plum.”

63    Master Tenryu, successor of Master Daibai Hojo. His history is not known, but he is famous for transmitting “one-finger Zen” to Master Gutei.

64    Master Gutei (dates unknown), successor of Master Tenryu. He used to live in a hut but at the instigation of a nun who scolded him, he set off to visit many masters and met Master Tenryu. He is said to have realized the truth when Master Tenryu showed him one finger. Thereafter, in answer to all questions, Master Gutei just showed one finger.

65    Dates unknown.

66    Tigers and elephants symbolize excellent Buddhist practitioners.

67    Master Goso Hoen (1024-1104), successor of Master Hakuun Shutan.

68    Goso means Gosozan, lit., “Fifth Patriarch Mountain”; this is the mountain from where Master Daiman Konin spread the Dharma. It is in present-day Hupei province in east China.

69    Master Yogi Hoe (992-1049), successor of Master Sekiso Soen and succeeded by Master Hakuun Shutan.

70    Kotei (Ch. Huangdi), supposed to have reigned 2697-2597 B.C.E.

71    Reigned 2356-2255 B.C.E.

72    Reigned 2255-2205 B.C.E. These three emperors, Kotei, Gyo, and Shun, belong to the period of Chinese history called the legendary age of the five rulers.

73 Shishi (Ch. Shizi), is the name of the book and also the name of the author, Shishi. The book was written in the Warring States era (475-221 B.C.E.) of the Zhou dynasty.

74    Meido, “hall of brightness,” means the building where the emperor conducted political

business.

75    The legend of the Yellow Emperor’s visit to the Daoist sage Kosei is described in Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I), Sansuigyo.

76    Master Nansen Fugan (748-834), successor of Master Baso Doitsu.

77    Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 18.

78    Master Wanshi Shogaku (1091-1157), successor of Master Tanka Shijun. See Chapter Twenty- seven, Zazensh in.

79    Daibyakuhozan, lit., “Big White Mountain,” is another name of Mount Tendo, where Master Dogen met Master Tendo Nyojo.

80    A poem by O Kokyo, a Chinese poet of the Later Jin dynasty (936-946), says: “Small hermits conceal themselves in hills and thickets,/Great hermits conceal themselves in palaces and towns.”

81    Alludes to Lotus Sutra, Anrakugyo (“Peaceful and Joyful Practice”): “It is like the king releasing from his topknot/The bright pearl, and giving it./This sutra is honored/As supreme among all sutras,/I have always guarded it,/And not revealed it at random./Now is just the time/To preach it for you all.” (LS 2.276-78.) Nonrealization, that is, the real state that is beyond realization, is already present. At the same time, it is not simply the materialistic denial of enlightenment, which can easily be grasped by anyone.

82    Master Daiji Kanchu (780-862), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai.

83    Setsu, to[ku] means 1) to explain in words, and 2), to preach or manifest in action or in words. See, for example, Chapter Thirty-eight, Muchu-setsumu; Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), Sesshin-sessho.

84    The original units corresponding to inch, foot, and yard are sun, shaku, jo. One sun is 1.193 inches; ten sun (11.93 inches) is one shaku; and ten shaku (119.3 inches) is one jo. Shinj i-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 77; Keitokudentoroku, chapter 9.

85    Kanchu [no] ji-i-do means, in the first case, words that Kanchu expresses through his own intention, and in the second case, words that naturally emerge from Kanchu. Ji mizuka[ra]onozuka[ra] means both “oneself’ and “naturally.”

86    Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869), successor of Master Ungan Donjo and the thirty-eigth patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage.

87    Keitokudentoroku, chapter 9.

88    Master Ungo Doyo (?-902), successor of Master Tozan and the thirty-ninth patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage. Great Master Kokaku is his posthumous title.

89    The words of Master Joshu, quoted in paragraph 139 of this chapter. In Chapter Thirty-nine, Dotoku, Master Dogen asserts that to spend a lifetime without leaving the monastery is to express the truth.

90    The story of the monk who expressed the truth by washing his head and going before Master Seppo Gison to have his head shaved is also contained in Chapter Thirty-nine, Dotoku.

91    The words of the Buddha, quoted in Keitokuden toroku, chapter 2, in the section on Master Samghanandi.

92    See Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Kokyo.

93    Master Nangaku Ejo (677-744), successor of Master Daikan Eno. Zen Master Daie is his posthumous title.

94    Master Daikan Eno. See paragraph 129.

95    Alludes to the words of Master Yoka Genkaku in the Shodoka: “A person who is through with study and free of doing, who is at ease in the truth, does not try to get rid of delusion and does not want to get reality.” See also Vol. I, Appendix Two, Fukanzazengi.

96    Master Nangaku’s words to Master Daikan Eno after he had been in Master Daikan Eno’s order for eight years. See Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan.

97    Master Kyogen Chikan (?-898), successor of Master Isan Reiyu.

98    Master Isan Reiyu.

99    Master Nan’yo Echu (?-775), successor of Master Daikan Eno. National Master Daisho is his title as the teacher of the emperor.

100    Master Rinzai Gigen (815?-867), successor of Master Obaku. Great Master Esho is his posthumous title.

101    Master Obaku Kiun (d. ca. 855), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai.

102    Master Bokushu Domyo (780?-877?), successor of Master Obaku. Chin-sonshuku, Venerable Patriarch Chin, was a name given to him later.

103    Master Koan Daigu (780-862), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai.

104    The story of Master Rinzai’s encounters with the masters Bokushu, Obaku, and Daigu is recorded in the Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 27.

105    Soseki generally refers to the Buddhist lineages in China stemming from Master Bodhidharma.

106    Master Tokusan Senkan (780-865), successor of Master Ryutan Soshin. See, for example, Chapters Eighteen and Nineteen (Vol. I), Shin-fukatoku.

107    Gyogo-junitsu. The four characters come directly from the story quoted in the Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 27.

108    Quoted from the Rinzaizenjigoroku.

109    Saisho-dosha, “one of the way of planting pines,” is another name for the Fifth Patriarch in China, Master Daiman Konin (688-761). See Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho, paragraph 22.

110    Daian-shoja. Shoja literally means “spiritual house” or “spiritual hut”suggesting that the temple was not grand.

111    The story of Master Obaku’s encounter with Prime Minister Hai is recorded in the Sh inji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 9.

112    Emperor Senso reigned 847-860.

113    Emperor Kenso reigned 806-821.

114    Emperor Bokusho reigned 821-825.

115    It was customary in the Chinese court to conduct political business first thing in the morning.

116    Ryusho, “dragon dais,” a raised platform serving as the emperor’s throne.

117    Eichu, literally, “excellent helmet.”

118    824.

119    Emperor Keiso reigned 825-827.

120    The historical records say that Emperor Bunso reigned 827-841.

121    Emperor Buso reigned 841-847.

122    841-847.

123    Master Kyogen Chikan (see paragraph 169).

124    Master Kankei Shikan (?-895), mentioned earlier in this chapter in paragraph 141; a successor of Master Rinzai.

125    Ryozan (Ch. Lushan), is a mountain famed for its beauty. There are said to be several hundred Buddhist temples on the mountain.

126    Master Enkan Saian (?-842), successor of Master Baso Doitsu. Kokushi, “National Master,” is his title as the teacher of Emperor Senso.

127    Shoki, the clerk assisting the head monk, was one of the six assistant officers of a big temple.

128    Master Obaku eventually became the successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai. Both Master Hyakujo Ekai and Master Enkan Saian were disciples of Master Baso Doitsu.

129    Quoted from the Yuimakyo (Vimalakirtinirdesa-sutra).

130    Gushi, “wretched son,” again alludes to the parable in the Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”) chapter of the Lotus Sutra. See notes to paragraph 111.

131    Master Seppo Gison (822-907), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan. Great Master Shinkaku is his posthumous title.

132    The mountain where Master Tozan Ryokai (807-869) had his order.

133    The mountain where Master Tosu Daido (819-914), and Master Tosu Gisei (10321083) had their orders.

134    Jushu, “imparting of the hand,” means a teacher’s personal instruction or guidance.

135    Tasho, “pounding the mortar,” suggests the efforts of Master Daikan Eno and Master Daiman Konin described earlier in this chapter.

136    Master Bodhidharma (d. ca. 528), successor of Master Prajnatara. He was the twenty-eighth patriarch in India (counting from Master Mahakasyapa) and the First Patriarch in China.

137    Master Prajnatara was the twenty-seventh patriarch in India.

138    The fourth line of Master Bodhidharma’s poem, quoted in Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III), Kuge: “A flower is five petals opening,/Effects naturally are realized./I originally came to this land,/To transmit the Dharma and save deluded emotional beings.”

139    In other words, he came from India not because of idealism but because of reality.

140    Present day Guangzhou. This part of China was the most active in terms of contact with foreign countries.

141    527. The Futsu era was 520-527.

142    The Liang dynasty was 502-557.

143    Emperor Bu, or Wu, reigned 502-550.

144    In present-day Jiangsu province, in east China, bordering on the Yellow Sea.

145    The section of dialogue from paragraph 188 to here is quoted directly from the Chinese.

146    Present-day Luoyang, a city in the Huang basin in northern Hunan province in east China.

147    The one hundred sixty-nine years between 420 and 589 were the epoch of division between north and south China. During this epoch, in the south, the Liu Song (420479), Southern Qi (479-502), Liang (502-557), and Chen (557-589) dynasties prevailed. In the north, the Northern Wei dynasty (386-535) and the Western Wei dynasty (535-589) prevailed.

148    Bodhiruci was a monk from North India who came to Luoyang in 508. He was one of the main translators of Buddhist sutras from Sanskrit into Chinese during the Northern Wei dynasty. He is said to have tried to poison Master Bodhidharma out of jealousy.

149    Precepts teacher Kozu participated in the translation of the Mjiky^ron (Sutra of Commentaries on the Ten States), and he made a commentary on the same text. He is also said to have tried to poison Master Bodhidharma.

150    Sanzo, lit., “three stores,” represents the Sanskrit Tripitaka, the three baskets of Sutra, Vinaya, and Abhidharma. The Chinese gave the title “Sanzo” to scholar-monks from India, such as Bodhiruci, who were versed in the Tripitaka.

151    Master Kakuhan Eko (1071-1128). He lived at Ruitokuji in the Sekimon district.

152    The Sekimon-rinkanroku, lit., “Sekimon’s Forest Record,” published in 1107. It has two volumes containing over three hundred fascicles describing the words, deeds, and teachings of Buddhist patriarchs.

153    Zenna, representing the sound of the Sanskrit dhyana, “meditation” or “concentration,” here represents the practice of zazen itself.

154    Kyogyo, read here as keiko, means to walk along, or to pass along, in order to get from A to B.

155    Kyogyo, read here as kinhin, means walking as a Buddhist practice, maintaining the balanced state of body and mind. In Japan kinhin is performed very slowly, the standard being issoku-hanpo, or half a step for each breath.

156    Gyo literally means “high” or “far away.” At the same time, Gyo is the name of an emperor in the legendary period of Chinese history, who is supposed to have ruled 2356-2255 B.C.E. In this context gyo means Master Bodhidharma as a great man or a great founder.

157    Chudo, lit., “middle lands,” and chuka, lit., “middle flower [of civilization],” both refer to China.

158    Nihei: 1) civilian power, 2) military power.

159    Sansai: 1) the heavens, 2) the earth, 3) people.

160    Gosai: 1) wood, 2) fire, 3) earth, 4) metal, 5) water.

161    Koso literally means “founding patriarch” or “founder.” The founder of the Han dynasty ruled 206-194 B.C.E.

162    Taiso, lit., “big patriarch,” also is a term used for the founding emperor of a dynasty. In this case it refers to Dobutei, the founder of the Northern Wei dynasty who ruled 386-409.

163    Shi means child or disciple.

164    The udumbara flower is said to bloom once every three thousand years. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge.

165    So is the name of an ancient kingdom in China where a man called Benka found a big rough gemstone (“Benka’s gem”) and offered it to the king, but the king could not recognize its value.

166    That is, after Master Bodhidharma had come to China (in the last year of the Futsu

era, 527).

167    Sui (ca. 581-618); Tang (618-ca. 907); Song (960-1279).

168    Counting sand symbolizes the boring work of Buddhist scholars.

169    Master Kyogen Chikan. See paragraph 169.

170    Hakuhatsu, “white-haired,” in this case suggests the corpse of an old person.

171 Refers to a Chinese legend recorded in the Zokuseikaiki (Tales from Sei, Part Two): A nine-year-old boy called Yoho saved an injured sparrow. The sparrow repaid him with four white rings, which led Yoho to assume the three top official posts in the land.

172    Refers to another Chinese legend, recorded in the Shinshoretsuden, the collection of biographies contained within the book Shinsho (Writings of the Shin Dynasty). A man called Koyu saved a turtle in distress, and as a result he later rose to the public office called Yofu. (The seal of the office of Yofu depicted a turtle.)

173    The Aikuohiyukyo (Sutra of the Parable ofKing Asoka) contains the story of a traveler who saw an angel prostrating to a corpse lying beside the road. The traveler asked why, and the angel said that its body had done only good deeds when alive and so the angel had been born in heaven. Further on, the traveler saw a demon beating a corpse. The demon explained that this body had done only bad, and so it had become a demon.

174    The Chuhonkikyo (Middle-length Sutra of Past Occurrences) has a chapter entitled Butsujikibabaku, “How the Buddha Ate Horses ’ Barley.” The chapter relates how the brahman king Akidatsu (Sanskrit name not traced), after inviting the Buddha and five hundred disciples to a meal, became busy and forgot to serve food to the sangha, so they made do with barley meant for the horses.

175    Alludes to an episode in the Shikietsuden, the collection of biographies in the book Shiki (Historical Records). A warrior-king of the Zhou dynasty (1122-255 B.C.E.)

conquered the country of In, after which two former nobles of In took refuge in the mountains, preferring to eat bracken than to eat the new king’s millet.

176    Master Taiso Eka, successor of Master Bodhidharma.

177    Yi and Raku are the names of rivers in the Kanan district of China. The place between them is Luoyang (pronounced Rakuyo in Japanese). The kings of the Zhou dynasty (1122-255 B.C.E.) made their capital in Luoyang, and the city also served as the capital of later dynasties such as the Later Han, Western Jin, Later Wei, Sui, etc.

178    Master Kozan Hojo, Master Taiso Eka’s original teacher.

179    This may refer to a story in the Daihannyagyo (Heart Sutra): Bodhisattva Jotai visited Bodhisattva Hoyu (Sanskrit: Dharmagupta) and heard the teaching of the great real wisdom, but he had nothing to serve as an offering, so he sold his own body and served his own marrow as an offering.

180    The Kengukyo contains the story of a king of Jambudvlpa who stabbed himself and served up his own blood in order to save a hungry demon.

181    Refers to a story in the Daihoshakkyo: Before Sakyamuni realized the truth, he revered people who had already realized the truth so much that he spread his hair over a muddy puddle so that the Buddha Dipamkara could walk over it.

182    Refers to a story in the Konkomydkyo: Makasatta, the third son of the king of Makara-dei (Sanskrit: Maharatha), seeing that a mother tiger that was suckling seven cubs was about to die of hunger, fed the tiger his own body.

183    He did not see purification as a means to an end. He was free from ulterior motives.

184    Master Mahakasyapa, whose face broke into a smile when the Buddha showed his audience an udumbara flower. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge.

185 The story of Master Bodhidharma telling Master Taiso Eka, “You have got my marrow,” is recorded in Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Katto.

186    Rasetsu represents the sound of the Sanskrit rdksasa which means an evil or malignant demon.

187    Mugen-kuge, “flowers in space,” symbolize illusions.

188    Chiso, lit., “mowing weeds,” means clearing a site for the building of a temple.

189    Master Seigen Gyoshi (?-740), successor of Master Daikan Eno. Master Dogen’s lineage is through Master Seigen.

190    Master Nangaku Ejo (677-744), also a successor of Master Daikan Eno. The Rinzai sect traces its lineages back to Master Nangaku.

191    Master Sekito Kisen (700-790), successor of Master Seigen Gyoshi. Sekito literally means “rock top.”

192    Juniji no zazen, “twelve-hour zazen,” means zazen all day long. “Twelve hours” in Master Dogen’s time was a whole day and night, twenty-four hours in our time.

193    Master Unmon Bun’en (864-949), founder of the Unmon sect. See Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III), Butsudo.

194    Master Hogen Bun’eki (885-958), founder of the Hogen sect. Ibid.

195    Master Daii Doshin (580-651), successor of Master Kanchi Sosan, is the thirty-first patriarch counting from Master Mahakasyapa. He is the Fourth Patriarch in China, counting from Master Bodhidharma.

196    Sanso-daishi, lit., “Great Master the Third Patriarch,” is Master Kanchi Sosan, successor of Master Taiso Eka and the Third Patriarch in China.

197    Sesshin, literally, “to collect/gather together/concentrate the mind.” Recently, the same two characters have been used as a name for short zazen retreats.

198    Jokan-kibo. The Jokan era corresponds to the reign of the Tang dynasty emperor Taiso (627-650). Kibo, the tenth calendar sign and the fourth horary sign, identifies the year as the seventeenth year of the Jokan era: 643.

199    This paragraph is quoted directly from the Keitokudentoroku.

200    Alludes to Lotus Sutra, Anrakugyo. See LS 2.244.

201    From this point onward, this paragraph is in Chinese characters only; quoted from the Keitokuden toroku.

202    The Eiki era was 650-656. Shingai, the eighth calendar sign and the twelfth horary sign, identifies the year as the second year of the Eiki era: 651.

203    Emperor Koso reigned 650-684.

204    Master Gensha Shibi (835-907), successor of Master Seppo Gison. Gensha was the name of the mountain/temple where Master Gensha lived. Shibi was his homyo, literally, Dharma name, i.e., the name he received when he became a monk and used thereafter in his lifetime. It was the custom in China not to use the Dharma name after a monk’s death but to use a posthumous name or title, which, in Master Gensha’s case, was Great Master Shuitsu.

205    Fuzhou (Jp. Fukushu) is in present-day Fujian province in southeast China, bordering on the Formosa Strait.

206    The Kantsu era was 860-874.

207    Master Fuyo Reikun, successor of Master Kiso Chijo.

208    In Jiangxi province in southeast China.

209    Master Seppo Gison (822-908), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan.

210    The twelve dhutas are listed earlier in this chapter, in the section on Master Mahakasyapa, paragraph 119.

211    Hensan, or “thorough exploration,” is the title of Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III).

212    These episodes are also discussed in Chapter Four (Vol. I), Ikka-no-myoju.

213    Zokotsuzan, lit., “Elephant Bone Mountain,” is another name for Mount Seppo.

214    Master Chokei Eryo (854-932), successor of Master Seppo Gison.

215    Senitsu ni kufu su. The same phrase appears in the Fukanzazengi and suggests the practice of zazen.

216    Master Isan Reiyu (771-853), successor of Master Hyakujo Ekai. Zen Master Daien is his posthumous title.

217    Bonsetsu. Bon represents the Sanskrit brahma, moral, pure, sacred; or brahmacarya, pure conduct. Setsu represents the Sanskrit ksetra, which means place, land, or temple. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

218    Kekkai, lit., “bounded areas,” from the Sanskrit sima-bandha, are discussed in Chapter Eight (Vol. I), Raihai-tokuzui.

219    Kufu-bendo, a favorite expression of Master Dogen’s to suggest zazen itself.

220    Furin refers to wind as one of the five elements, or five wheels (from the Sanskrit panca-mandalaka): earth, water, fire, wind, and air.

221    Master Kyozan Ejaku (807-883), successor of Master Isan.

222    Master Hyakujo Ekai (749-814).

223    Sariputra was said to be the most excellent of the Buddha’s ten great disciples. In Shinji-shobogenzo, pt. 1, no. 61, Master Isan says “The mystical powers and the wisdom of you two disciples (Kyozan and Kyogen) are far superior to those of Sariputra and Maudgalyayana.” The story is quoted in Chapter Twenty-five, Jinzu.

224    Kangyu alludes to the words of Master Enchi Daian quoted earlier. “Watching over a buffalo” means training himself.

225    Master Fuyo Dokai (1043-1118), successor of Master Tosu Gisei, and the forty-fifth patriarch in Master Dogen’s lineage (the Eighteenth Patriarch in China).

226    Purple indicated the highest among the ranks of priests.

227    Beito, lit., “hot rice water,” refers to a line in the quote from Master Fuyo Dokai that follows.

228    In this opening section, Master Fuyo outlines the general principles of Buddhism, in much the same way that Master Dogen does at the beginning of the Fukanzazengi: we have the balanced state originally but we still need to make effort to realize it.

Reitan, “cool and pale,” means without emotional heat or color.

Nahen, literally, “that area over there.”

Master Tanshu Ryuzan, a successor of Master Baso Doitsu. He lived away from human society, deep in the mountains.

Master Joshu Jushin (778-897). See paragraph 136.

Master Hentan Gyoryo, successor of Master Daikan Eno.

Master Daibai Hojo. See paragraph 141.

Shie-dosha, lit., “paper clothes Way-being,” was the nickname of Master Takushu Shie, a successor of Master Rinzai.

Master Nangaku Gentai, successor of Master Sekiso Keisho. He was known for refusing to wear fine silk clothes.

Master Sekiso Keisho (807-888), successor of Master Dogo Enchi. His posthumous title is Great Master Fue.

Kobokudo, lit., “withered tree hall,” means the zazen hall, which is more commonly referred to as sodo, “monks ’ hall,” or undo, “cloud hall.” This sentence suggests that Master Sekiso’s temple consisted only of the zazen hall.

Master Tosu Daido (819-914), successor of Master Suibi Mugaku. He originally studied the teachings of the Kegon sect, then realized the truth in Master Suibi’s order, after which he built himself a hut on Mount Tosu. His posthumous title is Great Master Jisai.

Sanso, “mountain monk,” is a humble term used by the speaker to refer to him- or herself. Hereafter it has sometimes been translated as “I.”

Keshu. Ke means to raise donations, and shu means the monk in charge.

Koboku-ryugin. See Chapter Sixty-five (Vol. III), Ryugin.

Shiji, or the four necessities: food, drink, bedding, and medicine.

Master Fukushu Gozubi. A slightly different version of the verse is quoted in the Keitokudentoroku, chapter 15.

Chincho was a common salutation used when taking leave of someone. The original quotation of Master Fuyo Dokai’s words (recorded in the Zokukankosonshukugoyo, Part 2) is one long paragraph in the source text.

The park purchased by Sudatta from King Prasenajit's son Prince Jeta, and donated to the Buddha as a site for Buddhist practice.

Master Baso Doitsu (709-788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejo. His family name was Ba, “Horse,” so he was called Baso, “Horse Patriarch,” and the mountain where he had his order was called Basozan, “Horse Patriarch Mountain.”

248    In present-day Jiangxi province in southeast China.

249    In present-day Sichuan in southwest China.

250    With these two questions, Master Dogen considered kikyo, “returning home,” not as a subjective journey but as concrete conduct—which Master Dogen himself maintained, for example, in returning from China to Japan.

251    Master Nangaku was expressing a fact of life, not a supposition about the future.

252    Master Daiman Konin (688-761), successor of Master Daii Doshin. He was the Fifth Patriarch in China.

253    It was well-known in China and Japan that Laozi, who laid the foundations of Daoist philosophy in the sixth century B.C.E., was born to a single mother.

254    This refers to a legend quoted in Chapter Twenty-two, Bussho, paragraph 22.

255    Master Daikan Eno, the Sixth Patriarch.

256    Jinshu was regarded by many as the most brilliant member of Master Daiman’s order. See notes to Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Kokyo, paragraph 134.

257    Master Tendo Nyojo (1163-1228), successor of Master Setcho Chikan. He was the fiftieth patriarch (the Twenty-third Patriarch in China).

258    In present-day Zhekiang province in east China.

259    Shigo refers to a posthumous title conferred by an emperor upon a highly esteemed master. The Second Patriarch in China, for example, was called Taiso Eka (among other names) during his lifetime. After his death, the emperor gave him the title “Great Master Shoshu Fukaku.” (See paragraph 214.)

260    Emperor Neiso, reigned 1195-1225.

261    1208-1225.

262    The first six patriarchs in China: Master Bodhidharma, Master Taiso Eka, Master Kanchi Sosan, Master Daii Doshin, Master Daiman Konin, and Master Daikan Eno.

263    Master Tendo was born in 1163, and so when Master Dogen practiced under him, between 1225 and 1227, Master Tendo would have been in his mid-sixties.

264    Sanzen, literally, “experiencing/participating in/practicing dhyana.” Chapter Fifty-eight (Vol. III), Zazengi, begins with the phrase sanzen wa zazen nari, “To practice Zen is to sit in zazen.”

265    Kosho Manjuji on Kinzan Mountain was one of the five most famous temples in China. Its site is in present-day Zhekiang province.

266    Bussho Tokko, successor of Master Daie Soko.

267    Sanzen. See note 264.

268    Master Tendo lived and slept in the zazen hall.

269    The robe worn by monks in China and Japan under the kasaya has very wide sleeves, the hems of which form a kind of pocket.

270    There was said to be a flat bed of rock under the ground upon which the Buddha was sitting, beneath the bodhi tree in Bodhgaya, when he realized the truth. This bed of rock is called the diamond seat.

271    Cho Teikyo. Teikyo was the official title of a minister in charge of irrigation, tea and salt, and other matters. Minister Cho was the eighth-generation descendant of the Song emperor Taiso who reigned 976-998.

272    Emperor Neiso (r. 1195-1225). See also paragraph 254.

273    1208-1225.

274    Minshu was a district of what is now Zhekiang province in east China.

275    Shin represents the sound of the Sanskrit daksina, which means a donation.

276    Sekko, lit., “Setsu River,” is the name not only of a river but also of Zhekiang province itself. Setsu-to-setsu-sei, “east of Setsu and west of Setsu,” therefore means east and west Zhekiang.

277    Corresponds to present-day Sichuan province in southwest China.

278    Kinhin-dogyo means to walk in kinhin and to sit in zazen.

279    The Sanskrit bhiks-unTmeans nun.

280    It was rare for men to be ranked lower than women.

281    In present-day Fujian province in southwest China.

282    That is, toward his home in Fujian.

283    Master Ryuge Kodon, quoted at the end of Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Keisei-sanshiki, said: “With this life we can deliver the body that is the accumulation of past lives.” Master Dogen substituted doshu, “express,” for doshu, “deliver.”

284    In other words, when we become buddha we express nothing other than ourselves.

285    Alludes to the Chinese saying quoted in the notes to paragraph 155: “Small hermits conceal themselves in hills and thickets,/Great hermits conceal themselves in palaces and towns.”

286    1242.

[Chapter Thirty-one]

Kai-in-zanmai Samadhi, State Like the Sea

Translator's Note: Kai means “sea ” and in (a translation of the Sanskrit word mudraj means “seal ” or “stamp.,’ Zanmai (a phonetic representation of the Sanskrit word samadhij means the state in zazen. So kai-in-zanmai means “sea-stamp samadhi,’ or “samadhi as a state like the sea.,’ These words appear frequently in the Garland Sutra. Master Dogen explains that the words describe the state in zazen, or the mutual interrelation between subject and object here and now. In this chapter Master Dogen expounds on samadhi as a state like the sea, quoting from the VimalakTrti Sutra, the Lotus Sutra, and from a conversation between Master Sozan Honjaku and his disciple.

[3] Those who are buddhas and patriarchs are always in samadhi, the state like the sea.1 Swimming in this samadhi, they have times of preaching, times of experiencing, and times of moving. The virtue of their moving over the surface of the sea includes movement along the very bottom of that [sea]: they move over the surface of the sea [knowing] this to be “movement along the bottom of the deepest ocean.”2 To seek to make the uncertain currents of life and death return to their source is not to be moving along in the ineffable state of mind. While past instances of passing through barriers and breaking joints were, of course, individual instances of the buddhas and the patriarchs themselves, at the same time, each was governed by samadhi, the state like the sea.

144c

[4] The Buddha said:

Only of real dharmas is this body composed.

The moment of appearance is just the appearance of dharmas;

The moment of disappearance is just the disappearance of dharmas.

At the moment when these dharmas appear we do not speak of the appearance of self.

At the moment when these dharmas disappear we do not speak of the disappearance of self.3

An instant before, an instant after: instant does not depend on instant;

dharma before, a dharma after: dharma does not oppose dharma.

Just this is called samadhi, state like the sea.

[5] We should painstakingly learn in practice and consider these words of the Buddha. Attaining the truth and entering the state of experience do not always depend upon an abundance of knowledge or upon an abundance of words. Scholars of wide learning and abundant knowledge have gone on to attain the truth under four lines. Scholars extensively versed [in texts as numerous as] the sands of the Ganges have eventually entered the state of experience under a single line or verse. Still less are the present words about seeking inherent enlightenment in the future or about grasping initiated enlightenment in the middle of experience. In general, though the real manifestation of inherent enlightenment and so on is a virtue of a Buddhist patriarch, the various kinds of enlightenment such as initiated enlightenment and inherent enlightenment do not define a Buddhist patriarch.

[7] The Buddha said:

Only of real dharmas is this body composed.

The moment of appearance is just the appearance of dharmas;

The moment of disappearance is just the disappearance of dharmas.

At the moment when these dharmas appear we do not speak of the appearance of self.

At the moment when these dharmas disappear we do not speak of the disappearance of self.

An instant before, an instant after: instant does not depend on instant;

dharma before, a dharma after: dharma does not oppose dharma.

Just this is called samadhi, state like the sea.

[8] “The moment of appearance is just the appearance of dharmas•” This “appearance of dharmas” never leaves “appearance” trailing behind. For this reason, “appearance” is beyond sensing and beyond knowing, and this state is expressed as “not speaking of the appearance of self.” It is not that, while we are “not speaking” of “the appearance of self,” other people are perceiving, realizing, thinking, and discriminating that “these dharmas appear.”5 Just in the moment of the ascendant state of mutual realization, we fall upon convenient opportunities for mutual realization.6 “Appearance” is inevitably a concrete “moment” having arrived; for “the moment” is “appearance.” Just what is this “appearance”? It may be “appearance” itself. It is “appearance” that is itself already a “moment,” and it never fails to disclose the naked skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. Because appearance is “appearance” that is “com-posed,”1 appearance as “this body” and appearance as “appearance of the self” is “only of real dharmas•” It is beyond only perception of sound and form: it is “the real dharmas” that are “the appearance of the self,” and it is “the appearance of the self” that is “beyond speech.”8 “Not speaking” does not mean failing to express anything; for being able to express the truth is not the same as being able to speak. “The moment of appearance” is “these real dharmas” here and now: it is not of the twelve hours. “These real dhar-mas” here and now are “the moment of appearance”; they are beyond the competitive appearance of the three worlds.9An ancient buddha said, “Suddenly fire appears.”10 The “independence” of this real “appearance” is expressed as “fire appears.” An ancient buddha said, “In the moment, when appearance and disappearance do not cease, what are we to do?”11 Thus, “appearance and disappearance,” though they are the appearance of the self itself and are the disappearance of the self itself, are “not ceasing.”12 We should determine the real meaning of these words “not ceasing” by entrusting ourselves totally to that buddha.13 This “time” in which “appearance and disappearance” are “not ceasing” is cut and continued as the very lifeblood of the Buddhist patriarchs. At the moment when appearance and disappearance are not ceasing, “It is who that appears and disappears.” The appearance and disappearance of “who” is “people who must be saved through this body,” is “at once manifesting this body,” and is “preaching for them the Dharma”;14 it is “past mind being unable to be grasped”;15 it is ”you having got my marrow,”16 and it is “you having got my bones”17—for it is “who”18 that appears and disappears.

[11] “At the moment when these dharmas disappear, we do not speak 145b of the disappearance of self.” The very moment in which “we do not speak of the disappearance of self’ is just “the moment when these dharmas disappear.” “Disappearance” is the disappearance of “real dharmas” it is disappearance, but at the same time it must also be real dharmas. Because it is real dharmas, it is not confined to the atoms of the objective world, and because it is not confined to the atoms of the objective world, it is untainted.19 Simply this untaintedness is the buddhas and the patriarchs themselves. They say “You are also like this,” [but] who could not be “you”?—it may be that all those who have “an instant [of mind] before and an instant [of mind] after”20 are “you.” [Buddhas and patriarchs] say “I am also like this,” [but] who could not be “I”?—because all those who have “an instant [of mind] before and an instant [of mind]” after are “I.” This “disappearance” is adorned with abundant varieties of hands and eyes. That is to say, it is “supreme and great nirvana,” which is “called ‘death,’” which is “insisted to be extinction,”21 and which is “seen as an abode.” Such limitlessly abundant hands and eyes22 are all virtues of “disappearance.” “Not speaking” in the moment when disappearance is the self, and “not speaking” in the moment when appearance is the self, while sharing the common liveliness of “not speaking,” may be beyond the not speaking of common deadness. [“Not speaking”] is, already, the disappearance of “the dharma before” and the disappearance of “the dharma after”; it is “the instant before” of Dharma and “the instant after” of Dharma; it is “dharmas before and after” working for the Dharma; and it is “instants before and after” working for the Dharma. “Not to be dependent” is to work for the Dharma. “Not to be opposed” is to work for the Dharma. To cause [dharmas] not to be opposed and not to be dependent is to “express eighty or ninety percent of the truth.”23 When “disappearance” makes the four elements and the five aggregates into its hands and eyes, there is taking up and there is drawing back. When “disappearance” makes the four elements and the five aggregates into its course of action, a step forward is taken and a meeting takes place. At this time even [the expression] “the thoroughly realized body is hands and eyes”24 is not sufficient, and even “the whole body is hands and eyes”25 is not sufficient. In sum, “disappearance” is the virtue of the Buddhist patriarchs.26 In regard to the present expression of the words “not opposed” and the expression of the words “not dependent,” remember,

“appearance” in the beginning, middle, and end is “appearance”—“Officially, there is no room for a needle, but privately, a horse and cart can get through.”27 [Appearance] neither depends upon nor opposes disappearance at the beginning, middle, and end. It makes real dharmas suddenly appear where there was formerly disappearance, but it is not appearance defined by disappearance: it is the appearance of real dharmas. Because it is the appearance of real dharmas, it is a form beyond opposition and dependence.28 At the same time, disappearance and disappearance neither depend upon each other nor oppose each other. “Disappearance” also, at the beginning, middle, and end, is “dis-appearance”—“While we are meeting it, it does not stand out, but when our attention is drawn then we recognize its existence.”29 Disappearance happens suddenly where there was formerly appearance, but it is not disappearance defined by appearance: it is the disappearance of real dharmas. Because it is the disappearance of real dharmas, it is beyond mutual opposition and dependence.30 Either way—whether “disappearance” is “just this”31 or whether “appearance” is “just this”—“sole reliance on samddhi as the state like the sea is called ‘real dharmas.’” Practice-and-experience that is “justthis” is not nonexistent; it is simply that this untaintedness is called “samddhi, the state like the sea.” Samddhi is realization; it is the expression of the truth; it is a night in which a hand reaches back and gropes for the pillow.32 In such reaching back in the night and groping for the pillow, the groping for the pillow is not only a matter of kotis of kotis of myriad kalpas; it is “myself being in the middle of the sea, preaching the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma solely and eternally.”33

[17] Because of “not speaking of the appearance of self,” “myself is in the middle of the sea.” The surface before [me]34 is “eternal preaching” as “ten thousand ripples following a single slight wave”;35 and the surface behind [me] is “the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma” as a single wave following ten thousand slight ripples.36 Even though I have wound and cast a thousand feet or ten thousand feet of fishing line, regrettably, the line just hangs straight down. The aforementioned “surface before and surface behind”37 is “the surface of the sea that I am on”: it is like saying “a concrete thing before, a concrete thing after.”38 “A concrete thing before, a concrete thing after” describes the placement of a thing upon a thing.39 It is not that “in the middle of the sea” there is a person: “[the sea of] my being in the

145c

sea” is neither an abode of worldly people nor a place loved by sacred people, but “my being there” exists only in “the middle of the sea.” This is the “preaching” proclaimed “solely and eternally.” This “being in the middle of the sea” neither belongs to the middle nor belongs to inside and outside; it “exists peacefully and eternally, preaching the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma”4 It 146a does not reside in the east, west, south, or north; it is, “in a full boat emptily loaded with moonlight, to come back.” This real refuge41 is the process itself, here and now, of “coming back”: who could describe it as the drudgery of staying in water?42 It is realized only within the steep confines of the Buddha’s state of truth. We call this [realization] the seal that seals water [as water]. Expressing it further, it is the seal that seals space [as space], or still further, the seal that seals mud [as mud]. The seal that seals water, though not necessarily the seal that seals the sea, in the further ascendant state may be the seal that seals the sea.43 This is what is meant by “the seal of the sea,”44 “the seal of water,” “the seal of mud,” and “the seal of the mind.” Having been transmitted one-to-one, the mind-seal seals water, seals mud, and seals space.45

[20]    Great Master Gensho46 of Sozan Mountain on one occasion is asked by a monk, “I have heard it said in the teachings that ‘the Great Sea does not accommodate dead bodies.’47 What is meant by ‘the Sea’?”

The master says, “It includes myriad existence.”

The monk says, “Then how can it not accommodate dead bodies?” The master says, “What has stopped breathing does not belong.” The monk says, “Given that [the Sea] includes myriad existence, how can what has stopped breathing not belong?”

The master says, “Myriad existence, being beyond those virtues, has stopped breathing.”48

[21]    This Sozan is the brother disciple of Ungo.49 Here Tozan’s50 fundamental instruction has found its mark exactly. The present words “I have heard it said in the teachings” mean the true teachings of the Buddhist patriarchs, not the teachings of the common and the sacred and not the small teachings of those who attach themselves to the Buddha-Dharma.

[22]    “The Great Sea does not accommodate dead bodies.” This “Great Sea” is beyond the inland seas, the outlying seas,51 and suchlike, and it may be beyond the eight seas52 and the like. Such things are not the concern of

[Buddhist] students. We recognize as sea not only that which is not the sea;53 we recognize as the sea that which is the sea. Even if we forcibly insist that [this sea] is the sea, we cannot call it “the Great Sea.”54 “The Great Sea” does not always mean profound depths of water of the eight qualities,55 and “the Great Sea” does not always mean nine great pools56 of salt water and so on: “real dharmas” may be its “realized composition.” Why should “the Great Sea” always be deep water? Therefore, the reason [human beings and gods] ask the question “What is the Sea?” is that “the Great Sea” remains unknown to human beings and gods, and so they express “the Great Sea” in words. People who ask about it are disturbing their attachment to the Sea. “It does not accommodate dead bodies”: The meaning of “not accommodating” may be “acting with a clear head when a clear head comes, and acting with a dull head when a dull head comes.”57 “A dead body” is dead ash—“a mind that never changes however many times it meets spring.”58 [At the same time] “a dead body” is something that no person has ever experienced; therefore no one knows what it is.

[24] The master’s words “includes myriad existence” express the sea. The fundamental principle he is expressing is not the assertion that some anonymous subject includes myriad existence; it is “inclusive myriad existence.” He is not saying that “the Great Sea” includes myriad existence, but that what is expressing “inclusive myriad existence” is just “the Great Sea” itself. Though we do not know what it is, it is, for the moment, “myriad existence.” Even to meet the figure of a buddha or the figure of a patriarch is just a momentary misperception of “myriad existence.” In the time of “inclusion,” even mountains are not confined to “rising to the top of the highest peak” and even water is not confined to “moving along the bottom of the deepest sea.”59 Drawing in may be like this, and letting go may be like this.60 We speak of “the sea of buddha-nature” and we speak of “Vairocana’s sea”:61 these are just “myriad existence.” Although the surface of the sea is invisible, those who are swimming along do not doubt it. For example, in expressing [himself as] a Bamboo Thicket, Tafuku62 says, “The odd one or two stalks are awry” and “Three or four stalks are askew.” His is the path of action that realizes myriad existence as a confusion of mistakes. Even so, why does he not say “A thousand crooked ones, ten thousand crooked ones!”? Why does he not say “A thousand thickets, ten thousand thickets!”? We should not

146b

146c forget the truth that is present like this in a thicket of bamboo. Even Sozan’s expression “it includes myriad existence” is just “myriad existence” itself.

[26] The monk says, “How can what has stopped breathing not belong?” Though this might mistakenly be seen in the form of a doubt, it is just the working of the ineffable mind. When [Master Rinzai says] “I have long had my doubts about this fellow,”63 it is simply that he is meeting really with [the fellow in] “I have long had my doubts about this fellow.” At the place where the ineffable exists, “how can what has stopped breathing ‘not belong’”?, and “how can [the Great Sea] ‘not accommodate’ dead bodies”? At this concrete place, “this already is inclusive myriad existence; how can what has stopped breathing ‘not belong’”? Remember, “inclusion” is beyond “belonging”: “inclusion” is “not accommodating.”64 Even if “myriad existence” is a dead body, it may be that “not accommodating” directly goes through ten thousand years, and that “not belonging”65 is this old monk placing one stone. Sozan says, “Myriad existence, being beyond those virtues, has stopped breathing.” This “myriad existence,” whether it has stopped breathing or has not stopped breathing, may be “not belonging.” Even if a dead body is a dead body,66 if it experiences action in the state of “myriad existence,” it will include [myriad existence], and it may be “inclusion” itself. In the process before and the process after described as “myriad existence,” there are peculiar virtues. [But] this is not the state of “having stopped breathing”: it is what is usually described as “the blind leading the blind.”67 The principle of the blind leading the blind, going further, is that of blind person leading blind person, and that of the blind masses leading the blind masses. At the time when the blind masses are leading the blind masses, “inclusive myriad existence” includes “inclusive myriad existence.” Are there any number of additional great truths that are other than “myriad existence”? Before such consideration has ever been realized, the state is samadhi, state like the sea.

Shobogenzo Kai-in-zanmai

Written at Kannondorikoshohorinji on the twentieth day of the first month of summer,68 in the third year of Ninji.69

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THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY SHOBOGENZO

VOLUME III

dBET PDF Version All Rights Reserved© 2017

 

BDK English Tripiṭaka Series

THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE

TREASURY SHOBOGENZO

Volume III

(Taishō Volume 82, Number 2582)

Translated from the Japanese by

Gudo Wafu NishijimaChodo Crossand

BDK America, Inc.2008

Copyright of the Original Edition © 1994–1999 Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross

Gudo Nishijima was born in Yokohama, Japan, in 1919, and graduated from Tokyo received until the master’s death in 1965. During this time he combined the daily University in 1946. In 1940 he first met Master Kōdō Sawaki, whose teaching he Shōbōgenzō with a career at the Japanese Ministry practice of zazen and study of the of Finance and at a securities financing company. In 1973 he became a priest under Nishijima became a consultant to the Ida Ryogokudo company, and in 1987 the late Master Renpo Niwa, and in 1977 he received transmission of the Dharma from Master Niwa (who subsequently became abbot of Eiheiji). Shortly thereafter give instruction in zazen and lectures, in Japanese and in English, on Master Dōgen’slished the Ida Ryogokudo Zazen Dōjō in Ichikawa City near Tokyo. He continues to work in Tokyo and Osaka and at the Tokei-in Temple in Shizuoka Prefecture.

train as a teacher of the FM Alexander Technique. He formally received the Dharma1982and received the Buddhist precepts in May 1983. In 1994 he returned to England toin 1998 and in the following year established the Middle Way Re-education Centre, after graduating from Sheffield University, met Nishijima Roshi in June 1982,Chodo Cross was born in Birmingham, England, in 1959. He went to Japan in(www.the-middle-way.org).

Copyright © 2008 by Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai andBDK America, Inc.

Reprinted by permission of Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—in a retrieval system, or transcribed in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2008931432ISBN: 978-1-886439-37-5

Third Printing, 2015

Moraga, California 94556BDK America, Inc.1675Published by School Street

Printed in the United States of America

A Message on the Publication of the English Tripiṭaka

The Buddhist canon is said to contain eighty-four thousand different teachings. I believe that this is because the Buddha’s basic approach was to prescribe a different treatment for every spiritual ailment, much as a doctor prescribes a different medicine for every medical ailment. Thus his teachings were always appropriate for the particular suffering individual and for the time at which the teaching was given, and over the ages not one of his prescriptions has failed to relieve the suffering to which it was addressed.

Ever since the Buddha’s Great Demise over twenty-five hundred years ago, his message of wisdom and compassion has spread throughout the world. Yet no one has ever attempted to translate the entire Buddhist canon into English throughout the history of Japan. It is my greatest wish to see this done and to make the translations available to the many English-speaking people who have never had the opportunity to learn about the Buddha’s teachings.

Of course, it would be impossible to translate all of the Buddha’s eighty-four thousand teachings in a few years. I have, therefore, had one hundred thirty-nine of the scriptural texts in the prodigious Taishō edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon selected for inclusion in the First Series of this translation project.

It is in the nature of this undertaking that the results are bound to be criticized. Nonetheless, I am convinced that unless someone takes it upon himself or herself to initiate this project, it will never be done. At the same time, I hope that an improved, revised edition will appear in the future.

It is most gratifying that, thanks to the efforts of more than a hundred Buddhist scholars from the East and the West, this monumental project has finally gotten off the ground. May the rays of the Wisdom of the Compassionate One reach each and every person in the world.

                                                                     Founder of the English                                                                     

August 7, 1991                                                         Tripiṭaka Project

 

Editorial Foreword

In January 1982, Dr. NUMATA Yehan, the founder of Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai (Society for the Promotion of Buddhism), decided to begin the monumental task of translating the complete Taishō edition of the Chinese Tripiṭaka (Buddhist canon) into the English language. Under his leadership, a special preparatory committee was organized in April 1982. By July of the same year, the Translation Committee of the English Tripiṭaka was officially convened.

The initial Committee consisted of the following members: (late) HANAYAMA Shōyū (Chairperson), (late) BANDŌ Shōjun, ISHIGAMI Zennō, (late) KAMATA Shigeo, KANAOKA Shūyū, MAYEDA Sengaku, NARA Yasuaki, (late) SAYEKI UShinkō, (late) SRYŪZU Ryūshin, and YHIOIRI Ryōtatsu, TUYAMA Akira. Assistant members of the Committee AMARU Noriyoshi, (late) TAMURA Kwansei, were as follows: KANAZAWA Atsushi, WATA NABE Shōgo, Rolf Giebel of New Zealand, and Rudy Smet of Belgium.

After holding planning meetings on a monthly basis, the Committee selected one hundred thirty-nine texts for the First Series of translations, an estimated one hundred printed volumes in all. The texts selected are not necessarily limited to those originally written in India but also include works written or composed in China and Japan. While the publication of the First Series proceeds, the texts for the Second Series will be selected from among the remaining works; this process will continue until all the texts, in Japanese as well as in Chinese, have been published.

Frankly speaking, it will take perhaps one hundred years or more to accomplish the English translation of the complete Chinese and Japanese texts, for they consist of thousands of works. Nevertheless, as Dr. NUMATA wished, it is the sincere hope of the Committee that this project will continue unto completion, even after all its present members have passed away.

ing his son, Mr. NDr. NUMATA passed away on May 5, 1994, at the age of ninety-seven, entrust-UMATA Toshihide, with the continuation and completion of the

Translation Project. The Committee also lost its able and devoted Chairperson,

Editorial Foreword

these severe blows, the Committee elected me, then Vice President of Musashino Professor HANAYAMA Shōyū, on June 16, 1995, at the age of sixty-three. After

Women’s College, to be the Chair in October 1995. The Committee has renewed its determination to carry out the noble intention of Dr. NUMATA, under the leadership of Mr. NUMATA Toshihide.

IS HIGAMI The present members of the Committee are MZennō, ICHISHIMA Shōshin, KANAOKA Shūyū, NAYEDA Sengaku (Chairperson),ARA Yasuaki, TAMARU Noriyoshi, Kenneth K. Tanaka, URYŪZU Ryūshin, YUYAMA Akira, WATANABE Shōgo, and assistant member YONEZAWA Yoshiyasu.

The Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research was established in November 1984, in Berkeley, California, U.S.A., to assist in the publication of the BDK English Tripiṭaka First Series. The Publication Committee was organized at the Numata Center in December 1991. Since then the publication of all the volumes has been and will continue to be conducted under the supervision of this Committee in close cooperation with the Editorial Committee in Tokyo.

            M AYEDA Sengaku

           

 Chairperson

             Editorial Committee of                 

the BDK English Tripiṭaka


Publisher’s Foreword

On behalf of the Publication Committee, I am happy to present this contribution to the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series. The initial translation and editing of the Buddhist scripture found here were performed under the direction of the Editorial Committee in Tokyo, Japan, chaired by Professor Sengaku Mayeda, Professor Emeritus of Musashino University. The Publication Committee members then put this volume through a rigorous succession of editorial and bookmaking efforts.

Both the Editorial Committee in Tokyo and the Publication Committee in Berkeley are dedicated to the production of clear, readable English texts of the Buddhist canon. The members of both committees and associated staff work to honor the deep faith, spirit, and concern of the late Reverend Dr. Yehan Numata, who founded the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series in order to disseminate Buddhist teachings throughout the world.

The long-term goal of our project is the translation and publication of the one hundred-volume Taishō edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon, plus a few influential extracanonical Japanese Buddhist texts. The list of texts selected for the First Series of this translation project is given at the end of each volume.

As Chair of the Publication Committee, I am deeply honored to serve in the post formerly held by the late Dr. Philip B. Yampolsky, who was so good to me during his lifetime; the esteemed Dr. Kenneth K. Inada, who has had such a great impact on Buddhist studies in the United States; and the beloved late Dr. Francis H. Cook, a dear friend and colleague.

In conclusion, let me thank the members of the Publication Committee for the efforts they have undertaken in preparing this volume for publication: Senior Editor Marianne Dresser, Dr. Hudaya Kandahjaya, Dr. Eisho Nasu, Reverend Kiyoshi Yamashita, and Reverend Brian Nagata, President of the Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research.

                  Publication Committee                       John R. McRae                Chairperson

 

Note on the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series Reprint Edition

After due consideration, the Editorial Committee of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series chose to reprint the translation of Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō by Gudo Wafu Nishijima and  Chodo Cross (originally published under the title Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Books 1–4, by Wind-bell Publications, 1994–1999) in order to make more widely available this exemplary translation of this important text. Volumes I and II of this edition of Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury were published in November 2007 and July 2008. The remaining volume IV will be published in sequence in 2008.

Aside from the minor stylistic changes and the romanization of all Chinese and Japanese characters in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series, this edition reproduces as closely as possible the original translation.

 

Contents

A Message on the Publication of the English Tripiṭaka

                                                                        NUMATA Yehan                          v Editorial Foreword                                         MAYEDA Sengaku                    vii Publisher’s Foreword                                     John R. McRae                        ix Note on the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series Reprint Edition                            xi

Translators’ Introduction                                Gudo Wafu Nishijima

                                                                        and Chodo Cross                    xv

Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury, Volume III

Chapter Forty-two. Tsuki: The Moon                                                               3 Chapter Forty-three. Kūge: Flowers in Space                                                13 Chapter Forty-four. Kobusshin: The Mind of Eternal Buddhas                     29

Chapter Forty-five. Bodaisatta-shishōbō: Four Elements of a

    Bodhisattva’s Social Relations                                                                  39 Chapter Forty-six. Kattō: The Complicated                                                   49

Chapter Forty-seven. Sangai-yuishin: The Triple World Is Only

    the Mind                                                                                                     61

Chapter Forty-eight. Sesshin-sesshō: Expounding the Mind and

    Expounding the Nature                                                                              73 Chapter Forty-nine. Butsudō: The Buddhist Truth                                         87 Chapter Fifty. Shohō-jissō: All Dharmas are Real Form                             109 Chapter Fifty-one. Mitsugo: Secret Talk                                                      129 Chapter Fifty-two. Bukkyō: The Buddhist Sutras                                         139

Chapter Fifty-three. Mujō-seppō: The Non-emotional Preaches

    the Dharma                                                                                               155 Chapter Fifty-four. Hosshō: The Dharma-nature                                         171 Chapter Fifty-five. Darani: Dhāraṇī                                                            179 Chapter Fifty-six. Senmen: Washing the Face                                              189

Contents

Chapter Fifty-seven. Menju: Face-to-Face Transmission                            209 Chapter Fifty-eight. Zazengi: The Standard Method of Zazen                      225 Chapter Fifty-nine. Baike: Plum Blossoms                                                  229 Chapter Sixty. Juppō: The Ten Directions                                                   247 Chapter Sixty-one. Kenbutsu: Meeting Buddha                                           257 Chapter Sixty-two. Hensan: Thorough Exploration                                     275 Chapter Sixty-three. Ganzei: Eyes                                                               285 Chapter Sixty-four. Kajō: Everyday Life                                                     293 Chapter Sixty-five. Ryūgin: The Moaning of Dragons                                 303 Chapter Sixty-six. Shunjū: Spring and Autumn                                           309

Chapter Sixty-seven. Soshi-sairai-no-i: The Ancestral Master’s

    Intention in Coming from the West                                                         319 Chapter Sixty-eight. Udonge: The Uḍumbara Flower                                 325

Chapter Sixty-nine. Hotsu-mujōshin: Establishment of the Will

    to the Supreme                                                                                         335

Chapter Seventy. Hotsu-bodaishin: Establishment of the Bodhi-mind        349

Chapter Seventy-one. Nyorai-zenshin: The Whole Body of the

    Tathāgata                                                                                                  365

Chapter Seventy-two. Zanmai-ō-zanmai: The Samādhi That Is the

    King of Samādhis                                                                                    371 Appendix. Chinese Masters                                                                          377 Glossary of Sanskrit Terms                                                                           381 Bibliography                                                                                                 393 Index                                                                                                             401

A List of the Volumes of the BDK English Tripiṭaka (First Series)             429

Translators’ Introduction

Preface

by Gudo Wafu Nishijima

The Shōbōgenzō was written by Dōgen in the thirteenth century. I think that reading the Shōbōgenzō is the best way to come to an exact understanding of Buddhist theory, for Dōgen was outstanding in his ability to understand and explain Buddhism rationally.

Of course, Dōgen did not depart from traditional Buddhist thought. However at the same time, his thought as expressed in the Shōbōgenzō follows his own unique method of presentation. If we understand this method, the Shōbōgenzō would not be difficult to read. But unless we understand his method of thinking, it would be impossible for us to understand what Dōgen is trying to say in the Shōbōgenzō.

Buddhists revere the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Buddha means Gautama Buddha. Sangha means those people who pursue Gautama Buddha’s truth. Dharma means reality. Dōgen’s unique method of thought was his way of explaining the Dharma.

Basically, he looks at a problem from two sides, and then tries to synthesize the two viewpoints into a middle way. This method has similarities with the dialectic method in Western philosophy, particularly as used by Hegel and Marx. Hegel’s dialectic, however, is based on belief in spirit, and Marx’s dialectic is based on belief in matter. Dōgen, through the Buddhist dialectic, wants to lead us away from thoughts based on belief in spirit and matter.

Dōgen recognized the existence of something that is different from thought; that is, reality in action. Action is completely different from intellectual thought and completely different from the perceptions of our senses. So Dōgen’s method of thinking is based on action and, because of that, it has some unique characteristics.

Translator’s Introduction

First, Dōgen recognized that things we usually separate in our minds are, in action, one reality. To express this oneness of subject and object Dōgen says, for example:

If a human being, even for a single moment, manifests the Buddha’s posture in the three forms of conduct, while [that person] sits up straight in samādhi, the entire world of Dharma assumes the Buddha’s posture and the whole of space becomes the state of realization.

This sentence, taken from the Bendōwa chapter (Chapter One), is not illogical

but it reflects a new kind of logic.

Secondly, Dōgen recognized that in action, the only time that really exists is the moment of the present, and the only place that really exists is this place. So the present moment and this place—the here and now—are very important concepts in Dōgen’s philosophy of action.

The philosophy of action is not unique to Dōgen; this idea was also the center of Gautama Buddha’s thought. All the Buddhist patriarchs of ancient India and China relied upon this theory and realized Buddhism itself. They also recognized the oneness of reality, the importance of the present moment, and the importance of this place.

But explanations of reality are only explanations. In the Shōbōgenzō, after he had explained a problem on the basis of action, Dōgen wanted to point the reader into the realm of action itself. To do this, he sometimes used poems, he sometimes used old Buddhist stories that suggest reality, and he sometimes used symbolic expressions.

So the chapters of the Shōbōgenzō usually follow a four-phased pattern. First Dōgen picks up and outlines a Buddhist idea. In the second phase, he examines the idea very objectively or concretely, in order to defeat idealistic or intellectual interpretations of it. In the third phase, Dōgen’s expression becomes even more concrete, practical, and realistic, relying on the philosophy of action. And in the fourth phase, Dōgen tries to suggest reality with words. Ultimately, these trials are only trials. But we can feel something that can be called reality in his sincere trials when we reach the end of each chapter.

I think this four-phased pattern is related with the Four Noble Truths preached by Gautama Buddha in his first lecture. By realizing Dōgen’s method of thinking,

Translator’s Introduction

we can come to realize the true meaning of Gautama Buddha’s Four Noble Truths. This is why we persevere in studying the Shōbōgenzō.

Notes on the Translation by Chodo Cross

Source Text

The source text for Chapters Forty-two to Seventy-two is contained in volumes seven to nine of Nishijima Roshi’s twelve-volume Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese). The Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō contains Dōgen’s original text, notes on the text, and the text rendered into modern Japanese. Reference numbers enclosed in brackets at the beginning of some paragraphs of this translation refer to corresponding page numbers in the Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō, and much of the material reproduced in the notes comes from the Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō.

The Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō is based upon the ninety-five–chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō, which was arranged in chronological order by Master Hangyō Kōzen sometime between 1688 and 1703. The ninety-five–chapter edition is the most comprehensive single edition, including important chapters such as Bendōwa (Chapter One, Vol. I) and Hokke-ten-hokke (Chapter Seventeen, Vol. I) that do not appear in other editions. Furthermore, it was the first edition to be printed with woodblocks, in the Bunka era (1804–1818), and so the content was fixed at that time. The original woodblocks are still preserved at Eiheiji, the temple in Fukui prefecture that Dōgen founded.

Sanskrit Terms

As a rule, Sanskrit words such as samādhi (the balanced state), prajñā (real wisdom), and bhikṣu (monk), which Dōgen reproduces phonetically with Chinese characters, read in Japanese as zanmai, hannya, and biku, have been retained in Sanskrit form.

In addition, some Chinese characters representing the meaning of Sanskrit terms that will already be familiar to readers (or which will become familiar in the course of reading the Shōbōgenzō) have been returned to Sanskrit. Examples are (“reality,” “law,” “method,” “things and phenomena”), usually translated as “Dharma” or “dharmas”; nyorai (“Thus-come”), always translated as “Tathāgata”; and shōmon (“voice-hearer”), always translated as “śrāvaka.”

xvii

Translator’s Introduction

The Glossary of Sanskrit Terms includes all Sanskrit terms appearing in this volume not included in the Glossary of Sanskrit Terms in Volumes I and II.

Chinese Proper Nouns

In general Chinese proper nouns have been romanized according to their Japanese pronunciation—as Dōgen would have pronounced them for a Japanese audience. Thus, we have let the romanization of all names of Chinese masters follow the Japanese pronunciation, while also adding an appendix showing the Chinese romanization of Chinese masters’ names.

Chinese Text

Dōgen wrote the Shōbōgenzō in Japanese, that is to say, using a combination of Chinese characters (squared ideograms usually consisting of many strokes) and the Japanese phonetic alphabet which is more abbreviated. Chinese of course is written in Chinese characters only. Therefore when Dōgen quotes a passage, or borrows a phrase, from a Chinese text—as he very often does—it is readily apparent to the eye as a string of Chinese ideograms uninterrupted by Japanese squiggles. We attempted to mirror this effect, to some degree, by using italics for such passages and phrases. (Editorial Note: In this BDK English Tripiṭaka Series edition, all such passages appear in quotemarks. Also, in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series, all Chinese characters have been omitted in this reprint edition. Interested readers may consult the original Windbell Publications edition, Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Books 1– 4.)

The Meaning of Shōbōgenzō, “True Dharma-eye Treasury”

Shō means “right” or “true.” Hō, “law,” represents the Sanskrit “Dharma.” All of us belong to something that, prior to our naming it or thinking about it, is already there. And it already belongs to us. “Dharma” is one name for what is already there.

Hōgen, “Dharma-eye,” represents the direct experience of what is already there. Because the Dharma is prior to thinking, it must be directly experienced by a faculty that is other than thinking. Gen, “eye,” represents this direct experience that is other than thinking.

Shōbōgen, “true Dharma-eye,” therefore describes the right experience of

what is already there.

Translator’s Introduction

Zō, “storehouse” or “treasury,” suggests something that contains and preserves the right experience of what is already there. Thus, Nishijima Roshi has interpreted Shōbōgenzō, “true Dharma-eye treasury,” as an expression of zazen itself.

Nishijima Roshi’s right Dharma-eye is, for me, evidenced nowhere more clearly than in his introduction to one of the chapters of this volume, Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō: All Dharmas are Real Form. Any virtue that this translation has stems entirely from the profoundly philosophical mind, the imperturbable balance, and the irrepressible optimism and energy of Nishijima Roshi.

 

SHŌBŌGENZŌ

THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY VOLUME III by

Dōgen

 

[Chapter Forty-two]

                                                           Tsuki1                                                                                                        

The Moon

Translator’s Note: Tsuki means “moon”; in this chapter Master Dōgen uses the moon as a symbol to explain the relationship between an abstract concept and a concrete entity. The moon existed yesterday, it exists today, and it will exist tomorrow. We can say that at one moment in time the moon is a unique and independent entity. At the same time, there is the abstract concept “moon.” The concept “moon” is an abstraction of the concrete moon which exists at one moment; that is the moon yesterday, the moon today, the moon tomorrow. Although the unique, concrete moon is the origin of the abstract concept “the moon,” we are prone to discuss philosophical problems only in terms of abstract concepts, forgetting concrete facts, and creating a division between thinking and perception. Buddhist philosophy synthesizes the two factors, and here Master Dōgen explains the mutual relationship between thinking and sensory perception, comparing the abstract concept “moon” with the concrete moon. Secondly, Master Dōgen uses the relationship between moon and cloud to explain the relationship between subject and object. Buddhist theory says that reality is oneness between subject and object here and now. Master Dōgen explains this using the example of the moon and a cloud that surrounds the moon.

[3] The round realization of moons is not only three and three before and not only three and three after.2 The state in which moons are round realization is not only three and three before and not only three and three after.3 Therefore.

. .

Śākyamuni Buddha says,

The Buddha’s true Dharma body4 Is just like space.

3

Manifesting its form according to things,

It is like the moon in water.5

The “reality as it is”6 in this “is like the moon in water” may be the [oneness of] “water-and-moon,” or it may be “the water’s reality,”7 or “the moon’s reality,”8 or “being in reality,”9 or “the reality of being in.”10 “Being like” does not express resemblance; being like is concrete existence.11 “The Buddha’s true Dharma body” is “the reality itself”12 of “space.” This “space” is the “Buddha’s true Dharma body” of “reality itself.” Because [space] is the Buddha’s true Dharma body, the whole earth, the whole world, the whole Dharma, and the whole of “manifestation,” are themselves naturally space. The “reality itself” of the manifest hundred things and myriad phenomena is totally the true Dharma body of Buddha, and it “is like the moon in water.” The time of the moon is not always night, and night is not always dark. Do not limit yourself to narrow human consideration. There may be day and night even where there is no sun or moon. The sun and the moon are not for day and night. The sun and the moon each are reality as it is, therefore [the

168b moon] is not one moon or two moons and not a thousand moons or ten thousand moons. Even if the moon maintains and relies upon a view of itself as one moon or two moons, that is the view of the moon, but it is not necessarily an expression of the Buddha’s truth or the wisdom of the Buddha’s truth. So although the moon was there last night, tonight’s moon is not yesterday’s moon. We should master in practice that the moon tonight, at the beginning, middle, and end, is the moon tonight. Because the moon succeeds the moon, the moon exists and yet is not new or old.13

[6] Zen Master Banzan Hōshaku says:14

Mind-moon, alone and round.

Light swallows myriad phenomena. Light does not illuminate objects, Neither do objects exist. Light and objects both vanish, This is what?

What has now been expressed is that the Buddhist patriarchs and the Buddha’s disciples always have the state of “mind-moon.” Because we see the moon as the mind, it is not the mind unless it is the moon, and there is

Chapter Forty-two

no moon which is not the mind. “Alone and round” means lacking nothing. That which is beyond two and three is called “myriad phenomena.” “Myriad phenomena,” being moonlight itself, are beyond “myriad phenomena”; therefore “light swallows myriad phenomena.” Myriad phenomena have naturally swallowed moonlight, and so he expresses light swallowing light as “light swallows myriad phenomena.” It may be, for another example, that the moon swallows the moon, or that light swallows the moon. This being so, he says, “Light does not illuminate objects,/Neither do objects exist.” Because [buddhas]15 have got the state like this, when “people must be saved through the body of a buddha, they manifest at once the body of a buddha and preach for them the Dharma.”16 When people must be saved through a common17 physical body, they manifest at once a common physical body and preach for them the Dharma. There is no such instance which is not the turning of the Dharma wheel in the moon. Even though the illumination of phenomena by yin energy and by yang energy18 is produced by the fire pearl and the water pearl,19 at the same time it is just the direct manifestation of reality. This mind is the moon itself, and this moon is naturally the mind. The Buddhist 168c patriarchs and the Buddha’s disciples master the principles of the mind and master the facts of the mind like this.

[8] An eternal buddha says, “One mind is the whole Dharma, and the whole Dharma is one mind.”20 So the mind is the whole Dharma, and the whole Dharma is the mind. And, because the mind is the moon, it may be that the moon is the moon. Because the whole Dharma as the mind is totally the moon, the whole world is the whole moon, and the “thoroughly realized body”21 is in its entirety the thoroughly realized moon. Even among the “three and three before and after”—which belong directly to eternity—is any not the moon? The sun-faced buddhas and moon-faced buddhas which are the present body-mind or object-subject may all be in the moon. Living-anddying, coming-and-going, are both “in the moon.” The whole universe in ten directions may be the top, bottom, left, and right of “in the moon.”22 Daily functions23 now are the hundred things being utterly clear “in the moon,” and are the mind of the ancestral masters being utterly clear “in the moon.”24

[10] Great Master Jisai25 of Tōsuzan in Jōshū district, the story goes, is

asked by a monk, “How is the moon when not yet round?”

The master says, “Swallowing three or four [concrete moons].”

5

The monk says, “And after it has been round?”

The master says, “Vomiting seven or eight.”26

The states under investigation now are “not yet being round” and “having been round.” Both are moments of the moon. Among three or four [concrete moons] in the moon, there is one [conceptual moon] which is not yet round.27 Among seven or eight [concrete moons] in the moon, there is one [conceptual moon] which has been round. Swallowing is [a concrete matter of] three or four; this moment is the realization of “the time when the moon is not yet round.” Vomiting is [a concrete matter of] seven or eight; this moment is the realization of “having been round.” When the moon swallows the moon,28 it is [a concrete matter of] three or four. In the act of swallowing, the moon exists and is realized. The moon is the realization of swallowing. When the moon vomits the moon, it is [a concrete matter of] seven or eight. In the act of vomiting, the moon exists and is realized. The moon is the realization of vomiting. Therefore it is swallowing wholly and it is vomiting wholly. The whole earth and the whole heavens are the act of vomiting, and the entire heavens and the entire earth are the act of swallowing. We should swallow

the self and should swallow the external world. We should vomit the self and should vomit the external world.

[12] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses Bodhisattva Diamond Treasury:29 “Just as, for example, moving eyes are able to stir calm waters and still eyes make fire seem to swirl, so too it is that [when] a cloud flies the moon moves and [when] a boat sails the shore drifts.”30

We must clarify and master in practice the present preaching of the Buddha that “[when] a cloud flies the moon moves and [when] a boat sails the shore drifts.” We must not understand it hastily and must not compare it with the sentiments of the common person. Still, those who see and hear this preaching of the Buddha in accordance with the preaching of the Buddha are few. When we are able to learn in accordance with the preaching of the Buddha, round realization31 is not always “the body-mind” and not always “bodhi” or “nirvana.” Bodhi and nirvana are not always “round realization” and not always “the body-mind.” The words now spoken by the Tathāgata that “[when] a cloud flies the moon moves and [when] a boat sails the shore drifts” mean that at the time of the cloud’s flying the moon is moving, and

Chapter Forty-two

at the time of the boat’s sailing the shore is drifting. The point is that the moving together of the cloud and the moon, in the same step, at the same time, in the same way, is beyond beginning and end and is beyond before and after. The moving together of the boat and the shore, in the same step, at the same time, in the same way, is beyond starting and stopping and is not a cycle. Similarly, when we learn human action, a person’s action is beyond starting and stopping, and the action of stopping and starting is beyond the person. Do not think of human action in the relative terms of starting and stopping. The flying of a cloud, the moving of the moon, the sailing of a boat, and the drifting of a shore, are all like this. Do not stupidly think limited thoughts according to the small view. Do not forget the principle that the flying of a cloud is beyond east, west, north, and south, and the moving of the moon is ceaseless day and night, past and present. The sailing of a boat and the drifting of a shore, both being beyond the three times, are able to utilize the three times. For this reason, “Having arrived directly at the present, we are full up and not hungry.”32

[15] Still, stupid people have understood that the unmoving moon appears      169b

to move because of the flying of a cloud, and that the motionless shore seems to drift because of the sailing of a boat. If it were as stupid people say, how could it be the teaching of the Tathāgata? The fundamental principle of the Buddha-Dharma is never the small thoughts of human beings and gods: although it is unthinkable, it is that there is only practice at every opportunity. Who could fail to sift through the boat and the shore over and over again? Who could fail to put on their eyes at once and look at the cloud and the moon?

[16] Remember, the teaching of the Tathāgata does not liken a cloud tosomething else, does not liken the moon to something else, does not liken a boat to something else, and does not liken a shore to something else. We should consider this truth quietly and master it in practice. A step of the moon is the round realization of the Tathāgata, and the round realization of the Tathāgata is the action of the moon, which is beyond movement and stillness and beyond progress and retreat. Because the moon’s moving is never a metaphor, its essence and form are “alone and round.” Remember, the gait of the moon—even if it is a gallop—is beyond beginning, middle, and end.

For this reason, the first moon and the second moon exist.33 The first and the

7

second are both the moon itself. What is “truly lovely for practice” is the moon; what is “truly lovely for serving offerings” is the moon; and what “swings the sleeves and goes at once” is the moon.34 Its roundness and sharpness are beyond waxing and waning. Using and not using the cycle of waxing and waning, letting go and holding back, it gives free play to the elegant ways,35 and so it exists like this in many moons.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Tsuki

                                    Written at Kannondōrikōshōhōrinji on the sixth                                     day of the first lunar month in [the fourth year  of] Ninji.36

                                    Śramaṇa Dōgen

Notes

1         chapter itself, Master Dōgen uses the usual single character for moon: All chapters of the in the chapter title, for the sake of conformity, Master Dōgen represents the Japanese Suki, “moon,” phonetically with the two Chinese characters Shōbōgenzō have at least two Chinese characters in the title. Thus,tsu and getsu, tsuki.ki. In the word

2         south. Monju says: How is the Buddha-Dharma of the south dwelled in and maintained? Zen sansan, go sansan, concrete facts as opposed to general abstractions. See, for example, pt. 2, no. 27: “Monju asks Mujaku: Where have you come from? Mujaku says: Thebhikṣu “three and three before, three and three after,” suggests randoms in the age of the latter Dharma observe the precepts. MonjuShinji-shōbōgenzō,

Mujaku says: Few cases five hundred. Mujaku asks Monju: How is the Buddha-Dharma here dwelled says: How big is the sangha? Mujaku says: In some cases three hundred, in some and snakes mix in confusion. Mujaku says: How big is the sangha? Monju says: Three and three before, three and three after. “in and maintained? Monju says: The common and the sacred live together, and dragons

3         the scientific or materialist viewpoint of the moon is the only viewpoint. The opening sentences suggest the oneness of realization and moons, denying that

4         Hosshin represents the Sanskrit dharmakāya.

5         Nyo-sui-chū-getsu,chū means “in,” but in his commentary Master Dōgen explores the meaning or suichū no tsuki no gotoshi. On the surface Konkōmyōkyōpt. 2, no. 25; Chapter nyo, gotoshi(Golden Lightmeans

“like,” and

Ten (Vol. I), Sutraof these two characters more deeply. Quoted from the ), vol. 24. The verse is also quoted in Shoaku-makusa. Shinji-shōbōgenzō,

6         Nyo-nyo. Nyo means “like.” At the same time, as a suffix, nyo affirms the thing itself it is, as in the word or the thing as it is. Further, the character sometimes represents the state of reality as Sanskrit Tathāgata). Therefore nyorai, “thus-come,” or “one who has arrived at reality” (from the nyo-nyo means reality itself or reality affirmed as it is.

7         Suinyo.

8         Getsunyo. 9           Nyochū.

10    center.” Master Dōgen often uses the character Chūnyo. Chū as a preposition means “in” and as a noun means “the middle” or “thechu to represent the concrete state of

Shōbōgenzō Volume III

I), II), being in reality. For other examples of this usage see notes to Chapter Fourteen (Vol.Sansuigyō;Muchū-setsumu. Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō; and Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol.

11    Nyo wa ze nari.Vol. I), Soku-shin-ze-butsu.The various meanings of ze are discussed at length in Chapter Six (

12    itself. ”to.” In Master Dōgen’s commentary the characters read as The characters are read in the poem as nao . . .  gotoshi, “just like” or “indeed similar yū-nyaku mean “reality

13    ongoing entity, it is never new or old. Because the moon is as it is at every moment, even though the moon exists as an

14    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 7.

15    The subject may be understood as Buddha’s disciples,” from the opening sentence of the commentary. busso busshi, “the Buddhist patriarchs and the 16 Alludes to the twenty-fifth chapter of the Universal Gate of the Bodhisattva Regarded of the Sounds of the World”). See LS 3.252.Lotus Sutra, Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon (“The

17    bodies means bodies that can be seen everywhere, such as those listed in the Sutra “Common” is etc. —bodies of generals, kings, monks and laypeople, boys and girls, gods, dragons, fugen, literally, “universally manifest.” Universally manifest physical Lotus

18    Onshō yōshō, moon, and yangyinis associated with the sun. Energy and yang energy.” In general, yin is associated with the

19    topadeśa energy.” The fire pearl thus suggests the sun, and the water pearl suggests the moon. Chap. 7 of the is water energy. The pearl of the sun is fire energy and the pearl of the moon is water) says: “There are two kinds of brightness: The first is fire energy. The second Daichidoron (the Chinese translation of the Mahāprajñāpārami-

20    [The quotation can be found, for example, in the Hiei, the head temple of the Tendai sect in Japan. would have studied from the age of twelve when he began monastic life on Mount Practice of] Stopping and Reflecting,” is a twenty-fascicle record of the lectures of Makashikan, Makashikan,a text that Master Dōgen which means “Great

Master Tendai Chigi (538–597), who is generally regarded as the founder of the Tendai sect in China. 21 Tsūshin. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon.

22    Getsuchū,“the reality of the moon.” See note 10.“in the moon,” means “in the presence of the moon” and at the same time

23    Nichiyō. Nichi means both “daily” and “the sun.”

24    Alludes to the saying clear are the hundred things; clear, clear is the will of the Buddhist patriarchs.” Themei-mei [taru] hyaku-sō-tō, meimei [taru] busso [no] i. “Clear,

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Chapter Forty-two

saying is attributed to the so-called Happy Buddha, Hōtei (Chinshū Fuke). See shōbōgenzō, three (Vol. II), pt. 1, no. 8; Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Gyōbutsu-yuigi; Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), Busshō;Kōmyō;Chapter Twenty-etc.                                                  Shinji-

25    Master Tōsu Daidō (819–914), successor of Master Suibi Mugaku (a third-generation he was a student of the descendant of Master Seigen Gyōshi). Before becoming the disciple of Master Suibi,Garland Sutra. In his later years, Master Tōsu returned to receiving many visitors. Tōsuzan in his home district and built a hut there where he lived for thirty years,

26    Rentōeyō, chap. 21; Hekiganroku, no. 79.

27    “Three or four [concrete moons]” is Chinese and Japanese use different counters for different objects. The counter sanko shiko. “One [conceptual moon]” main is for thin ichimai.ko is used for small inanimate objects like potatoes or pebbles. The counter moons, and ko flat objects such as sheets of paper, photographs, and paintings. In the story the counter is used. Master Dōgen uses both counters in his commentary; mai for the moon as an abstract concept or picture.  ko for concrete

28    When the moon realizes itself in action.

29    Called Vajragarbha in Sanskrit.

30    Daihōkōengakushutararyōgikyō (Mahāvaipulya Round Realization Sutra).

31    Engaku, “round realization,” suggests the concrete experience of wholeness in zazen.

32    doubts.” See Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Master Reiun Shigon said, “Having arrived directly at the present, I have no further Keisei-sanshiki. 33 Daiichi-getsu, dai-ni-getsu, lit., “moon number one and moon number two” or “the or the moon and its reflection, or concentrated mind and divided mind. The words dai-ni-getsuprimary moon and the secondary moon,” means the first month and the second month, appear in the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 83.

34       One night Seidō, Hyakujō, and Nansen happen to be enjoying the moon. Master[offerings.” Hyakujō says, “It is truly lovely for practice.” Nansen swings his sleeves and goes [to the zazen hall] at once. (Baso] asks, “How is it just at this moment?” Seidō says, “It is truly lovely for serving Gotōegen, chap. 3.)

35       Alludes to the words of Master Tendō Nyojō quoted in Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol.true,/Holding back and letting go,/We give free play to the elegant ways.” II), Muchū-setsumu, paragraph 175: “Dreams going awry and dreams coming

36       Kisign (the rabbit). These signs identify the year as 1243, which, in the Japanese system,1243is the tenth calendar sign (the younger brother of water) and . The year is identified, using the Chinese dating system, by the characters is the fourth horarykibō. era. See also Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), was both the fourth and final year of the Ninji era and the first year of the KangenShisho, note 74.

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[Chapter Forty-three]

                                                            Kūge                                             

Flowers in Space

Translator’s Note: means “the sky” or “space,” and ge means “flowers.” What are flowers in space? Master Dōgen uses the words “flowers in space” to express all phenomena in this world. According to the ideas of the German philosopher Immanuel Kant, we cannot be sure whether things really exist in this world, but we can be sure that there are phenomena which we can perceive with our senses. Therefore, for him, phenomena are not necessarily identified with reality although they do actually appear in this world. He refused to discuss the metaphysical problem of “real existence” and based his philosophy on human reason. The same idea was present in ancient Buddhism. Master Dōgen thought that this skeptical attitude was important in considering the meaning of our life, and so in this chapter he explains the meaning of “flowers in space,” which in Buddhism expresses real phenomena.

[19] The Founding Patriarch says: A flower is five petals opening,

Effects naturally are realized.1

We should learn in practice this moment of a flower opening, and its brightness, color, and form. The composition of a flower is five petals, and the opening of five petals is a flower. Penetration of the truth of a flower is “I originally came to this land to transmit the Dharma and to save deluded emotional beings.”2 The state that is visited by brightness and by color may be present in this learning in practice. “I entrust effects to effects themselves”: this expresses “natural realization.”3 “Natural realization” means enacting causes and accepting effects. The world has causes, and the world has effects. We enact the cause-and-effect that is this world, and we accept the cause and-effect that is the world. “The [natural] self”4 is “itself,”5 and the self is

13

inevitably just you, in other words, the four elements and five aggregates. Because we are “utilizing a true human being without rank,”6 the state is not I and not anyone else, and so we call what is indefinite “the self.”7 “The state of being [natural]”8 means “agreement.”9 “Natural realization” is the very moment of opening flowers and bearing fruit,10 and the very moment of transmitting the Dharma and saving the deluded. For example, the time and place that blue lotus11 flowers open and spread are in the midst of fire and in the time of fire.12And all sparks and flames exist at the place and at the time that blue lotus flowers open and spread. Beyond the time and the place of blue lotus flowers, not a single spark is born, and not a single spark has vivid life. Remember, in a single spark there are hundreds and thousands of clusters of blue lotus flowers, and they open and spread in space, they open and spread on the ground, they open and spread in the past, and they open and spread in the present. To experience the actual time and the actual place of fire is to experience blue lotus flowers. We should not pass by the time and the place of blue lotus flowers, but should experience them.

[22] An ancestor says: “Blue lotus flowers open inside fire.”13

170a So “blue lotus flowers” inevitably open and spread “inside fire.”14 If we want to know “the inside of fire,” it is the place where blue lotus flowers open and spread. We should not, out of attachment to human views and views of gods, neglect to research “the inside of fire.” If we are to doubt, we might doubt that lotus flowers have grown in water, or we might doubt that other flowers are present on branches and twigs. Again, if we are to doubt, we might doubt that the objective world15 is stably established, but this we do not doubt. None other than Buddhist patriarchs knows that “the opening of flowers is the occurrence of the world.”16 “Flowers opening” are “three and three before, and three and three after.”17 In order to make up these numbers, they have accumulated material particles and exalted them. Letting this truth come to us, we should consider spring and autumn: Not only in spring and in autumn do flowers and fruit exist; existence-time always has flowers and fruit. Every flower and fruit has maintained and relied upon a moment of time, and every moment of time has maintained and relied upon flowers and fruit. For this reason, all miscellaneous things have flowers and fruit: trees all have flowers and fruit; trees of gold, silver, copper, iron, coral, crystal, and so forth, all have flowers and fruit; and trees of earth, wind, fire, water, and space, all have flowers and fruit. Flowers are present in

human trees, flowers are present in human flowers, and flowers are present in withered trees. In such circumstances there are the flowers in space18 of which the World-honored One speaks. Yet people of small knowledge and small experience do not know of the colors, brightness, petals, and flowers of flowers in space, and they can scarcely even hear the words “flowers in space.” Remember, in Buddhism there is talk of flowers in space. In nonBuddhism they do not even know, much less understand, talk of flowers in space. Only the buddhas and the patriarchs know the blooming and falling of flowers in space and flowers on the ground, only they know the blooming and falling of flowers in the world, and so on; only they know that flowers in space, flowers on the ground, flowers in the world, and so on, are sutras. This is the standard for learning the state of buddha. Because flowers in space are the vehicle upon which Buddhist patriarchs ride, the Buddhist world and 170b all the buddhas’ teachings are just flowers in space.

[26] Nevertheless, when the common and the stupid hear the Tathāgata’s words that “What is seen by clouded eyes is flowers in space,” they imagine that “clouded eyes” means the upset eyes of ordinary beings. They imagine that sick eyes, because they are upset, perceive “flowers in space” in a pure void. Because [stupid people] attach to this theory, they have concluded that the triple world, the six states, the existence of the buddha-nature, and the nonexistence of the buddha-nature all do not exist, but are deludedly seen to exist. They excitedly consider that if we could stop this deluded cloudiness of the eyes, we would not see this floweriness in space, and this is why we say that “space is originally without flowers.” It is pitiful that people like this do not know the time of, or the beginning and end of, the flowers in space of which the Tathāgata speaks. The truth that buddhas speak of clouded eyes and flowers in space is never seen by the common person and non-Buddhists. By practicing this flower of space,19 the buddha-tathāgatas receive the robes, the seat [of preaching], and the [master’s] room, and they attain the truth and get the effect. Picking up a flower and winking an eye are all the universe, which is realized by clouded eyes and flowers in space. The right Dharma eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, which have been authentically transmitted to the present without interruption, are called clouded eyes and flowers in space. Bodhi, nirvana, the Dharma body, selfhood, and so on, are two or three petals of five petals opened by a flower in space.

[29] Śākyamuni Buddha says,

It is like a person who has clouded eyes Seeing flowers in space;

If the sickness of clouded eyes is cured,

Flowers vanish in space.20

No scholars have clearly understood this statement. Because they do not know space,21 they do not know flowers in space. Because they do not know flowers in space, they do not know a person who has clouded eyes, do not see a person who has clouded eyes, do not meet a person who has clouded eyes, and do not become a person who has clouded eyes. Through meeting a person who has clouded eyes, we should know flowers in space and should see flowers in space. When we have seen flowers in space we can also see “flowers vanish in space.” The idea that once flowers in space 170c vanish they can never reappear is the view and opinion of the Small Vehicle. At a time when flowers in space could not be seen, what could exist? Only knowing that flowers in space can become an object to get rid of, [scholars] do not know the great matter that follows from flowers in space, and do not know the seeding, maturation, and falling free of flowers in space. Among scholars today who are common people, most think that the place where yang energy resides may be space, or that the place where the sun, moon, and stars are suspended may be space, and so for example they believe that “flowers in space” might describe the appearance of colorful forms which are like floating clouds in clear sky and like flying blossoms being blown east and west and up and down by the wind. They do not know that the four elements as creator and creation, together with the real dharmas22 of the objective world, on the one hand, and original realization,23 original nature and so forth, on the other hand, are all called “flowers in space.” Furthermore, they do not know that the four elements and so on which are the agents of creation exist because of real dharmas, and they do not know that the objective world abides in its place in the universe because of real dharmas; they see only that real dharmas exist because of the objective world. They understand only that flowers in space exist because of cloudiness in the eyes; they do not understand the truth that cloudiness in the eyes is caused to exist by virtue of flowers in space. Remember, in Buddhism a person of

 

clouded eyes is a person of original realization, a person of subtle realization, a person of the buddhas, a person of the triple world, and a person in the ascendant state of buddha.24 Do not stupidly see cloudiness as delusion and learn that true reality exists elsewhere. To do so would be the small view. If cloudiness and flowers were delusion, that which attaches to the wrong view that they are delusion, and the attachment itself, must all be delusion. If both [subject and object] were delusion, there would be no possibility of establishing any truth. There being no truth to establish, [to assert] that cloudiness and flowers are delusion would be impossible.

[33] When realization is clouded, each of the many dharmas in realization is a dharma adorned with cloudiness. When delusion is clouded, each of the many dharmas in delusion is a dharma adorned with cloudiness. For the present, we can say that when clouded eyes are balanced, flowers in space are balanced; when clouded eyes are nonarising,25 flowers in space are nonerasing; and when all dharmas are real form, clouded-flowers are real form. We should neither discuss this as past, present, or future, nor relate it to beginning, middle, and end. Because it is not hindered by arising and passing, it can cause arising and passing to arise and pass—arising in space26 and passing in space, arising in clouded eyes27 and passing in clouded eyes, arising in flowers28 and passing in flowers, and so on for all other times and places. Learning of flowers in space may take many forms: there is what is seen by clouded eyes, what is seen by clear eyes, what is seen by the Buddha’s eyes, what is seen by the patriarchs’ eyes, what is seen by the eyes of the truth, what is seen by blind eyes, what is seen by three thousand years, what is seen by eight hundred years, what is seen by hundreds of kalpas, and what is seen by countless kalpas. All these see flowers in space, but space itself is multifarious, and flowers also are diverse. Remember that space is a thing.29 This space unfailingly yields flowers as all the hundred things30 yield flowers. To express this truth, the Tathāgata says, “Space is originally without flowers.”31 Although there are originally no flowers, now there are flowers—a fact which is true for peach and plum trees and true for apricot and willow trees.32 [The Tathāgata’s expression] is like saying “the apricot yesterday was without flowers but the apricot in spring has flowers.” Still, when the season arrives and just then flowers bloom, this may be the flowers’ time or it may be the flowers arriving.33 This exact moment of flowers arriving is

171a

171b

never a random event. Apricot and willow flowers inevitably bloom on apricot and willow trees; looking at [apricot and willow] flowers we can identify apricot and willow trees, and looking at apricot and willow trees we can distinguish [apricot and willow] flowers. Peach and plum flowers never bloom on apricot or willow trees. Apricot and willow flowers bloom on apricot and willow trees, and peach and plum flowers bloom on peach and plum trees. Flowers in space blooming in space are also like this; they never bloom on other things and never bloom on other trees. Looking at the various colors of space flowers, one imagines the limitlessness of space fruits. Watching flowers in space open and fall, we should learn of the spring and autumn of flowers in space. Spring for flowers in space and spring for other flowers may be alike. As flowers in space are miscellaneous, so must spring seasons be of many kinds. Thus do springs and autumns of the past and present exist. People who understand that flowers in space are not real but other flowers are real are people who have not seen or heard the Buddha’s teaching. To understand, on hearing the preaching that “space is originally without flowers,” that there now exist flowers in space which originally did not exist, is the near-sighted and small view. We should step ahead and take the broad view. An ancestral master34 says, “Flowers have never appeared.” The realization of this principle is, for example, the truth that flowers have never appeared,35 that flowers have never disappeared, that flowers have never been “flowers” and that space has never been “space.” We should not engage in idle discussion of existence and nonexistence, confusing the before and 171c after of flower-time. Flowers always seem to be imbued with all colors. [But] colors are not always limited to flowers: other seasons also have blues, yellows, reds, whites, and other colors. Spring brings in flowers, and flowers bring in spring.

[38]  The mandarin Chō Setsu36 is a lay disciple of Sekisō.37 The poem

he makes on realizing the truth is as follows:

Brightness is serenely illuminating the whole sands-of-the-Ganges     world.

This “brightness” has clearly realized the monks’ hall, the Buddha hall, the kitchen hall, and the temple gate.38 The “whole sands-of-the-Ganges world” is realized by brightness, and is brightness realized.

[39]  All souls, common and sacred, are my family.

It is not that there are no common people and saints. [But] do not insult

common people and saints by this [discrimination].

[40]  When not one image appears39 the total body manifests itself.

Image and image are one by one.40 This state is inevitably not appearance,41 and it is the total manifestation of the total body. For this reason he says that one image is not appearance.42

[40] If the six sense organs are slightly moved [the mind] is covered     with clouds.

Although “the six sense organs” are the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and sense-center, they are not always two times three; they may be “three and three before and after.”43 “Moving” is as Mount Sumeru,44 as the earth, as the six sense organs, and as slight moving itself. Because moving is as Mount Sumeru, not moving is also as Mount Sumeru. For example, it forms clouds and produces water.45

[42]  By eliminating disturbances46 we redouble the disease.

We have not been free of disease hitherto; we have had the Buddha bug and the patriarch bug. Intellectual excluding now adds to the disease and augments the disease. The very moment itself of “eliminating” is inevitably “disturbance.” They are simultaneous and are beyond simultaneousness. Disturbances always include the fact of [trying to] eliminate them.

[43]  To approach the truth intentionally is also wrong.

To turn one’s back on the truth is wrong, and to approach the truth is also wrong. The truth is the approaching and the turning away, which, in each instance of approaching or turning away, are the truth itself. Is there anyone who knows that this “wrong is also the truth”?

[43]  In following worldly circumstances there are no hindrances.

            “Worldly circumstance” and “worldly circumstance follow” each other,  172a

and “following” and “following” is “worldly circumstances.” This state is

called “without hindrances.” We should learn the state beyond hindrance and no hindrance as that which is obstructed by the eyes.47

[44]  Nirvana, and living-and-dying, are just flowers in space.

“Nirvana” means the state of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. The abode of Buddhist patriarchs and the disciples of Buddhist patriarchs is just this state. “Living-and-dying” is “the real human body.”48 This “nirvana and livingand-dying” are this reality, and at the same time they are just “flowers in space.” The roots and stalks, twigs and leaves, flowers and fruit, and brightness and colors of flowers in space, are each the blooming of flowers in space. Space-flowers inevitably bear space-fruit and drop space-seeds. Because the triple world which we are experiencing now is the “five petals opening” of flowers in space, “It is best to see the triple world as the triple world.”49 [The triple world] is this “real form of all dharmas.”50 It is this “flower form” of “all dharmas”; and all dharmas, from these to others beyond imagination, are flowers in space and fruit in space. We should learn by experience that they are identical to those in apricot, willow, peach, and plum trees.

[46]          Zen Master Reikun51 of Fuyōzan in the Fuzhou district of the great kingdom of Song, when first entering the order of Zen Master Shishin52 of

Kisūji, asks, “What is Buddha?”

Kisū says, “If I tell you, will you believe me or not?

Master [Reikun] says, “How could I not believe the master’s honest

words?”

Kisū says, “You yourself are just it.”

Master [Reikun] says, “How should I maintain it?”

Kisū says, “When an instance of cloudiness is there in the eyes, flowers

in space tumble down.”53

[47]          The words that Kisū now speaks, “When an instance of cloudednessis there in the eyes, flowers in space tumble down,”54 express maintenance of buddha. So remember, the tumbling down of clouded-flowers is what buddhas realize, and the flowers and fruit of eyes-and-space are what buddhas maintain. With cloudiness they make eyes real. Flowers in space are realized in eyes, and eyes are realized in flowers in space. It may be that “When flowers in space are there in the eyes, a single instance of cloudiness tumbles down,”55 and “When an eye is there in space, all instances of cloudiness tumble down.”56 This being so, cloudiness is “the manifestation of all functions,”57 eyes are “the manifestation of all functions,” space is “the manifestation of all functions,” and flowers are “the manifestation of all functions.” “Tumbling down” is the “thousand eyes” and is the “thoroughly realized body” as an eye.58 In sum, at the time and place an eye exists, there are inevitably flowers in space and flowers in eyes. We call flowers in eyes flowers 172b in space. And an expression of eyes-and-flowers is always open and clear. [49] For this reason, Great Master Kōshō59 of Rōyasan says:

How wondrous are the buddhas in the ten directions! They are originally just the flowers in our eyes.

And if we want to know the flowers in our eyes,

They are originally just the buddhas in the ten directions. If we want to know buddhas in ten directions, They are other than the flowers in our eyes.

If we want to know flowers in eyes,

They are other than the buddhas in the ten directions; And when we understand this situation clearly, The fault is with buddhas in ten directions. Not understanding this situation clearly,

Voice-hearers might dance

And the independently awakened might put on make-up.60

[50] Remember, “the buddhas in the ten directions” are not unreal; they are originally just “the flowers in our eyes.” The place where the buddhas of the ten directions abide is “in the eyes,” and anywhere other than “in the eyes” is not the abode of buddhas. “The flowers in our eyes” are neither nonexistence nor existence, they are neither immaterial nor real; they are naturally just “the buddhas in the ten directions.” Now if we want to know only the buddhas of the ten directions, one-sidedly, they are other than the flowers in our eyes; and if we want to know only flowers in eyes, one-sidedly, they seem to be other than the buddhas of the ten directions. Both “clear understanding” and “unclear understanding,” because they are like this, are flowers in the eyes and buddhas in the ten directions. “Wanting to know” and “it not being so”61 are the very realization of “wondrousness”; they are great wonders. The fundamental meaning of the flowers in space, and the flowers on the ground, of which the buddhas and the patriarchs speak, is such “giving of free play to the elegant ways.”62 Even teachers of sutras and teachers of commentaries are able to hear the name of flowers in space, but none other than a Buddhist patriarch has the means or the circumstances to experience the lifeblood of flowers on the ground. One who has apprehended the lifeblood of flowers on the ground speaks the state of a Buddhist patriarch.

[52] Zen Master Etetsu63 of Sekimonzan in the great kingdom of Song is a venerable patriarch in the order on Ryōzan.64 In the story, a monk asks him, “What is the jewel in the mountain?” The point of this question is, for example, the same as in asking “What is buddha?” It is like asking “What is the truth?” The master says, “Flowers in space unfold on the ground. Even

172c if we buy throughout the country, there is no gate.”65 This expression should never be compared with other expressions. Ordinary teachers in many districts, when discussing flowers in space as “flowers of emptiness,”66 speak only of arising in emptiness and passing in emptiness.67 None has understood “reliance on space”;68 how much less could any understand “reliance on the ground.”69 Only Sekimon has understood. The meaning of “relying on the ground” is that beginning, middle, and end are, ultimately, “relying on the ground.” “To unfold” is to open.70 Just at this moment, there is unfolding “from the whole earth,” and there is opening “from the whole earth.”71 “Even if we buy throughout the country, there is no gate”: it is not that there is no “buying throughout the country”; it is “buying the gateless.”72 Flowers in space exist on the basis of unfolding from the ground, and the whole ground exists on the basis of the opening of flowers. So remember, there is a principle that flowers in space cause both the ground and space to unfold.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kūge

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kannondōri kōshō                                     hōrinji on the tenth day of the third lunar                                     month in the first year of Kangen.73

Notes

1     Ikke-kai-go-yō/kekka-jinen-jōMaster Bodhidharma, quoted in the as 1) “effects,” and 2) “the bearing of fruit.” The fourth line can be read, “The bearingof fruit is naturally realized.” are the third and fourth lines of a four-line poem byKeitokudentōroku, chap. 3. Kekka can be translated

2     Ware moto shido ni kitari/Hō o tsutae meijō o sukuu. The first and second lines of Master Bodhidharma’s poem.

3     Dōgen considers the meaning of the characters Jinen-jō. As a compound, jinen means “naturally,” but in his commentary Masterji and nen separately.

4     “naturally. “I. As a noun ji means “self.” As an adverb it means “by itself,” “spontaneously,” or

5     ently. He says the compound Ko means self, and in normal usage it only appears in compounds—most common lyjiko,ji wa ko nari,“self.” Here however, Master Dōgen uses the character independent-literally, “self is itself.” 6 Shitoku mu-i shinjin, the words of Master Rinzai. See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 47. 7 Ji. See note 4.

8     ordinarily be used as a noun, but here Master Dōgen uses it as a noun—“the state of Nenmakes means “as is,” “being so,” or “in such and such a state.” Used as a suffix, ji, “self,” into an adjective, “natural,” or into an adverb, “naturally.” Nen cannot Nen being so.”

9     Chōko,as they are. “permission,” “approval,” or “agreement,” here suggests acceptance of things 10 Kekka, translated in Master Bodhidharma’s poem as “effects.” See note 1.

11    Ubara is a transliteration of the Sanskrit utpala, which means the blossom of the blue lotus. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

12    Blue lotus flowers, which bloom on pools in hot weather during the summer, are a symbol of coolness. Fire symbolizes heat.

13    chap. 29.This is the second line of an eight-line verse by Master Doan Jōsatsu (dates unknown),Keitokudentōroku, successor of Master Kyūhō Dōken. The verse is quoted in the

23

14    Kari. RI extension, the concrete place of something—as in means 1) the back side of something, 2) the inside of something, and, byshari, “this concrete place.”

15    opposed to Kiseken, literally, “vessel world,” or the objective world. Traditionally, ujo-seken, “the world of the sentient.”     kiseken is

16    These are the words of Master Prajñātara, Master Bodhidharma’s master.

17    abstractions. See notes to the opening paragraph of Chapter Forty-two, Zensansan, gosansan suggests random concrete facts as opposed to neat general Suki.

18    the expression Kokūge. KokūVol. IV], Kokūsuggests concrete three-dimensional space (see Chapter Seventy-seven kūge, ). By using this expression at this point, Master Dōgen indicates that which appears henceforward, means flowers (that is, real phe-

[ nomena) in concrete space.

19    Kūge .plural. In this case it is preceded by space” or “the flower of the state of In general kūge suggests images, or phenomena, and has been translated askono,śūnyatā“this,” and so it is singular. “The flower of” suggests the system of Buddhist philosophy.

20    Shuryōgonkyō (Śūraṃgama-sūtra), vol. 4.

21    “empty” (Kū.sutras, As a noun, karasometimes means “the immaterial,” as opposed to matter, and it sometimes), or “void,” “meaningless” kū, soraśūnyatā, means “the sky” or “space.” As an adjective it means “bare, ”emptiness”; that is, the state of detachment in which(muna[shii]). At the same time, in Buddhist

Two (Vol. I), things are seen as they are; see Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. See also Chapter represents the Sanskrit Maka-hannya-haramitsu; Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō. 22 Shohō, “real dharmas,” means real things and phenomena—not only objects of perception and not only subjective concepts, but things and phenomena that are realizedin action here and now.

23    original realization comes from the former theory.are two contradictory theories—that human beings have the buddha-nature originally,Hongaku.and that the buddha-nature can be attained through efforts in our life. The idea ofIn the Tendai sect, which Master Dōgen entered at the age of twelve, there

24    Butsu-kōjō-nin. See Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Butsu-kōjō-no-ji.

25    Mushō expresses the state at the moment of the present. At the same time, mushō is sometimes used as a synonym for nirvana, the state that is not disturbed by arisingand passing conditions.

26    suffix it means the midst of something and by extension—in Master Dōgen’s usage—Kūchū nispace.” the concrete reality of something. Chūmeans “in space,” “in the midst of space,” or “in the concrete reality of literally means “the middle” (as in beginning, middle, and end). As a Chapter Forty-three

27    Eichū ni.

28    Kechū ni.

29    Issō, of the six elements: earth, water, fire, wind, space, and consciousness.literally, “one weed.” Space is a thing in the sense, for example, that it is one 30 numerologists only affirm that flowers bloom, i.e., phenomena exist, Master DōgenHyakusō, lit., “hundred weeds,” means miscellaneous concrete things. Whereas pianists that things also exist—phenomena are things and things are phenomena.

31    out,” see Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Kū-hon-muge. Source not traced. For explanation of the meaning of Busshō.        mu, “being with-

32    included in trees of the genus “Plum” is ri, sumomo, and “apricot” is bai, ume.Prunus mume In Japan the tree referred to as ). At the same time it isume is accurately translated as a Japanese apricot (

chapter, the two varieties are distinguished, but where no distinction is necessary the translation of Fifty-nine, Baike.bai, ume as “plum” rather than “apricot” has been preferred. See Chapter Prunus, which can be classified as plum trees. In this

33    from two sides—flowers wait to bloom in spring, and spring waits for flowers tobloom.The words describe spring directly as a simple fact, but that fact can be interpreted

34    Master Taiso Eka. See Keitokudentōroku, chap. 3.

35    Because real phenomena exist at the moment of the present.

36    Apart from the fact that he became the disciple of Master Sekisō at the recommendation Gotōegen, of Great Master Zengetsu, his life history is not known. The poem is recorded in the chap. 6.

37    Master Sekisō Keisho (807–888), successor of Master Dōgo Enchi.

38    genzō, The assembled monks make no reply. [Unmown] himself says in their place, “Themonks’ hall, the Buddha hall, the kitchen, and the three gates.” See also Alludes to the words of Master Unmown Bun’en quoted in Chapter Thirty-six (Vol.II), Kōmyō:pt. 1, no. 81.Unmon asks, “Just what is this brightness that is present in all people?”Shinji-shōbō-

39    zastate in which no isolated thought emerges in zazen, so that the body-mind is free tonegation. Ichi-nen-fushō. Ichi[reba], or “when an image does not arise,” these four characters suggest the desirable Shō means “to appear” or “to arise.” In the poem, read as means “one.” Nen means “image” or “thought.” ichi-nen shōFu expresses[ze] reflect the whole.

40    an ideal situation, Master Dōgen’s comment is a stark description of concrete facts:Nen-nen ichi-ichi nari, “image-image is one-one.” Whereas the poem seems to describe he simply notices the existence of an image at a moment. This is reminiscent of

25

Master Dōgen’s instruction for zazen in the ba] suna[wachi] kaku[se yo]: “When an image arises, just be aware of it.”Fukanzazengi, Shinpitsubon: nen oko[ra

41    Fushō,which time stands still. See note 25. Master Dōgen explains this usage in Chapter“not appearance,” here suggests the state at the moment of the present inGenjō-kōan.

Three (Vol. I),

42    itself.”Ichi-nen-fushōimage [of reality] is beyond appearance, and the total body [of reality] manifestscan be interpreted as a description of momentary reality: “The one

43    We should not always understand “sense organs” as an abstract, inclusive concept. 44 a symbol of stability, or non-movement. But Master Dōgen’s view of movement tran-Mount Sumeru, standing at the center of the universe, is generally understood to be scends the ordinary idea of movement relative to non-movement. 45 Movement is reality itself, symbolized by clouds and water.

46    Dictionary,Bonnō, in modern Japanese usage, as defined by means “earthly passions” or “carnal desires.” Here which is defined in Monier-Williams’ Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-EnglishSanskrit-English Dictionarybonnō represents the

Sanskrit (worldly occupation, care, trouble.” MW) as follows: “pain, affliction, distress, pain from disease, anguish; wrath, anger;kleśa, the reception of a radio signal. Traditional examples of arrogance, doubt, and false views.Buddhist practitioner from harmonizing with the truth—just as interference hindersKleśas are emotional imbalances that hinder akleśa are greed, anger, ignorance,

47    Hi-gan-ge,in which eyes inevitably see all things as they are. Or me [ni] saera[ru], “being obstructed by the eyes,” suggests the state 48 body.” See Chapter Fifty, Master Engo Kokugon said, “Living-and-dying, coming-and-going, are the real human Shohō-jissō.

Lifetime”) chapter of the

to three traditional interpretations of the words. The interpretation of the two ways: 1) Flower of Dharma Commentary Shika zu (“be best”), and 2) ) is that [the Tathāgata sees the triple world] “not

49    (like [people of] the triple world seeing the triple world.” The interpretation of these the triple world as the triple world,” i.e., there is no triple world seen by the sees is different from the triple world that the common person sees. Master DōgenSangai no sangai o genzuru ni shika zu,Danaryū (Dāna school) is similar, suggesting that the triple world that the Buddha favored the interpretation of the Enshinryū (Blessed Mind school) that “It is best toLotus Sutra (LS 3.18). The characters gotoku nara zu from the Nyorai-juryō(“not like”). This gave rise bunyo(“The Tathāgata’scan be read in Hokkeron

seven, Buddha other than the triple world seen by the common person. See Chapter Forty-Sangai-yuishin.

50    Shohō-jissō. See Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō.

Chapter Forty-three

51    Master Fuyō Reikun (dates unknown), successor of Master Kisū Chijō. His posthumoustitle is Great Master Kōshō.

52    Shishin is his posthumous title.Master Kisū Chijō (dates unknown), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Zen Master

53    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 10.

54    Ichi-ei-zai-gen-kūge-rantsui,flowers tumble.” In other words, at a moment when we realize our own delusion,literally, “one cloudiness being present in eyes, spacephenomena become real.

55    Kūge-zai-gen-ichi-ei-rantsui,cloudedness tumbles.” In other words, when we are looking at real phenomena, weliterally, “space-flowers being present in eyes, one transcend our delusion at that moment.

56    Ichi-gen-zai-kū-shu-ei-rantsui,cloudedness tumble.” In other words, when our whole body-mind is existing inconcrete space (e.g., in zazen), we are transcending all kinds of delusion.literally, “one eye being present in space, all kinds of 57 Zenki no gen, the words of Master Engo Kokugon. See Chapter Forty-one (Vol. I), Zenki.

58    In other words, transcendence of subjective delusion and objective images is the vig-orous state of reality symbolized by Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon.

59    Master Setchō Myōkaku, as one of “the two gates of sweet dew.” Great Master KōshōMaster Rōya Ekaku (dates unknown), successor of Master Fun’yō Zenshō. Whileis his posthumous title.Rōya set off to return to his family’s home. But on the way back he stopped at YakusanMountain and decided to become a monk. He was praised in his day, along withMaster Rōya was a layman his father, who was the local governor, died so Master

60    Śrāvakarejoice in having understood what they have not really understood. The verse is quotedin the Gotōegen,s (voice-hearers) and chap. 12. pratyekabuddhas (independently awakened ones) might

61    Fuze, translated in the poem as “are other than. . . .”

Muchū-setsumu,

62    back and letting go,/We give free play to the elegant ways.” See also the final paragraphof Chapter Forty-two, Alludes to words of Master Tendō Nyojō quoted in Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II),paragraph 175: “Dreams going awry and dreams coming true,/HoldingTsuki.

63    Master Sekimon Etetsu (dates unknown), successor of Master Sekimon Kenun. 64 Ryōzan generally refers to Master Ryōzan Enkan. However, the exact relationshipbetween Master Sekimon and Master Ryōzan Enkan is unclear.

65    Tenshōkōtōroku, chap. 24.

27

66    “Flowers of emptiness” suggests the interpretation of “Flowers in space” and “flowers of emptiness” are originally the same word,  śūnyatā that Master Dōgen haskūge. opposed in this chapter—the interpretation that phenomena are devoid of reality.

67    O-kū, śūnyatā. O,“in emptiness,” suggests intellectual effort to relate phenomena to the conceptor [ni] oi[te], means “at,” “in,” “on,” or “in regard to.” This expressionkūchū, “in space,” which means “inside space” or “in the concrete reality of space.” See note 26.is distinct from the more concrete expression used earlier,

68    concrete state than Jūkū, “from space,” “relying on space,” or “on the basis of space,” suggests a moreo-kū, “in emptiness.” Jū, or [ni] yori[te], means “following from,”

“relying on,” or “on the basis of.”

69    of the ground,” is Master Sekimon’s expression. It suggests a still more concrete state. Jūchi, “from the ground,” “on the ground,” “relying on the ground,” or “on the basis

70    Master Dōgen explains the character hotsu in Master Sekimon’s words with the char-acter example, to describe the establishment of the will to the truth. See Chapter Seventy, kai. Hotsu means “to shoot out,” “to emit,” or “to open up.” It is used, for means “to open”; at the same time, it also sometimes means Hokke-ten-hokke.

Hotsu-bodaishin. Kai“to disclose” or “to reveal.” See Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I),

71    “in emptiness”; 2) Jūjindaichi, “from the whole earth” or “on the basis of the whole earth,” is Mastero-kū, Dōgen’s expression. Thus, four expressions may be contrasted in this part: 1)

  and 4) Master Dōgen’s suggestion of zazen which is earth.”    jūkū, “on the basis of space”; 3) jūchi,jūjindaichi,“on the basis of the ground”;“from the whole

72    gests that we get reality (in which there is no concept “gate”) just in action (buying)“The gateless” is Master Dōgen does not deny the effort to get something, and at the same time he sug-mumon, translated in Master Sekimon’s words as “there is no gate.” itself. 73 1243.

[Chapter Forty-four] Kobusshin

The Mind of Eternal Buddhas

Translator’s Note: Ko means “old” or “eternal,” butsu means “buddha” and shin means “mind.” So kobusshin means “the mind of eternal buddhas.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen cites examples of the mind of eternal buddhas, quoting Master Tendō Nyojō, Master Engo Kokugon, Master Sozan Kōnin, and Master Seppō Gison. Then he explains a story about National Master Daishō (Master Nan’yō Echū) and his disciple that suggests the oneness of the mind of eternal buddhas and miscellaneous concrete things. At the end of the chapter he quotes Master Zengen Chūkō’s words on the matter.

[55] The succession of the Dharma by ancestral patriarchs is forty patriarchs from the Seven Buddhas to Sōkei1 and forty buddhas from Sōkei to the Seven Buddhas. Because each of the Seven Buddhas has the virtue of ascending and of descending,2 they extend to Sōkei and extend to the Seven Buddhas. Because Sōkei has the virtue of ascending and of descending, he receives the authentic transmission from the Seven Buddhas, he receives the authentic transmission from Sōkei, and he passes the authentic transmission to later buddhas. But it is beyond only former and later. At the time of Śākyamuni Buddha, all the buddhas of the ten directions are present; at the time of Seigen, Nangaku is present;3 at the time of Nangaku, Seigen is present; and so on— 173a at the time of Sekitō, Kōzei is present.4 Their not hindering each other may be different from having no connection. We should investigate the presence of such virtue. Each of the forty Buddhist patriarchs mentioned above is an eternal buddha. At the same time, each has a mind, a body, a state of brightness, and a national land. Each has passed away long ago and has never passed away at all. It may be that both never having passed away, and having passed away long ago, are equally the virtue of an eternal buddha. Those who learn in practice the truth of eternal buddhas realize in experience the truth of

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eternal buddhas; they are the eternal buddhas of each age. Although the “eternal” of “eternal buddhas” is exactly the same as the “old”5 in “new and old,” [eternal buddhas] have completely transcended past and present;6 they belong directly in eternity.

[58] My late master says, “I have met with the eternal buddha Wanshi.”7

Clearly, an eternal buddha is present in the house of Tendō, and Tendō

is present in the house of an eternal buddha.

[58] Zen Master Engo8 says, “I bow to the ground9 before the true eternal

buddha Sōkei.”

Remember, we should bow down to the thirty-third patriarch from Śākyamuni Buddha, bowing to him as an eternal buddha. Because Zen Master Engo has the resplendent brightness of an eternal buddha, in the state of having met with an eternal buddha, he is able to prostrate himself like this. This being so, mindful of the state of Sōkei which is right from beginning to end, we should remember that eternal buddhas are the grasping of a nose-ring10 like this. One who has this ability to grasp a nose-ring is just an eternal buddha.

[59] Sozan11 says, “On the peak of Daiyurei Mountain12 an eternal buddha

is present, and he is radiating brightness that shines on this place.”13

Remember, Sozan has already met with an eternal buddha. We need not search elsewhere; the place where an eternal buddha exists is the peak of Daiyurei Mountain. Those who themselves are not eternal buddhas cannot know the place where eternal buddhas appear. One who knows the concrete place where an eternal buddha exists may be an eternal buddha.

173b             [60] Seppō14 says, “The eternal buddha Jōshū!”15

Remember, even though Jōshū is an eternal buddha, if Seppō had not been endowed with his own share of an eternal buddha’s power, it might be hard for him to realize the secret of how to pay homage to an eternal buddha. In his action now, as he relies on the influence of an eternal buddha and learns from an eternal buddha, there is effort “beyond conversing,”16 which is, in other words, Old Man Seppō, the great stout fellow, himself. The everyday customs of eternal buddhas, and the dignified behavior of eternal buddhas, are not similar to and never the same as those of people who are not eternal buddhas. This being so, by learning in practice the state of Jōshū which is “good in the beginning, middle, and end,”17 we should learn in practice “the lifetime”18 of an eternal buddha.

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[62]          National Master Daishō,19 of Kōtakuji in the Western Capital,20 is a Dharma successor of Sōkei, revered and venerated by human emperors and celestial emperors alike, and one who is rarely seen and heard [even] in China. Not only is he the teacher of four generations of emperors, but the emperors themselves lead his carriage into the imperial court. Still more, invited to the palace of the god Indra, he ascends far into the heavens and, for Indra among celestial multitudes, he preaches the Dharma.

[63]          The National Master is once asked by a monk, “What is the mind

of eternal buddhas?”

The master says, “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.”

The question says “this has got it” and says “that has got it.” [The monk] has taken this expression of the truth and made it into a question. And this question far and wide has become an eternal expression of the truth. Thus, myriad trees and hundreds of weeds, which are “flowers opening,” are eternal buddhas’ expressions of the truth and eternal buddhas’ questions. The nine mountains and eight oceans, which are “the occurrence of the world,”21 are eternal buddhas’ sun-faces and moon-faces and eternal buddhas’ skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. Furthermore, there may be instances of the eternal mind practicing buddha,22 there may be instances of the eternal mind experiencing buddha,23 there may be instances of the eternal mind making buddha,24 and there may be instances of the eternity of buddha making up a mind.25 The reason we speak of “the eternal mind” is that the mind is eternal. Because [the unity of] the mind and buddha is inevitably eternal, the eternal mind is 173c “a chair of bamboo and wood,” is “not being able to find a person who understands the Buddha-Dharma even if we search the whole earth,” and is “the master calling this what?”26 The moment and causes-and-conditions of the present, and the lands-of-dust and space of the present, are both nothing other than the eternal mind. They maintain and rely upon the eternal mind, and they maintain and rely upon the eternal state of buddha—it is maintenance and reliance upon two heads with one face, two things in a picture.

[65] The master says, “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.” The point here is that there is a line of attack whereby, facing fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles, we express them: “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.” And there is another mode of expression: there is a line of retreat whereby, inside the concrete place of fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles, “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles”

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speak. In the state of round realization and perfect realization in which these expressions are realized, there are walls standing a thousand feet or ten thousand feet high, there are fences standing around the earth and around the heavens, there is the covering of a tile or half a tile, and there are sharp edges of pebbles, big ones and small ones. What exists like this is not only the mind but also the body itself, and even object-and-subject. This being so, we should ask, and we should say, “What are fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles?” And if we want to converse, we should answer, “The mind of eternal buddhas.” Maintaining and relying upon the state like this, we should investigate further: Just what are fences and walls? What do we call “fences and walls”? With what forms and stages are they furnished at this moment? We should investigate them like this, in detail. Are fences and walls caused to appear through a process of production,27 or is production caused to appear on the basis of fences and walls? Are they products or are they beyond production? Should we see them as sentient or as insentient? Are they appearing before us now, or are they beyond appearance in the present? In the state like this of mental effort, and of learning in practice, whether it is in the heavens above or in the human world, and whether it appears in this land or in other worlds, the mind of eternal buddhas is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles. No additional 174a speck of dust has ever protruded to taint it.

[68] Great Master Zengen Chūkō,28 the story goes, is asked by a monk,

“What is the mind of eternal buddhas?” The master says, “The world is shattered.”

The monk says, “Why is the world shattered?”

The master says, “How is it possible to be without our own body?”29

As regards this “world,” its ten directions are totally the world of Buddha, and there has never been any world that is not the world of Buddha. As regards the form and stages of “being shattered,” we should learn them in practice in this whole world in ten directions, never learning them as self. Because we do not learn them as self, the very moment of “shatteredness” is one thing, two things, three, four, and five things, and therefore limitless things. Each thing is its “own body” in “the undecided state of being without.”30 “Our own body is the undecided state of being without.” Do not selfishly begrudge the moment of the present and thus fail to make your own body into the mind of eternal buddhas. Truly, prior to the Seven Buddhas

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the mind of eternal buddhas stands as a wall, and after the Seven Buddhas the mind of eternal buddhas sprouts. Prior to all the buddhas the mind of eternal buddhas flowers, and after all the buddhas the mind of eternal buddhas bears fruit. Prior to “the mind of eternal buddhas” the mind of eternal buddhas is liberated.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kobusshin

                                    Preached to the assembly at Rokuharamitsuji31                                     on the twenty-ninth day of the fourth lunar month in the first year of Kangen.32

 

Notes

1 Master Daikan Enō, the thirty-third patriarch. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso. 2 in the twenty-eight–chapter edition of the Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Kōjō-koge. The virtue of kōjō, “ascending” or “the ascendant state,” is discussed inButsu-kōjō-no-ji,Shōbōgenzō.and in the chapter of the same titleSee Vol. IV, Appendix II.

3 Master Seigen Gyōshi (d. 740) and Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744) were both disciples The Rinzai lineage is through Master Nangaku Ejō. of Master Daikan Enō. Master Dōgen’s lineage is through Master Seigen Gyōshi. 4 Master Sekitō Kisen (700–790) was the successor of Master Seigen. Kōzei (Ch. Kiangsi) refers to Master Baso Dōitsu (709–788), successor of Master Nangaku.

5 Kothat in the phrase literally means “old” or “ancient,” but in this sentence Master Dōgen indicates kobutsu the character means not only “old” but also “eternal.” 6 Kokon modern times,” but also “all ages” or “eternity.”lit., “ancient-present,” means not only “past and present” or “ancient and

7     a hundred years later—Master Dōgen finally met Master Tendō Nyojō. Master Wanshi Shōgaku (1091–1157), successor of Master Tanka Shijun. Around Master Wanshi became the master of Keitokuji on Mount Tendō, where—almost

1130

8     Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Master Goso Hōen. 9   Keishu means a prostration in which the head touches the ground.

10    Habi, the nose. It suggests humility and self-control. Lit., “grasping of the nose,” refers to the ring used to lead a water buffalo by

11    Master Sozan Kōnin (837–909), a successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai. 12 The name of a mountain in Kiangsi province in southeast China.

13    recommends the monk to take the middle way. Hearing of this, Master Sozan prostrates craftsman for building a monument—three coins, two coins, or one coin. The monk goesThe full story is: Master Sozan asks a monk how much the monk intends to pay a to see Master Razan Dōkan who resides in a hut on Daiyurei Mountain. Master Razan the peak of Daiyurei Mountain an eternal buddha is present, and he is radiating brightnesshimself toward Daiyurei Mountain and says, “I had thought there was no one, but on Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 97; Rentōeyō, chap. 22.

that shines on this place.” See

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14    Master Seppō Gison (822–907), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan.

15    Gotōegen,84897), Seppō says, “The eternal buddha Jōshū!” He just does prostrations toward chap. 7, relates that on hearing the words of Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no.

Jōshū, and subsequently does not converse. See also ; Rentōeyō, chap. 21.

16    Futōwa,shōbōgenzō.“not conversing,” appears in the story in the Gotōegen and in the Shinji-

17    Lotus SutraShochūgo-zen,. See LS 1.42; Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), “good in the beginning, middle, and end,” alludes to a phrase in theHokke-ten-hokke.

18    Juryō, “lifetime,” alludes to Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō.nyorai-juryō, “Tathāgata’s lifetime,” as described in the sixteenth chapter of the

19    Daishō is his posthumous title. Master Nan’yō Echū (d. 775), successor of Master Daikan Enō. National Master 20 Seikyō, “Western Capital,” in this case refers to the area of China now called Luoyang. There were five areas of Tang China called Seikyō, “Western Capital.” 21 Master Prajñātara said, “The opening of flowers is the occurrence of the world.” See Chapter Forty-three, Kūge.

22    Gyōbutsu, “practicing buddha” or “acting buddha,” is discussed in detail in Chapter Gyōbutsu-yuigi. Twenty-three (Vol. II),

23    Shōbutsu,Gyōbutsu-yuigi.126.  “experiencing buddha” also appears in Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II),See also, for example, Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), Kōmyō, paragraph

24    (Sabutsu,Vol. I), Kōkyō,“making buddha” or “becoming buddha,” is discussed in Chapter Twenty from paragraph 175. 25 Bukko no ishin naru, “buddha-eternity becoming the content of a mind,” suggests the decision to be a Buddhist.

26    no. 12.Alludes to a conversation between Master Gensha Shibi and Master Rakan Keichin, recorded in Chapter Forty-seven, Sangai-yuishin. See also Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2,

27    without elaboration). See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. musa,ment. It represents the Sanskrit Zōsa, lit., “made by building,” has the connotation of human intentionality or enforce-“without being made,” which represents the Sanskrit saṃskṛta (put together) and is opposed to the term asaṃskṛta (unadorned, 28 Zengen. Master Zengen Chūkō (dates unknown), successor of Master Dōgo Enchi (769–one day on hearing a child reciting the 835). He was the tenzo (cook) in the order on Dōgozan, where he realized the Dharma Kannonkyō. After that he lived and taught at

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29    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 11.

30    it possible for… not to exist?” At the same time Neimu. In the story, these characters (read as nanzo . . . nakara n yanei, or mushiro, means “A rather) mean “How is openness or undecidedness. Moreover, Master Dōgen frequently uses mu to mean than B” or “preferably”; it suggests the existence of two possibilities and therefore

“the state of being without [anything superfluous or lacking].” See, for example, Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō. 31 Rokuharamitsuji is in the Higashiyama district of the city of Kyoto. Hatano Yoshishige, Master Dōgen’s most powerful supporter, occupied a government office that was located nearby.

32 1243.

 

[Chapter Forty-five]

Bodaisatta-shishōbō

Four Elements of a Bodhisattva’s Social Relations

Translator’s Introduction: Bodaisatta means “bodhisattva,” a person who is pursuing the Buddhist truth; shi means “four”; and shōbō means “elements of social relations” or “methods for social relations.” The four are dāna, free giving; priya-ākhyāna, kind speech; artha-carya, helpful conduct; and samāna-arthatā, identity of purpose, or cooperation. Buddhism puts great value on our actual conduct. For this reason, our conduct in relating to each other is a very important part of Buddhist life. In this chapter Master Dōgen preaches that these four ways of behaving are the essence of Buddhist life. He explains the real meaning of Buddhism in terms of social relations. [71] First is free giving. Second is kind speech. Third is helpful conduct. Fourth is cooperation.1

[72] “Free giving”2 means not being greedy. Not being greedy means not coveting. Not coveting means, in everyday language, not courting favor.3 Even if we rule the four continents, if we want to bestow the teaching of the right truth, we simply must not be greedy. That might mean, for example, 174b donating treasures that are to be thrown away to people we do not know. When we offer flowers from distant mountains to the Tathāgata, and when we donate treasures accumulated in our past life to living beings, whether [the gift] is Dharma or material objects, in each case we are originally endowed with the virtue that accompanies free giving. There is a Buddhist principle that even if things are not our own, this does not hinder our free giving. And a gift is not to be hated for its small value, but its effect should be real. When we leave the truth to the truth, we attain the truth. When we attain the truth, the truth inevitably continues to be left to the truth. When possessions are left to be possessions, possessions inevitably turn into gifts. We give ourselves

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to ourselves, and we give the external world to the external world. The direct and indirect influences of this giving pervade far into the heavens above and through the human world, even reaching the wise and the sacred who have experienced the effect. The reason is that in becoming giver and receiver, the subject and object of giving are connected; this is why the Buddha says, “When a person who gives comes into an assembly, others admire that person from the beginning. Remember, the mind of such a person is tacitly understood.”4 So we should freely give even a single word or a single verse of Dharma, and it will become a good seed in this life and in other lives. We should freely give even a single penny or a single grass-stalk of alms, and it will sprout a good root in this age and in other ages.5 Dharma can be a treasure, and material gifts can be Dharma—it may depend upon [people’s] hopes and pleasures. Truly, the gift of a beard can regulate a person’s mind,6 and the service of sand can gain a throne.7 Such givers covet no reward, but

174c just share according to their ability. To provide a boat or to build a bridge are free giving as the dāna-pāramitā.8 When we learn giving well, both receiving the body and giving up the body are free giving. Earning a living and doing productive work are originally nothing other than free giving. Leaving flowers to the wind, and leaving birds to time,9 may also be the meritorious conduct of free giving. Both givers and receivers should thoroughly learn the truth which certifies that Great King Aśoka’s being able to serve half a mango10 as an offering for hundreds of monks is a wide and great service of offerings.11 We should not only muster the energy of our body but should also take care not to overlook suitable opportunities. Truly, it is because we are originally equipped with the virtue of free giving that we have received ourselves as we are now. The Buddha says, “It is possible to receive and to use [giving] even if the object is oneself, and it is all the easier to give to parents, wives, and children.” Clearly, to practice it by oneself is one kind of free giving, and to give to parents, wives, and children may also be free giving. When we can give up even one speck of dust for free giving, though it is our own act we will quietly rejoice in it, because we will have already received the authentic transmission of one of the virtues of the buddhas, and because for the first time we will be practicing one of the methods of a bodhisattva. What is hard to change is the mind of living beings.12 By starting with a gift we begin to change the mental state of living

Shōbōgenzō Volume III

was never a question that he might not teach them just because they were the people of a foreign land. So we should benefit friends and foes equally, and we should benefit ourselves and others alike. If we realize this state of mind, the truth that helpful conduct naturally neither regresses nor deviates will be helpfully enacted even in grass, trees, wind, and water. We should solely endeavor to save the foolish.

[82] “Cooperation”25 means not being contrary.26 It is not being contrary to oneself and not being contrary to others. For example, the human Tathāgata “identified”27 himself with humanity. Judging from this identification with the human world we can suppose that he might identify himself with other worlds. When we know cooperation, self and others are oneness. The proverbial “harps, poems, and sake”28 make friends with people, make friends with celestial gods, and make friends with earthly spirits. [At the same time,] there is a principle that people make friends with harps, poems, and sake, and that harps, poems, and sake make friends with harps, poems, and sake; that people make friends with people; that celestial gods make friends with celestial gods; and that earthly spirits make friends with earthly spirits. This is learning of cooperation. “The task [of cooperation]”29 means, for example, concrete behavior, a dignified attitude, and a real situation. There may be a principle of, after letting others identify with us, then letting ourselves identify with others. [The relations between] self and others are, depending on the occasion, without limit. The Kanshi30 says: “The sea does not refuse water; therefore it is able to realize its greatness. Mountains do not refuse earth; therefore they are able to realize their height. Enlightened rulers do not hate people; therefore they are able to realize a large following.” Remember, the sea not refusing water is cooperation. Remember also that water

175c has the virtue of not refusing the sea. For this reason it is possible for water to come together to form the sea and for the earth to pile up to form mountains. We can think to ourselves that because the sea does not refuse the sea it realizes the sea and realizes greatness, and because mountains do not refuse mountains they realize mountains and realize height. Because enlightened rulers do not hate people they realize a large following. “A large following” means a nation. “An enlightened ruler” may mean an emperor. Emperors do not hate the people. They do not hate the people, but that does not mean there is no reward and punishment. Even if there is reward and

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punishment, there is no hatred for the people. In ancient times, when people were unaffected, nations were without reward and punishment—at least inasmuch as the reward and punishment of those days were different from those of today. Even today there may be people who seek the truth with no expectation of reward, but this is beyond the thinking of stupid men. Because enlightened rulers are enlightened, they do not hate people. Although people always have the will to form a nation and to find an enlightened ruler, few completely understand the truth of an enlightened ruler being an enlightened ruler. Therefore, they are glad simply not to be hated by the enlightened ruler, while never recognizing that they themselves do not hate the enlightened ruler. Thus the truth of cooperation exists both for enlightened rulers and for ignorant people, and this is why cooperation is the conduct and the vow of a bodhisattva. We should face all things only with gentle faces.

[85] Because these four elements of sociability are each equipped with four elements of sociability, they may be sixteen elements of sociability.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Bodaisatta-shishōbō                                     Written on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month31 in the fourth year of Ninji32 by a monk who went into Song China and received the                                     transmission of the Dharma, śramaṇa Dōgen.

 

Notes

1     (Shishōbō,from the Sanskrit the four methods for social relations, or the four elements of sociability catvāri saṃgrahavastūni;Daichidoron.Lotus Sutrasee Glossary of Sanskrit Terms), areThey are also mentioned in the(LS 2.208), and in the eleventh See

Daibadattalisted and explained in chap. 66 of the chapter in the twelve-chapter edition of (“Devadatta”) chapter of the Shōbōgenzō, Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon.

Vol. IV, Appendix III.

2     Fuse, from the Sanskrit dāna.

3     Master Dōgen first explains the Chinese word fudon, “not being greedy,” which he then explains using a Japanese word written “to covet.” Finally he takes his explanation further using another hetsurau, which means to curry favor through groveling, fuse, “free giving,” with the Chinese

word in colloquial Japanese word, kana, musaboru, flattery, etc.

4     fourth of the Āgama sutras. Paraphrased by Master Dōgen in Japanese from chap. 24 of the Zōitsuagongyō, the

5     to lay Buddhists). Master Dōgen alludes to that distinction in these two sentences. A third category of (fearlessness.” See, for example, LS 3.252.Traditionally by lay Buddhists to monks) and dānadānais categorized into is sometimes added, namely dharma-dāna, hose,āmiṣa-dāna, zaise,abhaya-dāna, mui-se, “giving of Dharma” (by monks “giving of material gifts” “giving of

6     own beard and gave the ashes to the officer. Alludes to the story that when an officer in the court of the Tang emperor Taisō (r.627–649) fell sick and needed the ashes from a beard for medicine, Taisō burned his

7     sand when the Buddha came by on an alms round. The child put an offering of sand The Aikuōkyō (King Aśoka Sutra) tells the story of a child who was playing in the into the Buddha’s alms bowl, and by virtue of his giving he later became King Aśoka. 8 resents the meaning of the Sanskrit Dando. Dan represents the sound of the Sanskrit pāramitā, which literally means “gone to the fardāna. Do, lit., “crossed over,” repshore.” See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

9     Leaving owls to hoot at night, cocks to crow in the morning, etc.

10    Anra represents the sound of the Sanskrit āmra, which means mango.

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11    He had edicts in local languages carved on rocks and specially erected pillars through-ruler of a vast Indian empire two hundred and eighteen years after the Buddha’s death, and to have reigned from 269 to 232 Alludes to a story in chap. 5 of the Aikuōkyō.B.C.E., converting many peoples to Buddhism. King Aśoka is said to have become the out his empire. King Aśoka also sponsored the Third Council held in Patna in 235Thera vāda (Pāli) canon of Vinaya (precepts) and Sutra (discourses).B.C.E., during which the Abhidharma (commentaries) were added to the existing 12 Cf. “That without constancy is the buddha-nature. That which has constancy is themind that divides all Chapter Twenty-two [Vol. II], dharmas into good and bad.” (Master Daikan Enō, quoted inBusshō.)

13    The six pāramitākṣānti-pāramitās are dāna-pāramitā(forbearance), prajñā-pāramitā(giving freely), vīrya-pāramitā(wisdomśīla-pāramitā(diligence), ). dhyāna-pāramitā(observance of precepts), (the balanced state of zazen), and

14    Aigo, literally, “loving words,” from the Sanskrit priya-ākhyāna.

15    Chinchō, Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), his talk and taking his leave. literally, “value [yourself] highly.” This expression is used, for example, inGyōji, paragraph 241, by Master Fuyō Dōkai when finishing

16    paragraph 89: “I wonder. . . .” Master Dōgen himself uses the expression rhetorically Fushin no kōkō ari,The expression in detail,” appears at the beginning of a disciple’s question to a master in many of fushin,Shōbōgenzō. literally, “there is the act of filial piety of ‘it is not totally clear.’”“everything is not totally clear” or “I do not know everything See, for example, Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Kankin, paragraph 188. It is a kind of polite formula, Busshō, the stories in the in Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), and at the same time a polite greeting from student to teacher.

17    Quotation from a Chinese text; source untraced. 18 Kimo literally means “the liver.”

19 Shin, kokorois originally a pictograph of a heart. In this translation of the means not only “mind” but also “heart.” In fact the Chinese character  Shōbōgenzō, shin side of the whole human state, not only intellectual consciousness. has almost always been translated as “mind,” but the intended meaning is the subjective shin 20 Rigyō, useful conduct. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. “helpful conduct” or “beneficial conduct,” from the Sanskrit artha-carya,

21       Zengyō, lit., “good skill”; short for upāya-kauśalya.zengyō-hōben, See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. “skillful means” or “skillful expedients,” from the Sanskrit

22       Hōben. See note 21.

23       A Chinese chronicle, the Shinjō (History of the State of Shin) says that a man called

Koyu saved a turtle in distress and as a result of this good act he later became the

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governor of a district in the state. Another chronicle, the year-old boy called Yoho took care of an injured bird, and as a result of this good acthis descendants ascended to three top positions in the Chinese government. See alsoChapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 207.                                            Taigunikki, says that a nine-

24       The Chinese history Shiki says that when a king called Shuko appointed his son while I was eating, I would stop eating three times to meet them. . . .”Hakukin as a district governor, Shuko told his son, “If three guests came while I wastaking a bath, I would bind my hair three times to meet them, and if three guests came

25       and “identity of purpose” or “sharing the same aim” (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms);or, to use a more colloquial expression, “being in the same boat.” Dōji,jilit., “identity of task,” from the Sanskrit means “thing,” “matter,” or “task.”   samāna-arthatā which literally means Do means “same”

26       Fui. I, “different” or “contrary,” is opposed to dō, “the same,” in dōji.

27       Dō zeru. The character is as in dōji.

28       The Daoist text Goshainzui says that harps, poems, and sake are [a hermit’s] three mutual agreement between subject and object and identity of subject and object.friends. Master Dōgen picks up this sentence and uses it to express the principles of 29 “The task [of cooperation]” is the character but is always related to a concrete task. ji of dōji. Real cooperation is not abstract

30    Kanchu (Ch. Guanzi). Scholars suspect that there were actually several different Kanji is the name of a Chinese Daoist text in twenty-four volumes attributed to authors.

31    Tango no hi.tango no hi. The fifth day of the fifth lunar month was a day of celebration, referred In Japan today, the term tango no hi is still sometimes used for the national holiday on May Fifth (Children’s Day).to as

32    1243.

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[Chapter Forty-six]

                                                      Kattō                                               

The Complicated

Translator’s Note: Katsu means “arrowroot” and to means “wisteria.” Arrowroot and wisteria, being vines, are unable to stand by themselves but grow by entwining with other plants. Because of this, in China and Japan, arrowroot and wisteria are used as a symbol of something that is very complicated. Buddhist philosophy strives to describe what reality is. Because reality cannot be adequately expressed with words, it is sometimes described as “the ineffable.” Here, Master Dōgen uses the word kattō, the complicated, to suggest reality, which is very direct but complicated. He felt that the words “the complicated” express the nature of reality rather well.

[87] The experience and the transmission, in the order on Vulture Peak, of Śākyamuni Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury and supreme truth of bodhi belongs only to Great Master Mahākāśyapa. Authentically experienced in the transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor, it arrives at the twenty-eighth patriarch, Venerable Bodhidharma. The Venerable One demonstrates in China the behavior of a patriarch, and transmits the right Dharma-eye treasury and the supreme truth of bodhi to Great Master Taiso Shōshū Fukaku,1 making him the Second Patriarch. We call the twenty-eighth patriarch, as the first in China to possess the behavior of a patriarch, “the First Patriarch”; and we call the twenty-ninth patriarch “the Second Patriarch.” This is the custom in the Eastern Lands. The First Patriarch, under Venerable Prajñātara in the past, has directly experienced and has received the direct transmission of the Buddha’s instruction and the bones of the truth. Using the original root he has experienced the original root, and made this into a base for branches and leaves. In general, although sacred beings all aim to learn the cutting of the roots of the complicated,2 they do not learn that cutting means cutting the complicated with the complicated,

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and they do not know that the complicated is entwined with the complicated. How much less could they know that the succession of the complicated continues by means of the complicated? Few have known that the succession of the Dharma is the complicated itself. No one has heard so. No one has said so. Could many have realized so in experience?

[89] My late master, the eternal buddha, says, “A bottle gourd vine

entwines with a bottle gourd.”

This preaching has been neither seen nor heard in the orders in all directions of masters of all the ages. It has been preached by my late master, for the first time, and by him alone. Bottle gourd vines intertwining with bottle gourd vines is Buddhist patriarchs investigating the state of Buddhist patriarchs and is Buddhist patriarchs experiencing the exact-same state of Buddhist patriarchs. It is the state, for example, of “the mind being transmitted by the mind.”3

176b [90] The twenty-eighth patriarch says to his disciples, “The time is approaching.4 Why don’t you say what you have got.”

Then the disciple Dōfuku5 says, “My view now is, without being attached to words or being detached from words, to perform the function of the truth.”

The Patriarch says, “You have got my skin.”

The nun Sōji6 says, “My understanding now is like that of Ānanda7 seeing the land of Akṣobhya Buddha.8 Seen once, it is not seen again.” The Patriarch says, “You have got my flesh.”

The disciple Dōiku9 says, “The four elements10 are originally bare. The five aggregates11 are not ‘existence.’ My viewpoint is that there is nothing to be got.”

The Patriarch says, “You have got my bones.”

Finally, Eka12 does three prostrations and then stands at his place. The Patriarch says, “You have got my marrow.”

Consequently, he makes [Eka] the Second Patriarch, transmitting

the Dharma and transmitting the robe.13

[92] Now, learn in practice, the First Patriarch’s words “You have got my skin, flesh, bones, and marrow” are the Patriarch’s words. The four disciples each possess what they have got and what they have heard. Both what they have heard and what they have got are skin, flesh, bones, and marrow that spring out of body and mind, and skin, flesh, bones, and marrow which drop away body and mind. We cannot see and hear the ancestral Master only by means of knowledge and understanding, which are but one move in a go game—not one-hundred-percent realization of subject-and-object, that-and-this. Nevertheless, people who have not received the authentic transmission think that there are degrees of intimacy in the understanding of each of the four disciples, and so the Patriarch also [expresses] differences of profundity between skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. Thinking skin and flesh to be further away than bones and marrow, [people] say that the Second Patriarch has received certification of getting the marrow because his understanding is superior. People who talk like this have never experienced learning in practice under the Buddhist patriarchs and have never received the authentic transmission of the Patriarch’s truth. Remember, the Patriarch’s skin, flesh, bones, and marrow are beyond shallowness and depth. Even if there is superiority and inferiority in understanding, the Patriarch’s words are only about “getting me.” The point here is that the expression “You have got my marrow” and the expression “You have got my bones” are both beyond sufficiency and insufficiency, whether in teaching people or in receiving people, whether in picking up weeds or falling into grass.14 [The Patriarch’s expressions,] for example, are like picking up a flower and like transmitting 176c the robe.15 What [the Patriarch] expresses for the four disciples is, from the beginning, utterly the same. The Patriarch’s expression is utterly consistent, but this does not necessarily mean that the four understandings are the same. Though the four understandings are individual and distinct, the Patriarch’s expression is just the Patriarch’s expression. Generally, speech and understanding cannot always be entrusted to each other. When the ancestral master addresses each of the four disciples he is saying, for example, “You have got me as my skin.” If there were hundreds of thousands of disciples after the Second Patriarch, there would have been hundreds of thousands of expressions; there would be no limit. There are only four disciples and so there are only the four expressions of skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, but there are many possible expressions left unexpressed. Remember, even in addressing the Second Patriarch, he could say ”You have got my skin.” Even if [the expression] were “You have got my skin,” [the First Patriarch] would

be transmitting the right Dharma-eye treasury to [Eka] as the Second Patriarch. Getting skin or getting marrow do not rely upon superiority or inferiority. Again, in addressing Dōfuku, Dōiku, Sōji, or others, he could say ”You have got my marrow.” Even if they are “my skin,” he must transmit the Dharma to them. Consider the body-mind of the ancestral master: his skin, flesh, bones, and marrow are each the ancestral master himself; it is never the case that marrow is close and skin is distant. Now, when one who is equipped

177a with the eyes of learning in practice receives certification that “You have got my skin,” that is the ultimate realization of getting the ancestral master. There is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body16 is skin; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body is flesh; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body is bones; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body is marrow; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body is mind; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body is body; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized mind is mind; there is the ancestral master who is the thoroughly realized ancestral master; there is the ancestral master whose thoroughly realized body gets me-and-you; and so on. If these ancestral masters manifest themselves together and address hundreds of thousands of disciples, they will say, as now, “You have got my skin.” The hundreds of thousands of expressions will be the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, but onlookers will excitedly consider them without reason to be expressions about skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. If there were six or seven disciples in the ancestral master’s order he might say “You have got my mind,” he might say “You have got my body,” he might say “You have got my state of buddha,” he might say “You have got my eyes,” and he might say “You have got my real experience.” As regards “you,” there are times when it is the Patriarch and there are times when it is Eka. We should also investigate in detail the truth of “having got.” Remember, there are cases of “you have got me” and there are cases of “I have got you.” There are cases in which “getting me” is “you” and there are cases in which “getting you” is “me.” If, when we research the body-mind of the ancestral master, we say that inside and outside cannot be oneness, or that the whole body cannot be the thoroughly realized body, we are not in the real land of Buddhist patriarchs. To have got the skin is to have got the bones, the flesh, and the marrow; to have got the bones, the flesh,

and the marrow is to have got the skin, the flesh, and the countenance. How could this state only be the clear understanding that “The whole universe in ten directions is the real body”?17 It is utterly the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow themselves. For this reason, it is “getting my robe” and is “You have got the Dharma.” On this basis, even the speaking of words is individual instances of the springing out in which master and disciple experience the same state. And even the action of listening is individual instances of the springing out in which master and disciple experience the same state. Investigation of the same state by master and disciple is the entanglement18 of Buddhist patriarchs. The entangled state of Buddhist patriarchs is the lifeblood 177b of their skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. The picking up of a flower and the winking of an eye are entanglement itself, and a face breaking into a smile is the skin, the flesh, the bones, and the marrow themselves. We should investigate further. In the seed of entanglement the potential exists here and now to lay bare the substance and it is by virtue of this that there are stems, leaves, flowers, and fruits entwining in the entangled; because these [real stems, leaves, flowers, and fruits] are beyond complicatedness and uncomplicatedness, Buddhist patriarchs are realized and the universe is realized.

[99] Great Master Shinsai of Jōshū19 preaches to the assembly, “Mahā- kāśyapa gave the transmission to Ānanda. Say then, Bodhidharma gave the transmission to what person?”

Then a monk asks, “How about the Second Patriarch who got the mar-

row?”

The master says, “Do not insult the Second Patriarch!”20

On another occasion, the master says, “In Bodhidharma’s words, someone who is outside gets the skin and someone who is inside gets the bones. Say

then, someone who is still further inside gets what?”

A monk asks, “What does it mean to have got the marrow?”

The master says, “Just be aware of the skin! The old monk here and now

does not even broach the subject of marrow.”

The monk asks, “But what is the marrow?”

The master says, “If you are like that you cannot grope even for the

skin.”

[100] So remember, when we cannot grope for the skin we cannot grope for the marrow, and when groping gets the skin it also gets the marrow. We should consider the truth of being like that, unable to grope even for the skin. When [the monk] asks, “What does it mean to have got the marrow?”, the expression “Just be aware of the skin! The old monk here and now does not even broach the subject of marrow” is realized. In “being aware of the skin,” “not even broaching the subject of marrow” is the real “meaning of having got the marrow.” On this basis, the question “How about the Second Patriarch who got the marrow?” has been realized. When we reflect exactly21 the moment in which Mahākāśyapa gives the transmission to Ānanda, Ānanda is concealing his body in Mahākāśyapa and Mahākāśyapa is concealing his body in Ānanda. At the same time, in the moment of their meeting within the transmission, they are not beyond the sphere of concrete actions that change the countenance and change the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. On this basis, [Jōshū] preaches “Say then, Bodhidharma gives the transmission to a What person.”22 When Bodhidharma is giving the transmission he is

177c Bodhi dharma, and when the Second Patriarch is getting the marrow he is Bodhidharma. Relying on investigation of this truth, the Buddha-Dharma has remained the Buddha-Dharma to the present day. If it were otherwise, the Buddha-Dharma could not reach the present. Quietly endeavoring to master this principle, we should express it ourselves and should cause others to express it.

[102]     “Someone who is outside gets the skin and someone who is inside gets the bones. Say then, someone who is still further inside gets what?” The meaning of the “outside” expressed now, and of the “inside” expressed now, should be extremely straight and direct. When we are discussing “outside,” skin, flesh, bones, and marrow each have an outside; when are discussing “inside,” skin, flesh, bones, and marrow each have an inside. This being so, the four Bodhidharma have each mastered, instance by instance, the ascendant state of hundreds, thousands, and tens of thousands of skins, of fleshes, of bones, and of marrows. Do not think that there can be no state ascendant to the marrow; there are further concrete states of ascendance, numbering three or five. What the eternal buddha Jōshū has now preached to the assembly is the Buddha’s truth. It is beyond others such as Rinzai, Tokusan, Daii, and Unmown; they have never dreamt of it; how much less could they express it? The unreliable old veterans of recent times do not even know that it exists, and if we told them of it, they might be astonished and afraid.

[103]     Zen Master Setchō Myōkaku23 says, “The two ‘Shūs,’ Jō[shū] and Boku[shū],24 are eternal buddhas.”25 So the eternal buddha’s words are evidence of the Buddha-Dharma and are a past expression of the self. Great Master Seppō Shinkaku26 says, “The eternal buddha Jōshū!” A former Buddhist patriarch27 has eulogized him with the eulogy “eternal buddha” and a later Buddhist patriarch28 has also eulogized him with the eulogy “eternal buddha.” Clearly, in that which is ascendant to the past and present, [Jōshū] is a transcendent eternal buddha. In sum, the truth that skin, flesh, bones, and marrow are entangled is the standard for the state of “you have got me” which is preached by eternal buddhas. We should endeavor to master this criterion. 178a [105] Furthermore, some say that the First Patriarch has returned to the West, but we learn that this is wrong. What Soun29 saw may not have been real. How could Soun see the leaving and coming of the ancestral master? The true study is just to learn that after the ancestral master passed away [his ashes] were deposited on Yūjisan.30

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kattō

 Preached to the assembly at Kannondōrikōshō-                                     hōrinji in the Uji district of Yōshū31 on the  seventh day of the seventh lunar month in the  first year of Kangen.32

 

Notes

1     Shōshū Fukaku is his posthumous title. Master Taiso Eka (487–593), the Second Patriarch in China. Great Master Taiso

2     “Wordy Zen. Zen which clings to words and letters and does not understand the greatKattō.Dōgen’s, the word English DictionaryIn colloquial modern Japanese, and also in Zen teachings other than Master gives: “trouble(s), discord, dissension; complications.” The kattō has negative connotations. (JEBD) gives: “A derogatory word used to express Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-kattō-zen:Japancom plicated teachings.” JEBD also has the following dubious entry for ese-English Buddhist Dictionary way of the buddhas and patriarchs” (cf. words of Master Dōfuku in paragraph 90). 3 resonance of tuning forks.Ishin-denshin.mind,” is common in everyday speech even among Japanese today. The Buddhist meaning of ishin-denshin The phrase can be represented with the metaphor of the sympathetic ishindenshin, “intuitive communication from mind to

4     Master Bodhidharma knew that the time of his death was drawing near.

5     Master Dōfuku (464–524), successor of Master Bodhidharma. He traveled through and becoming his successor. Many lands in search of a true teacher before finally meeting Master Bodhidharma 6 daughter of Emperor Bu (r. 502–549) of the Liang dynasty. Nun Sōji is her title, her The nun Sōji (dates unknown), successor of Master Bodhidharma. She was the ordained name being Myoren.

7     is said to be derived from the fact that Master Ānanda’s birthday was the day on Keiki, “joy,” represents the meaning, not the sound, of the Sanskrit ānanda. The name which the Buddha first realized the truth.

8     on the eastern side is of Akṣobhya Buddha. This buddha is mentioned in the In the mandala used by the Shingon sect there are five buddha images, and the image Sutra, Kejō-yu (“Parable of the Magic City”): “Two of those s became Lotus of Joy. The second was named Sumeru Peak.” (LS 2.66) In the story, the buddha land of Akṣobhya Buddha means an imaginary land or an ideal world. Buddhas in the eastern quarter. The first was named Akṣobhya and lived in the Landśramaṇera

9     Master Dōiku (dates unknown), successor to Master Bodhidharma. 10 The four elements are earth, water, fire, and wind.

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11    consciousness. The four elements and the five aggregates represent all physical things The five aggregates, or five and mental phenomena in the universe. Skandhas, are matter, perception, thinking, action, and

12    Master Taiso Eka. See note 1.

13    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 3. See also Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 1.

14    Nensō-rakusō, cases of sincere active behavior and trivial passive behavior in everyday life. Lit., “picking up weeds and falling into weeds,” suggests miscellaneous 15 Refers to the transmissions between the Buddha and Master Mahākāśyapa, and between Master Daiman Kōnin and Master Daikan Enō.

16    Tsūshin. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon.

17    Alludes to the words of Master Chōsha Keishin. See Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō. 18 Kattō, “the complicated,” as in the chapter title.

19    Shinsai is his posthumous title. Master Jōshū Jūshin (778-897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. Great Master

20    Kōsonshukugoroku, chap. 13.

21    Tōkan. Tōre fleet. The phrase is discussed in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), means to be exact, especially with regard to timing, and Busshō,kan means tonote 19.

22    Shimo no hit with words. means 1) what person? and 2) a person whose state cannot be explained

23    with the title Zen Master Myōkaku during his lifetime. See, for example, Chapter Master Setchō Jūken (980–1052), successor of Master Chimon Kōso. He was honored Shin-fukatoku.

Nineteen (Vol. I),

24    Master Bokushū Dōmyō (780?–877?), successor of Master Ōbaku Kiun. See, for example, Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 170.

25    From the Myōkakuzenjigoroku, vol. 1.

26    Master Seppō Gison (822–907). The same quotation is discussed in Chapter Forty-four, Kobusshin.

27    Master Seppō.

28    Master Setchō.

29    The monk Soun was sent by imperial edict to India in 518 and he returned three years later with sutras and commentaries of the Mahayana. The three years after Master Bodhidharma’s death, Soun and Bodhidharma met while Keitokudentōroku says that

Soun was returning to China along the Silk Road.

30    A mountain in China where Master Bodhidharma’s stupa was erected.

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31    Corresponds to present-day Kyoto prefecture. 32 1243.

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[Chapter Forty-seven] Sangai-yuishin The Triple World Is Only the Mind

Translator’s Note: San means “three” and kai means “world.” So sangai means “three worlds” or “triple world.” Traditionally, Buddhist theory looks at the world as the amalgamation of three worlds: the world of thinking, the world of feeling, and the world of action. In traditional Buddhist terminology these three worlds are called the worlds of volition, matter, and non-matter. The phrases “the three worlds” or “the triple world” are often used to mean this world here and now, the whole world, the real world, which includes the world of thinking, the world of feeling, and the world of action. Yui means “only,” “solely,” or “alone,” and shin means “mind.” So sangai-yuishin means “the triple world is only the mind” or “the triple world is the mind alone.” The phrase “the triple world is only the mind” is often interpreted as an idealistic insistence that the whole world is produced by our mind. Historically, many Buddhist monks thought that this was the case. Master Dōgen did not agree; he insisted that in Buddhism the phrase “the triple world is only the mind” means something far more real. This phrase refers to the teaching that reality exists in the contact between subject and object. From this viewpoint, when we say that the world is only the mind, we also need to say that the mind is only the world, to express the fact that the relationship is a mutual one. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the meaning of the phrase “the triple world is only the mind” from the Buddhist viewpoint, criticizing idealistic interpretations.

[107] Great Master Śākyamuni says,

The triple world is only the one mind,

There is nothing else outside of the mind.

The mind, buddha, and living beings— The three are without distinction.1

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[107] [This] one saying is the whole effort of [the Buddha’s] lifetime. The whole effort of his lifetime is the complete wholeness of his total effort. While it is deliberate action, it may also be action in the natural stream of speech and action. Thus, the words now spoken by the Tathāgata, “The triple world is only the mind” are the whole realization of the whole Tathāgata, and his whole life is the whole of this one saying. The triple world2 is the whole world; we do not say that the triple world is the same thing as mind. The reason is that however brilliant in all aspects the triple world is, it is still the triple world. Even if we misunderstand that it might be beyond the triple world, that is completely impossible. Inside, outside, and middle, beginning, middle, and end; all are the triple world. The triple world is as the triple world is seen, and a view of something other than the triple world is a mistaken view of the triple world. While in the triple world, we see views of the triple world as old nests and see views of the triple world as new twigs.3 The old nests were visions of the triple world, and a new twig is also a vision of the triple world.

[110] For this reason. . .

178b Great Master Śākyamuni says, “It is best to see the triple world as the triple world.”4

This view is the triple world itself. This triple world is just as it is seen. The triple world is not original existence, the triple world is not present existence, the triple world is not fresh realization, the triple world does not arise from causes and conditions, and the triple world is beyond beginning, middle, and end. There is “getting free from the triple world,”5 and there is “the triple world that is here and now.”6 This state is the pivot meeting the pivot and entanglement promoting entanglement. The triple world here and now is the object seen as the triple world, and this object seen is [the agent’s] “seeing it as the triple world.” “Seeing it as the triple world” is the realized triple world, is the triple world’s realization, and is the realized universe.7 Being able to make the triple world establish the mind, undergo training, [realize] bodhi, and [experience] nirvana, is just the state in which “All is my possession.” [112] For this reason. . .

Great Master Śākyamuni says,

Now this triple world All is my possession And living beings in it All are my children.8

Because this triple world here and now is the Tathāgata’s “own possession,” the whole universe is the triple world. Because the triple world is the whole universe, “here and now”9 is the past, present, and future. The reality of past, present, and future does not obstruct “the here and now.” The reality of “the here and now” blocks off past, present, and future. “My possession” [expresses that] “The whole universe in ten directions is a real human body,”10 and “The whole universe in ten directions is a śramaṇera’s one eye.”11 “Living beings” are the real bodies of the whole universe in ten directions. Because there are many beings, each one with a life as a living being, they are “living beings.” “All are my children” is the truth that children themselves are the manifestation of all functions. At the same time, “my children” inevitably receive from a compassionate father their body, hair, and skin, which they neither injure nor lack, and this is seen as the child’s realization.12 That the state in the moment of the present is beyond the father being former and the child being latter, beyond the child being former and the father being latter, and beyond father and child being aligned together, is the truth of “my children.” Without being given, this state is received, and without being taken 178c by force it is acquired. It is beyond the forms of leaving and coming, beyond the scale of large and small, and beyond discussion of old and young. We should retain “old” and “young” as the Buddhist Patriarch retains “old” and “young.” Sometimes a father is young and a child is old;13 sometimes a father is old and a child is young; sometimes a father is old and a child is old; and sometimes a father is young and a child is young. One who imitates the maturity of a father is not being a child, and one who does not pass through the immaturity of childhood will not be a father. We must consider and investigate in detail, without fail and without haste, the maturity and youth of a child and the maturity and youth of a father. There are [relations between] father and child that become apparent at the same time to father and to child, there are those that actually cease at the same time for father and for child, there are those that become apparent at different times to father and to child, and there are those that cease to be apparent at different times for father and for child. Though not restricting the compassionate father, we are realized as “my children,” and without restricting “my children,” the compassionate

father is realized. There are mindful living beings and there are unmindful living beings; there are “my children” who are mindful of it and there are “my children” who are not mindful of it.14All such children—“my children” and “childlike ‘me’s”—are true heirs of the compassionate father Śākyamuni. Those living beings of the past, present, and future that exist throughout the universe in ten directions are the past, present, and future buddhas of the universe in ten directions. The buddhas’ “my children” are living beings, and the compassionate fathers of living beings are the buddhas. This being so, the flowers and fruits of all things are the buddhas’ “own possessions”; rocks and stones, large and small, are the buddhas’ “own possessions”; “a peaceful abode” is “forests and fields,” and “forests and fields” are “already free.”15 And though this may be so, the point of the Tathāgata’s words is only to speak of “my children.” We should investigate that he has never spoken of being the father.

[116] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Even the suitably transforming Dharma bodies16 of the buddhas do not leave the triple world. Outside the triple world there are no living beings, so what object could buddhas teach? For this reason, I say the doctrine that there is another world of living beings outside the triple world is a doctrine in the non-Buddhist Scripture of the Great Existence,17 and not the preaching of the Seven Buddhas.”18

179a [117] We should clearly realize in practice that “the suitably transforming Dharma bodies of the buddhas” are all of “the triple world.” The triple world has “no outside,”19 in the same way, for example, as the Tathāgata has “no outside,” and in the same way as fences and walls have “no outside.” Just as the triple world has “no outside,” living beings have “no outside.” At the place where “there are no living beings, what is the object that buddhas teach?” The object of buddhas’ teaching is always living beings. Remember, that which brings into existence another world of living beings outside the triple world is a non-Buddhist Scripture of the Great Existence, and not a sutra of the Seven Buddhas. “The mind alone”20 is beyond one or two; it is beyond the triple world and beyond leaving the triple world; it is free of error; it has thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization and it is free of thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization; it is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles and it is mountains, rivers, and the earth. The mind itself is skin, flesh, bones, and marrow; the mind itself is the picking up of a flower and a

face breaking into a smile. There is conscious mind and there is unconscious mind; there is mind in which the body is present and there is mind in which no body is present; there is mind before the moment of the body and there is mind after the moment of the body. When the body is born, there are different kinds of birth—from womb, from egg, from moisture, and from transformation—and when the mind is born, there are different kinds of birth—from womb, from egg, from moisture, and from transformation. Blues, yellows, reds, and whites are the mind. The long, the short, the square, and the round are the mind. Living-and-dying and coming-and-going are the mind. Years, months, days, and hours are the mind. Dreams and fantasies, and flowers in space, are the mind. The spray of water, foam, and flame are the mind. Spring flowers and the autumn moon are the mind. Each moment is the mind. And yet it can never be broken. For this reason the real form of all dharmas is the mind, and buddhas alone, together with buddhas, are the mind.

[120]  Great Master Shūitsu21 of Gensha-in Temple asks Great Master Shinō22 of Jizō-in Temple, “How do you understand ‘the triple world is the mind alone’?”

Shinō points to a chair and says, “What does the master call this thing?” The great master says, “A chair.”

Shinō says, “The master does not understand ‘the triple world is the

mind alone.’”

The great master says, “I call this thing bamboo and wood. What do you

call it?”

Shinō says, “Keichin also calls it bamboo and wood.”

       The great master says, “If we search the whole earth for a person who            

understands the Buddha-Dharma, it is impossible to find one.”23

[121]  As regards the question that the great master now asks, “How do you understand ‘the triple world is the mind alone,’” both “somehow understanding”24 and “somehow not understanding” are “the triple-world-mind alone,”25 and for this reason, they may not yet have become “the triple world is the mind alone.” Shinō, for this reason, points to a chair and says, “What does the master call this thing?” Remember, [the meaning of] “How do you understand?” is “What does the master call this thing?” As for the great master’s words “a chair,” say, for the present, are they words that understand the triple world? Are they words that do not understand the triple world? Are they words of the triple world? Are they words beyond the triple world? Are they expressed by the chair? Are they expressed by the great master? We should investigate expression like this, “seeing if we can express something ourselves.”26 We should have understanding, “seeing if we can understand something ourselves.” And we should have investigation in experience, “seeing if we can experience something ourselves.” Shinō says, “The master does not understand ‘the triple world is the mind alone.’” This expression, for example, in expressing Jōshū, is “the east gate and the south gate,” but there may also be “a west gate and a north gate,” and furthermore there is east Jōshū itself and south Jōshū itself.27 Even if we have the state of understanding “the triple world is the mind alone,” we should also master “not understanding” “the triple world is the mind alone.” Moreover, there is “the triple-world-mind alone” that is beyond both understanding and not understanding. The great master says, “I call this thing bamboo and wood.” We must completely master, both before it is voiced and after it becomes words, this unprecedented and unrepeatable28 snippet of an expression. “I call this thing bamboo and wood”:  prior to the naming that has now taken place, what was it called? In its former state of brilliance in all aspects, has it always been, in the beginning, middle, and end, bamboo and wood? Is to call it bamboo and wood now to express “the triple world is the mind alone”? Is it to leave unexpressed “the triple world is the mind alone”? Remember, when “the triple world–mind-alone” is expressed in the morning it may be a chair, it may be the mind alone, and it may be the triple world, but when “the triple world–mind-alone” is expressed in the evening it comes out as “I call this thing bamboo and wood.” Shinō says, “Keichin also calls it bamboo and wood.” Remember, though this is a conversation between master and disciple, it may also be a state of rightness from beginning to end that they are experiencing together. At the same time, we should investigate whether the great master’s words “I call this thing bamboo and wood,” and Shinō’s words “I also call it bamboo and wood,” are the same or not the same, and whether they are adequate or not adequate. The great master says, “If we search the whole earth for a person who understands the Buddha-Dharma, it is impossible to find one.” We should also closely scrutinize and decide about this expression. Remember, the great master only calls it bamboo and wood, and Shinō also only calls it bamboo and wood. They never understand “the triple world

is mind alone,” they never negate understanding of “the triple world is mind alone,” they never express “the triple world is mind alone,” and they never negate expression of “the triple world is mind alone.” Even so, I would like to ask Great Master Shūitsu, “You say that ‘if we search the whole earth for a person who understands the Buddha-Dharma, it is impossible to find one’; but see if you can answer this:29 What is it that you call ‘the whole earth’?” In conclusion, we should investigate it and make effort like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Sangai-yuishin

                                    Preached to an assembly on Yamashi Peak in                                     Etsu district,30 on the first day of the intercalary                                     seventh lunar month in the first year of Kangen.31

 

Notes

1         The (part 37) and “The mind, buddha, and living beings—the three are without distinction “part Garland Sutra10).  says, “[All] that exists in the triple world is solely the one mind,”

(

2         Sangai,kāmadhātushikikai)“triple world,” represents the Sanskrit , “world of matter or form (feeling)”; and (Jp. yokkai), “world of desire or volition (thinking)”; trayo-dhātavah.ārūpyadhātu The three worlds are(Jp. rūpadhātumushiki-kai(Jp.),

“world of non-matter or formlessness (action).” See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

3         While living in reality, we are constantly getting rid of views and opinions of reality, and at the same time, at every moment we are looking at reality directly.

4         SutraQuoted from the (LS 3.18). See Chapter Forty-three, Nyorai-juryō (“The Tathāgata’s Lifetime”) chapter of the Kūge, note 49.    Lotus

5         Shutsuri-sangai. appear several times in the third chapter of the causes living beings to get free from the suffering of the triple world (by seeing the which a wealthy man causes his children to leave a burning house just as the Buddha The characters shutsu-sangai,ri-sangai,Lotus Sutra, Hiyu“to get free from the triple world, “to be free from the triple world,”(“A Parable”), in

appear in the quotation in the following note. Triple world as it is). The characters

6         appears in the Konshi-sangai,Lotus Sutra, Hiyu:lit., “the triple world now and here” or “now this triple world. . .”The Tathāgata, already free from/The burning house fields./Now this triple world/All is my possession/And the living beings in it/All are my children.” (LS 1.198)of the triple world/Lives serenely in seclusion/Abiding peacefully in forests and

7         The triple world is realized by the action of seeing.

8         LS 1.198. See note 6.

9         Konshi, literally, “now this,” (as in the Buddha’s words) or “now and here.”

10       Master Dōgen attributes the expression to Master Chōsha Keishin. oneness of the Buddhist state and the external world. In Chapter Fifty, Master Dōgen frequently quotes this expression in the Shōbōgenzō. It expresses theShohō-jissō,

11       Master Chōsha Keishin’s words, quoted in Chapter Sixty, the oneness of the Buddhist state and the external world.    Juppō, again expressing

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12       says that to be sincere to one’s parents is not to injure or mutilate one’s own body, This may allude to the Confucianist text called Kōkyō (Book of Filial Piety), which hair, and skin.

13       This case is considered in the fifteenth chapter of the (world does not believe it.” (LS 2.318)“Springing Out from the Earth”): “The father young and the children old./The wholeLotus Sutra, Jū-chi-yūshutsu

14       “Conscious” and “unconscious” are Lotus Sutra, Hiyu:ushin and “All living beings/Are my children/[But]mushin, literally, “with mind, without

“wise mind”).” (LS 1.198)mind.” This may allude to deeply attached to worldly pleasures/They do not have wisdom (wisdom = literally,

15       See note 6.

16       in different forms as is appropriate to save different beings. Ōke-hosshin. The phrase suggests the fact that buddhas manifest the Buddhist state

17       non-Buddhist scripture, or whether it is a general term. Gedōdaiukyō. It has not been established whether this refers to the proper name of a

18       Ninnōgokokuhannyaharamitsugyō, pt. 1.

19       Muge. there are no. . .”) in order to suggest the state in which there is no object separate from the subject. Master Dōgen reversed the order of the characters in the sutra (“outside . . .

20       Yuishin, “only the mind” or “mind only,” as in the chapter title.

21       Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison. Great Master Shūitsu is his posthumous title. 22 Master Rakan Keichin (867–928), successor of Master Gensha Shibi. Great Master Shinō is his posthumous title. 23 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 11.

24    itive rather than merely intellectually precise. See also the end of Chapter Thirty-five Somosan-e,Vol. II), Hakujushi.“how,” suggests openness. It indicates that the understanding is real or intu-in Master Gensha’s words, means “How . . . understand?” Here the word somosan,

(

25    Sangai-yuishin. Here Master Dōgen uses the phrase not as the statement “the triple and the mind alon e,” i.e., one reality with the two faces of world and mind. world is the mind alone” but as a compound noun: “[the unity] of the triple world

26    Kokoromo self,” is a phrase that appears in the preaching of Master Tendō Nyojō. See for example Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), [ni] i[e] mi[n], “Try saying something!” or “See if you can express it your Gyōji, paragraph 264: “Try to express it yourself.” In the-

“experience” for “express.” expressions which follow, Master Dōgen substituted the words “understand” and

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27    Master Jōshū is asked by a monk, “What is Jōshū?” The master replies, “The east gate, the south gate, the west gate, and the north gate.” See no. 46. Jōshū is the name of the master, a city, and a district where the master lived. Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1,

The monk’s question suggests interest in Master Jōshū’s personality. Master Jōshū’sanswer suggests that he was only conscious of living in reality.

28    Kōzen-zetsugo. This is a poetic variation on the expression kūzen-zetsugo, which means “never before or since.”

29    Kokoromo[ni] i[e] mi[n]. See note 26.

30    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture. 31 1243.

 

[Chapter Forty-eight] Sesshin-sesshō

Expounding the Mind and Expounding the Nature

Translator’s Note: Setsu means “teach,” “explain,” or “expound.” Shin means “mind,” and shō means “the essence,” or “the nature.” So sesshin means “expounding the mind” and sesshō means “expounding the nature.” Some Chinese Buddhist monks asserted that expounding the mind and expounding the nature belong within the sphere of intellectual effort, and so to make such effort to explain the mind and essence is not only unnecessary but also detrimental to attainment of the Buddhist truth. They believed that the Buddhist truth could never embrace intellectual understanding. Master Dōgen had a different opinion. He thought that the concepts sesshin and sesshō in Buddhist thought refer to something much more real. He understood sesshin-sesshō as the manifestation of the mind and the manifestation of the nature in the real world. Master Dōgen saw no reason to deny the concepts sesshin and sesshō; instead he used them to explain the fundamental theory of Buddhism.

[127]           While Zen Master Shinzan Sōmitsu1 is walking with Great Master Tōzan Gohon,2 Great Master Gohon points to a nearby temple and says,

“Inside there is someone expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” His elder brother3 Sōmitsu says, “Who is it?”

Great Master Gohon says, “Being asked one question by you, elder

brother, I have directly attained the state of having died completely.”

Brother Sōmitsu says, “That concrete state of expounding the mind and

expounding the nature is who.”

             Great Master Gohon says, “In death I have come alive.”4                                         180a

[128]           “Expounding the mind and expounding the nature”5 are the universal basis of the Buddha’s truth, by virtue of which every buddha and every

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patriarch is realized. Unless there is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature,” [buddhas and patriarchs] do not turn the splendid wheel of Dharma, do not establish the mind and undergo training, and do not realize the truth simultaneously with the whole earth and all sentient beings; and all living beings do not realize the state of being without the buddha-nature. Picking up a flower and winking an eye are “expounding the mind and expounding the nature”; a face breaking into a smile is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature”; doing prostrations and standing in place are “expounding the mind and expounding the nature”; the ancestral master’s entry into Liang6 is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature”; and the transmission of the robe in the middle of the night is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” Holding up a staff is just “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” Laying down a whisk is just “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” In sum, the virtues which each buddha and each patriarch has are all just “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” There is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” by normality,7 and there is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” by fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles. [Moments] when the truth is realized that the arising of mind is the arising of miscellaneous real dharmas and the truth is realized that the passing of mind is the passing of miscellaneous real dharmas, are all moments when the mind is expounding and moments when the nature is expounding. Nevertheless, ordinary folk who do not penetrate the mind and do not master the nature, in their ignorance, not knowing “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” and not knowing discussion of the profound and discussion of the fine, say, and teach to others, that the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs should not include these things. Because they do not know “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” as “expounding the mind and expounding the nature,” they think of “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” as expounding about the mind and expounding about the nature.8 And this is mainly because they do not think critically about whether or not they have penetrated the great truth.

[131] Latterly, a certain Sōkō, [titled] Zen Master Daie9 of Kinzan Mountain, has said, “Because people today like to expound about the mind and expound about the nature, and they like to discuss the profound and discuss the fine, they are slow in attaining the truth. When we have simply thrown away the duality of mind and nature and forgotten both the profound and the fine, so that dualistic forms do not arise, then we really experience the state.” This [is the] insistence [of one who] has never known the thoughts10 of the Buddhist patriarchs and has never heard of the royal lineage of the Buddhist 180b patriarchs. As a result, because he understands that the mind is only thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization but does not understand that thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization are the mind, he speaks like this. Wrongly imagining “the nature” to be only clear, calm, peaceful, and quiet, he does not know the existence and nonexistence of the buddha-nature11 and the Dharma-nature,12 and he has never seen “the nature as it is”13 even in a dream; therefore he has formed such a distorted view of the Buddha-Dharma. The mind that Buddhist patriarchs express is skin, flesh, bones, and marrow; the nature that Buddhist patriarchs retain is a bamboo cane and a staff; the profound that Buddhist patriarchs uniformly experience14 is outdoor pillars and stone lanterns; and the fine that Buddhist patriarchs discuss is wisdom and understanding. Buddhist patriarchs who are really Buddhist patriarchs, from the beginning, hear in action, expound in action, practice in action, and experience in action this state of the mind and the nature. They retain and learn in action this state of the profound and the fine. People in the state like this are called children and grandchildren who are learning the Buddhist patriarchs. Those who are not like this are not learning the truth. For this reason, when it is time to attain the truth, they do not attain the truth, and when it is time to be beyond attainment of the truth they are not beyond attainment of the truth. They stumble through times of both attainment and nonattainment. The words “to forget the duality of mind and nature,” which that fellow [Sōkō] has spoken, are a partial attempt to expound the mind—a hundredth, thousandth, ten-thousandth, or hundred-millionth of a part. To speak of “throwing away the profound and the fine,” is a partial attempt to discuss the profound and the fine. When, not having learned this pivotal point, he stupidly speaks of forgetting, he thinks it means something leaving the hands; he understands that it means something having departed from the body.15 He has not let go of the limited thinking of the Small Vehicle, so how could he penetrate the inner depths of the Great Vehicle, and how much less could he know the pivotal matter of the ascendant state?16 It is hard to say that he has 180c tasted the tea and meals of a Buddhist patriarch. To work earnestly under a

teacher is to investigate physically, in the very moment of the body-mind, and is to investigate in experience, both before the body and after the body,17 nothing other than “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” There is no second or third different example at all.

[135]          Thereupon the First Patriarch says to the Second Patriarch,18 “If you just let external involvements cease and have no panting and gasping in your mind, your mind will be like fences and walls, and you will be able to enter the truth.” The Second Patriarch makes various efforts to expound the mind and expound the nature, but always fails to experience the state.19 One day he suddenly attains reflection. At length he addresses the First Patriarch: “This time, for the first time, the disciple has let involvements cease.” The First Patriarch, knowing that the other is already in the state of realization, does not examine him closely, but only says, “You have not realized cessation, have you?” The Second Patriarch says, “No.”20 The First Patriarch says, “What is the disciple’s situation?” The Second Patriarch says, “I am always recognizing it very clearly, therefore I cannot express it with words.” The First Patriarch says, “That is just the substance of the mind transmitted by the buddhas and patriarchs of the past. Now you

have got it, you yourself must guard it well.”21

[136]          There are those who doubt this story, and those who quote it.Among the stories of how the Second Patriarch served the First Patriarch, one story is like this. The Second Patriarch tried persistently to expound the mind and expound the nature, and at first his state did not match the state,22 but he gradually accumulated merit and heaped up virtue until he finally attained the First Patriarch’s state of truth. Common and stupid people have interpreted this as follows: “When at first the Second Patriarch expounded the mind and expounded the nature but did not experience the state, the fault was in the expounding of the mind and expounding of the nature. Later, when he abandoned expounding the mind and expounding the nature, he experienced the state.” They speak like this because they have not mastered the teaching that “with minds like fences and walls we are able to enter the truth.” The are especially ignorant of stages in learning the truth. The reason [I say so] is this: From the time we establish the bodhi-mind and direct ourselves toward training in the Way of Buddha, we sincerely practice difficult practices; and at that time, though we keep practicing, in a hundred efforts we never hit the target once. Nevertheless, “sometimes following good counselors and sometimes following the sutras,” we gradually become able to hit the target. One hit of the target now is by virtue of hundreds of misses in the past; it is one maturation of hundreds of misses. Listening to the teachings, training in the truth, and attaining the state of experience are all like this. Even though yesterday’s attempts to expound the mind and to expound the nature were a hundred misses, the hundred missed attempts to expound the mind and to expound the nature yesterday are suddenly a hit today. When we are beginners in practicing the Buddha Way, even though, due to lack of training, we have not mastered the Way, we can never attain the Buddha Way by abandoning the Buddha Way and pursuing other ways. It is hard for people who have not mastered the whole process of Buddhist training to clarify this situation as a fact. The Buddha Way, at the time of the first establishment of the will, is the Buddha Way; and at the time of realization of the right state of truth, it is the Buddha Way. The beginning, the middle, and the end are each the Buddha Way. It is like someone walking one thousand miles: the first step is one in a thousand miles and the thousandth step is one in a thousand miles. Though the first step and the thousandth step are different, the thousand miles are the same. Nevertheless, extremely stupid people think that when we are learning the Buddha Way we have not arrived at the Buddha Way; they think that it is the Buddha Way only in the time beyond realization of the effect. They are like this because they do not know that the whole Way is expounding of the Way, they do not know that the whole Way is practice of the Way, and they do not know that the whole Way is experience of the Way. Those who understand that only deluded people realize the great state of realization through Buddhist training and who neither know nor hear that people who are not deluded also realize the great state of realization through Buddhist 181b training, express [the thoughts] described above. Even before experience of the state, “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” is the Buddha Way; at the same time, it is by “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” that we experience the state. We should not learn that “experiencing the state” describes only a deluded person’s first realization of the great state of realization. People in the state of delusion realize the great realization;

people in the state of realization realize the great realization; people who are beyond realization realize the great realization; people who are beyond delusion realize the great realization; and people who are experiencing the state experience the state. Thus, to “expound the mind and expound the nature” is to be straight and true in the Buddha Way. Not having mastered this truth, Sōkō23 says that we should not expound the mind and expound the nature, but his words are not a truth of the Buddha-Dharma. In the great kingdom of Song today no one has arrived even at Sōkō’s level.

[140] The founding patriarch, Great Master Gohon, as an Honored One alone among the many patriarchs, has mastered the truth that “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” The ancestral masters in all directions who have never mastered it have no expressions like his in the present story: While Brother Sōmitsu and the great master are walking along, [the great master] points to a nearby temple and says, “Inside there is someone expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” Since the founding patriarch manifested himself in the world, his Dharma descendants have inevitably received the authentic transmission of this expression as the transcendent Way of the patriarchs. Other lineages have not seen or heard it even in a dream. How much less could they know, even in a dream, the method of understanding it? [The method] has only been received in the authentic transmission to rightful successors. How could those who have not received the authentic transmission of this principle master the basis of the Buddha Way? The principle under discussion now is that [the unity of] “in” and “side,”24 and [the unity of] “the existence of a human”25 and “a human’s existence,”26 is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” [This unity] is “the-mind-as-surface-and-content expounding”27 and is “the-nature-as-surface-and-content expounding.”28 We should investigate this and consider it. There has never been “expounding” that was separate from “the nature,” and “the mind” has never existed apart from “expounding.” “The buddha-nature” describes all things expounding and “being without the buddha-nature” describes all things expounding. Though we learn that the buddha-nature is “the nature,” if we do not learn the buddha nature as existence, that is not learning the truth; and if we do not learn the buddha-nature as being without, that is not learning the state in practice.29 Those who learn in practice that “expounding” is “natural” are the legitimate descendants of Buddhist patriarchs. Those who believe that “the natural state” is “expounding” itself are Buddhist patriarchs who are legitimate descendants. To say that the mind is shaky but the nature is tranquil is the view of non-Buddhists. To say that the nature remains serene while form changes is the view of non-Buddhists. Buddhist learning of the mind and learning of the nature are not like that. Buddhist practice of the mind and practice of the nature are not the same as in non-Buddhism. Buddhist clarification of the mind and clarification of the nature are beyond non-Buddhists. In Buddhism there is expounding of the mind and expounding of the nature “there being someone,” and there is expounding of the mind and expounding of the nature “there being no one”;30 there is not expounding the mind and not expounding the nature “there being someone,” and there is not expounding the mind and not expounding the nature “there being no one.” There is expounding the mind or failure to have expounded the mind and expounding the nature or failure to have expounded the nature. If we do not learn the expounding of the mind when there is no person, expounding of the mind has yet to reach fertile ground,31 and if we do not learn the expounding of the mind when there is a person, expounding of the mind has yet to reach fertile ground. We learn “the expounding of the-mind-in-which-there-is-noperson,”32 we learn “the-state-in-which-there-is-no-person expounding the mind,”33 we learn “expounding the mind as the concrete human state,”34 and we learn “a concrete human being expounding the mind.”35 The total effort that Rinzai expresses is only “a true human being without rank,”36 but he has never mentioned “a true human being who has a rank.” We can say that he has not yet realized other study and other expressions, and that he has yet to reach the state of exploring the ultimate.37 Because “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” is expounding the buddhas and expounding the patriarchs, we should meet it with the ears, and we should meet it with the eyes. Brother Sōmitsu, the story goes, says, “Who is it?” In realizing this expression, Brother Sōmitsu is able to exploit this expression in the former moment and he is able to exploit this expression in the latter moment. “Who is it?” is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” which belongs to “that concrete situation.”38 This being so, a moment in 182a which “Who is it?” is expressed, or a moment in which “Who is it?” is concretely thought, is “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” itself.

This “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” is something that people of other directions have never known. Because they forget the child and see it as the enemy, they deem enemies to be children.39 The great master says, “Being asked one question by you, elder brother, I have directly attained the state of having died completely.” Hearing these words, most ordinary practitioners think as follows: “Someone who expounds the mind and expounds the nature must directly attain the state of having died completely on being told “it is who!” The reason is that the words “it is who!” are [about] being face-to-face without consciousness of each other, [about] being totally without a view—so they may be a dead phrase.”40 That is not necessarily so. The people who have utterly mastered this “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” may be few. “Completely having died” is not to have died ten or twenty percent, and for this reason the “state of having died” is “complete.” At the very moment of “being asked” who can say that this state is not enclosing the whole sky and covering the whole earth? It may be that even illumination of the past is cut off, that even illumination of the present is cut off, that even illumination of the future is cut off, and that even illumination of this very moment is cut off.41 Brother Sōmitsu says, “That state of expounding the mind and expounding the nature is who.” Comparing the previous “Who is it?” and the present “it is who,” while the name is still the third son of Zhang’s, the man is the fourth son of Li.42 The great master says, “Death itself has come alive.”43 [With] this “death itself” he does not arbitrarily express “who it is”—hoping to indicate his “direct attainment of the state of having died,” and so directly indicating [his own] “concrete state of expounding the mind and expounding the nature”—for “it is who” has got rid of the “someone” who expounds the mind and expounds the nature.44 There may be something to learn in practice in the assertion that we cannot always expect the complete state of having died.45 The great master’s words “Death itself has come alive” are the manifestation before us of the voice and form of “someone expounding the mind and expounding the nature.” At the same time, they may also be one or two concrete parts of the complete state of having died. “Liveliness,” though it is liveliness of the whole, does not man-

182b infest itself as liveliness through a transformation from death; it is simply liberated in the head-to-tail rightness of “coming alive.” In general, in the truth of the buddhas and the truth of the patriarchs, “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” exists and is investigated like this. Progressing further, through dying a complete death we realize the vivid state of coming alive. Remember, from the Tang dynasty until today, there have been many pitiable people who have not clarified the fact that “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” is the Buddha’s truth and who, in their ignorance of “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” as teaching, practice, and experience, have produced outlandish explanations and confused sayings. We should save them both before the body and after the body. If I put it in words, “expounding the mind and expounding the nature” is the pivotal essence of the Seven Buddhas and the ancestral masters.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Sesshin-sesshō

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippōji in the                                     Yoshida district of Etsu-shū,46 Japan, in the  first year of Kangen.47

 

Notes

1     Master Shinzan Sōmitsu (dates unknown), successor of Master Ungan Donjō.

2     thirty-eighth patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage. Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869), also a successor of Master Ungan Donjō, and the

3     Shihaku,master or teacher. a term of respect for a senior member of one’s master’s order. Haku means elder brother or uncle.   Shi means

4     Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 62.

5     Shō, concrete reality. For example, in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), explains lit., “nature” or “essence,” means the natural state, or a natural function, inbusshō, “buddha-nature,” as the state of action. Busshō, Master Dōgen

6     Master Bodhidharma entered China during the time of the Liang dynasty (502–557).Gyōji. See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II),

7     Hyōjō See for example the opening paragraph of Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), frequently used in the phrase hyōjō-shin, “normal mind” or “everyday mind.”Busshō. 8 They think that real manifestation of the mind and the nature, which is done by action itself, means intellectual explanation.

9     Shōbōgenzō Master Daie Sōkō (1089–1163), successor of Master Engo Kokugon. His history isJishō-zanmai.). He was a major instigator of His works included Daiekōan recorded in Chapter Seventy-five (Vol. IV),

Shōgaku.Zen (based on intentional consideration of questions and answers), as opposed to themokushō Zen (silent, reflective zazen) advocated by his contemporary, Master Wanshi (Daie’s right Dharma-eye treasury

10    Kenshō. used in ancient times to bind Chinese texts. The words are therefore a concrete symbol These characters, which are rare, literally mean “blue thread,” of the sort of thoughts.

11    Busshō; see Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō. 12 Hōsshō; see Chapter Fifty-four, Hōsshō.

13    See also Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Nyozesō appears in the Lotus Sutra, HōbenHokke-ten-hokke;(“Expedient Means”) chapter (LS Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō.1.68).

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14    Shōkai. Shōment and, by extension, the state which is exactly the same as the state of Gautama means experience. Kai means pledge, promise, accord, or binding agree-Shisho.

Buddha. See also Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I),

15    To be conscious that something has gone is not to have forgotten it.

16    Dōgen in the final paragraph of Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Kōjō no kanreisu, the words of Master Ōbaku Kiun, discussed at length by Master Butsu-kōjō-no-ji.

17    Shinsen-shingo, “before the body and after the body,” suggests intuitive reflection continuation of Buddhist effort in eternity. immediately preceding and following an action. At the same time, it suggests endless

18    Master Bodhidharma is speaking to Master Taiso Eka. 19 Shōkai. See note 14.

20    nothing” or “I have nothing. ”Mu expresses general negation: “No!” At the same time it literally means “there is

21    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 3.

22    factors. Sōkai, a variation of shōkai; see note 14. expresses mutual relation between two

23    Kōkō, literally, “Mister Kō.” Kō is from the name Sōkō. used for monks.       is a title not generally

24    . . waku. . ., but here Master Dōgen separates the characters Men Wakuri-wakumen. means “face” or “surface.” In the story the compound In the story, “inside” is rimen. Riri and means “backside” or “inside. “merriment by the characters is used colloquially, waku .

He thus suggests reality as the combination of meaningful content (“in”) and objective form (“side”).which mean “either . . . or . . .” or “sometimes . . . and sometimes. . . .”

25    Unin, Nin means “person,” or “human. “translated in the story as “there is someone.” U means “there is” or “existence.”

26    suggests two faces of reality—the idea of there being someone, and the concrete existence of a human being. By reversing the order of the characters in the story, Master Dōgen again

27    Menri-shin setsu, literally, “the side-in mind expounding.”

28    Menri-sho setsu, literally, “the side-in nature expounding.”

29    and Ubusshō, mubusshō, “having the buddha-nature” or “the buddha-nature as concrete existence,” “being without the buddha-nature” or “the buddha-nature as the state of being without,” are two contradictory expressions of the buddha-nature (see ChapterTwenty-two [Vol. II], but as a real state that has two sides. realize the shō of sesshin-sesshōBusshō). In this sentence, Master Dōgen recommends us toas the shō of busshō, realizing it not as a concept

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Chapter Forty-eight

30    expounding of the nature there being no one” suggests the manifestation of the Munin Buddhist state by nature itself.is contrasted to unin in the story (see note 25). “Expounding of the mind and

31    Mi-tō-denchi. Mi means “not yet.” means “reach.” Den, which means “paddy of the field,” often represents a source of happiness—as for example in the poem in praise ground; and 2) state [of body-mind].kaṣaya (“Formless, field of happiness, robe!”). Chi means 1) earth, land, or

32    (Setsu shin-mu-nin,Vol. I), Genjō-kōan,literally, “expounding the-mind-without-person.” In Chapter Three  for example, Master Dōgen recommends us to realize the state in which we forget ourselves.

33    and the form of the mountains manifest the buddha-mind.Munin sesshin, literally, “no-person expounding the mind.” In Chapter Nine (Vol. I),for example, Master Dōgen teaches that the voices of the river valley

Keisei-sanshiki,

34    Sesshin-zenin, literally, “expounding the mind—concrete person.”

35    Zenin-sesshin, posture is the buddha-mind–seal.two, Zanmai-ō-zanmai,literally, “a concrete person expounds the mind.” In Chapter Seventy-for example, Master Dōgen says that sitting in the full lotus

36    Quoted in the Rinzaizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Rinzai Gigen).

37    Mi-tō-santetsu-chi.santetsu, Alludes to the parallel phrase discussed in note 31. Here Master “exploring the ultimate,” for den, “paddy field.”

Dōgen substitutes

38    Nari. Ri, literally, “the backside” or “the inside” (see note 24), means a concrete place or a concrete situation.

39    state of a child who asks “Who is it?” they recognize as the Buddha’s true disciples Because they do not understand that the straight and direct Buddhist state is like the people who are causing complicated misunderstanding of the Buddha’s teachings.

40    Shiku, straightf or ward question. meaning. Ordinary practitioners do not notice the real meaning of Master Sōmitsu’s “dead phrase,” means a comment which has no vital, concrete, or practical

41    points in the past and future, and so all processes are momentary. Saidan, “cut off,” means momentary. Each point of time is cut off from all other

42    interpreted in at least two ways: 1) As a straightforward invitation to Master TōzanKo[re] ta [zo], or zesui, “Who is it?”, “Concretely who?”, or “It is ‘who,’” can be the mind and expounds the natural state (“It is ‘who’”). This sentence says the word denial of the possibility of expressing in words the state of a person who expounds to make his words more concrete (“Who is it?” or “Concretely who?”), and 2) as ais the same in both cases but the meaning is different. zesui

43    Shichū-toku-katsu.suggest the meaning “In death I have come alive.” However, Master Dōgen’s In the story, read as shichū [ni] katsu [o] e[tari], these characters

In the context of the story, “death” represents the momentary extinction of all worries and fears. Means “the inside of death,” and hence “the real state of death” or “death itself.”shichū, which literally interpretation is that there is no personal subject in the word

44    the mind and expounds the nature. In other words, the balanced state of action—not a personal subject—expounds

45    Suggests the problem of attachment to the goal of detachment. 46 Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture.

47 1243.

[Chapter Forty-nine] Butsudō

The Buddhist Truth

Translator’s Note: Butsu means “buddha” and originally means “Way,” but also “morals” and “the truth.” So butsudō means “the Buddha’s truth” or “the Buddhist truth.” The concept of “the Buddhist truth” is central to Master Dōgen’s theory, and it is helpful to examine the meaning from each of the four phases of Buddhist philosophy. In the first (subjective) phase, the Buddhist truth is embodied in the Buddhist philosophical system. In the second (objective) phase, the Buddhist truth is the external world, or nature. In the third phase (based on action), the Buddhist truth is ethical or moral conduct in everyday life; that is, everyday life as we live it. In the ultimate phase, the Buddhist truth is ineffable, the complicated; the state in zazen, or reality itself. In this chapter, however, Master Dōgen does not try to explain these meanings of “the Buddhist truth”; he simply asserts that there is only one Buddhism— that which was established by Gautama Buddha. Based on his assertion, although there are several Buddhist sects, we do not need to use the titles that these sects have been given. Master Dōgen insists that the title “the Buddha’s truth” or “Buddhism” is sufficient, and that it is wrong to use such titles as the Unmown sect, the Hōgen sect, the Igyō sect, the Rinzai sect, and the Sōtō sect. We usually think of Master Dōgen as belonging to the Sōtō sect, but he himself did not approve of the use of even the title “Sōtō sect.”

[152] The eternal buddha Sōkei1 on one occasion preaches to the assembly, “From Enō to the Seven Buddhas there are forty patriarchs.”2 When we investigate these words, from the Seven Buddhas to Enō are forty buddhas. When we count the buddhas and the patriarchs, we count them like this. When we count them like this, the Seven Buddhas are seven patriarchs, and the thirtythree patriarchs are thirty-three buddhas. Sōkei’s intention is like this. This is the right and traditional instruction of the Buddha. Only the rightful successors

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of the authentic transmission have received the authentic transmission of this counting method. From Śākyamuni Buddha to Sōkei there are thirty-four patriarchs. Each of the transmissions between these Buddhist patriarchs is

182c like Kāśyapa3 meeting the Tathāgata and like the Tathāgata getting Kāśyapa. Just as Śākyamuni Buddha learns in practice under Kāśyapa Buddha, each teacher and disciple exists in the present. Therefore, the right Dharma-eye treasury has been personally transmitted from rightful successor to rightful successor, and the true life of the Buddha-Dharma is nothing other than this authentic transmission. The Buddha-Dharma, because it is authentically transmitted like this, is perfectly legitimate in its transmission. This being so, the virtues and the pivotal essence of the Buddha’s truth have been faultlessly provided. They have been transmitted from India in the west to the Eastern Lands, a hundred thousand and eight miles, and they have been transmitted from the time when the Buddha was in the world until today, more than two thousand years. People who do not learn this truth in practice speak randomly and mistakenly. They randomly call the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana that have been authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs “the Zen sect”; they call the ancestral master “the Zen patriarch”; they call practitioners “Zen students” or “students of dhyāna”;4 and some of them call themselves “the Zen schools.” These are all twigs and leaves rooted in a distorted view. Those who randomly call themselves by the name “Zen sect,” which has never existed in India in the west or in the Eastern Lands, from the past to the present, are demons out to destroy the Buddha’s truth. They are the Buddhist patriarchs’ uninvited enemies. [154] Sekimon’s Rinkanroku5 says:

Bodhidharma first went from the land of the Liang dynasty to the land of the Wei dynasty. He passed along the foot of Sūzan Mountain and rested his staff at Shōrin [Temple]. He just sat in stillness facing the wall, and only that—he was not learning Zen meditation. He continued this for a long time but no one could understand the reason, and so they saw Bodhidharma as training in Zen meditation. Now, dhyāna6 is only one of many practices: how could it be all there was to the Saint? Yet on the basis of this [misunderstanding] the chroniclers of that time subsequently listed him among those who were learning Zen meditation: they grouped him alongside people like withered trees and

dead ash. Nevertheless, the Saint did not stop at dhyāna; and at the same time, of course, he did not go against dhyāna—just as the art of divination emerges from yin and yang without going against yin and yang.7

[155] Calling him the twenty-eighth patriarch is on the basis that [Mahā] -

kāśyapa is the first patriarch. Counting from Vipaśyin8 Buddha, he is the thirty- 183a fifth patriarch. The Seven Buddhas’ and twenty-eight patriarchs’ experience of the truth should not necessarily be limited to dhyāna. Therefore the master of the past says, “Dhyāna is only one of many practices; how could it be all there was to the Saint?” This master of the past has seen a little of people and has entered the inner sanctum of the ancestral patriarchs, and so he has these words. Throughout the great kingdom of Song these days [such a person] might be difficult to find and might hardly exist at all. Even if [the important thing is] dhyāna we should never use the name “Zen sect.” Still more, dhyāna is never the whole importance of the Buddha-Dharma. Those who, nevertheless, willfully call the great truth that is authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha “the Zen sect” have never seen the Buddha’s truth even in a dream, have never heard it even in a dream, and have never received its transmission even in a dream. Do not concede that the Buddha-Dharma might even exist among people who claim to be “the Zen sect.” Who has invented the name “Zen sect”? None of the buddhas and ancestral masters has ever used the name “Zen sect.” Remember, the name “Zen sect” has been devised by demons and devils. People who have called themselves a name used by demons and devils may themselves be a band of demons; they are not the children and grandchildren of the Buddhist patriarchs.

[157]       The World-honored One, before an assembly of millions on Vulture Peak, picks up an uḍumbara flower and winks. The assembly is totally silent. Only the face of Venerable Mahākāśyapa breaks into a smile. The World-honored One says, “I have the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana; along with the saṃghāṭī robe,9 I transmit them to Mahākāśyapa.10

The World-honored One’s transmission to Mahākāśyapa is “I have the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana.” In addition to this there is no “I have the Zen sect and I transmit it to Mahākāśyapa.” He says “along with the saṃghāṭī robe;” he does not say “along with the Zen sect.” 183b Thus, the name “Zen sect” is never heard while the World-honored One is in the world.

[158]       The First Patriarch,11 at that time, addresses the Second Patriarch: “The buddhas’ supreme and fine truth is to persevere for vast kalpas in difficult conduct and painful conduct, and to be able to endure what it is hard to endure. How can one hope to seek the true vehicle with small virtue and small wisdom, and with a trivial and conceited mind?”12 On another occasion he says, “The Dharma seal13 of the buddhas is not got from other people.” And on another occasion he says, “The Tathāgata transmitted the right Dharma-eye treasury to [Mahā]kāśyapa.”

[159]       What has been indicated now is “the supreme and fine truth ofthe buddhas, the right Dharma-eye treasury, and the Dharma seal of the buddhas.” At this time, there has been no instance at all of using the name “Zen sect,” and no cause of or condition for using the name “Zen sect” has ever been heard. This “right Dharma-eye treasury” has been passed on in the face-to-face transmission by the raising of an eyebrow and the winking of an eye; it has been given with body, mind, bones, and marrow; it has been received with body, mind, bones, and marrow; it has been transmitted and received “before the body and after the body”;14 and it has been transmitted and received “on the mind and outside of mind.”15 The name “Zen sect” is not heard in the order of the World-honored One and Mahākāśyapa; the name “Zen sect” is not heard in the order of the First Patriarch and the Second Patriarch; the name “Zen sect” is not heard in the order of the Fifth Patriarch and the Sixth Patriarch; and the name “Zen sect” is not heard in the orders of Seigen and Nangaku.16 There is nothing to indicate who began using the name, and from what time. People out to destroy the Dharma and to steal the Dharma, who could not be numbered as practitioners even though they were among practitioners, may have secretly initiated the name. If practitioners of later ages randomly use the name that Buddhist patriarchs have never permitted, they will corrupt the lineage of the Buddhist patriarchs. Further, there will appear to be another method called “the Zen sect” besides the method of the buddhas and the patriarchs. If there is any method which is other than the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, it may be a method of no Buddhists. As already the children and grandchildren of Buddhist patriarchs, we should learn in practice the bones, marrow, and facial features of the Buddhist patriarchs. We have devoted ourselves to the Buddhist patriarchs’ truth; we should not flee from this place and learn non-Buddhism. We have retained the rarely retained body-mind of a human being. This is by virtue 183c of pursuing the truth in the past. If, having received this benevolent influence, we mistakenly promote non-Buddhism, we will not be repaying the benevolence of the Buddhist patriarchs. In great Song [China] in recent ages, common folk throughout the country have heard this wrong name “Zen sect,” and so the vulgar usually use the wrong names “Zen sect,” “Bodhidharma sect,” and “Buddha’s Mind sect,” rumors of which vie to be heard and to disturb the Buddha’s truth. These [names] are the confused expressions of people who have never known the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, and who neither perceive nor believe that the right Dharma-eye treasury even exists. How could anyone who knows the right Dharma-eye treasury call the Buddha’s truth by a wrong name?

[162] For this reason. . .

Great Master Musai17 of Sekitō-an Temple on Nangakuzan, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, addresses the assembly as follows: “My Dharma gate18 has been transmitted and received from past buddhas; it is, without discussing the balanced state of Zen or diligence,19 solely to master the wisdom of the Buddha.”20

Remember, Buddhist patriarchs who possess the authentic transmission from the Seven Buddhas and the many buddhas speak like this. The only words realized are that “My Dharma gate has been transmitted and received from past buddhas.” There is no realization of the words “My Zen sect has been transmitted and received from past buddhas.” Without distinguishing separate instances of “the balanced state of Zen and diligence,” he causes us “solely to master the wisdom of the Buddha.” That which he has solely mastered— without spurning the balanced state of Zen and diligence—is the wisdom of the Buddha. This is expressed as “I possess the right Dharma-eye treasury and I transmit it.”21 [Sekitō’s] “My”22 is [the Buddha’s] “I possess.”23 “The Dharma gate” is “the right Dharma.” “My,” “my possession,” and “my marrow”24 are “the transmission”25 which “you have got.”26 Great Master Musai is a disciple of the founding patriarch Seigen, the only one to have entered Seigen’s inner sanctum. And he is the Dharma child of the eternal buddha Sōkei who shaved his head.27 So the eternal buddha Sōkei is his forefather and his father, and the founding patriarch Seigen is his elder brother and his teacher. As a hero in the truth of the Buddha and in the order of the patriarchs, Great Master Musai of Sekitō-an Temple stands alone. Only Musai has solely mastered the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s truth: every fruition and every element of the realization of his words is the timelessness of an eternal buddha

184a and the everlasting present Ness of an eternal buddha. We should see him as the eye of the right Dharma-eye treasury, and we should not compare him with others. That people who do not know compare him with Daijaku of Kōzei28 is wrong. So remember, the Buddha’s truth transmitted and received from past buddhas is not even called “the balanced state of Zen”; how much less could it be called, or discussed as, “the Zen sect”? Clearly remember, to call it “the Zen sect” is the most enormous error. Inept people, thinking that [the Buddha’s truth] might be like a materialist sect29 or an immaterialist sect,30 regret that unless a name is given to a sect it is as if there is nothing to learn. The Buddha’s truth cannot be like that. We should be absolutely certain that [the Buddha’s truth] has never been called “the Zen sect.” Nevertheless, the common folk of recent ages, in their stupidity, do not know the old customs, and people who have not received the transmission of past buddhas wrongly say, “Within the Buddha-Dharma there are the lineages and customs of the five sects.” This is a degeneration that has been left to follow its natural course. There has been not one person nor half a person to redeem it. My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, is the first to have shown pity for this situation. This is his mission as a human being, and it is his mastery of the Dharma.

[166] My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, addresses the assembly as follows: “That individuals today talk solely of there being differences in the customs of the lineages of Unmown, Hōgen, Igyō, Rinzai, Sōtō, and so on is not the Buddha-Dharma and is not the truth of the ancestral master.”

The realization of these words is hard to meet [once] in a thousand years, for only my late master expresses it, and is hard to hear through the ten directions, for only his consummate order hears it. This being so, among one thousand monks there is no listening ear and no seeing eye; how much less is there any who listens with the whole mind; and how much less is there any who listens with the body? Even if they listened with their whole body-mind for hundreds of millions of myriad kalpas, they could never utilize the thoroughly realized body-mind of my late master to listen, to experience, to 184b believe, and to get free. It is pitiful that everyone throughout the ten directions of the great kingdom of Song has considered my late master to be on a par with the old veterans of other districts. Should we see the people who think like this as equipped with eyes? Or should we see them as not equipped with eyes? Again, some have considered my late master to be on a par with Rinzai and Tokusan. It must be said that these people have never seen my late master and have never met with Rinzai. Before I performed prostrations to my late master, the eternal buddha, I had intended to investigate the profound teachings of the five sects, but after performing prostrations to my late master, the eternal buddha, I clearly knew the principle that the five sects are random names. That being so, when the Buddha-Dharma flourished in the great kingdom of Song there were no names of five sects. There was never an ancient who proclaimed the names of five sects or who mentioned sectarian customs. Since the Buddha-Dharma has weakened the names of five sects have occurred at random. The situation is like this because people are negligent in learning in practice and not keen in pursuing the truth. To each individual monk who pursues real mastery in practice, I issue a stern warning: Do not retain the random names of the five sects, and do not retain any concept of lineages or customs belonging to five sects. How much less should there be “the three kinds of profundity,”31 “the three pivots,”32 “the four thoughts,”33 “the four relations between reflection and action,”34 “the nine standards,”35 and so on. How much less should there be “the three phrases,”36 “the five relative positions,”37 and “the ten kinds of shared true wisdom.”38 The truth of Old Master Śākyamuni is not small thinking like that, and it does not esteem thinking like that as great. The words have never been realized. They have not been heard at Shōrin [Temple] or on Sōkei [Mountain]. It is pitiful that they are repeated by shavelings who, in the present degenerate age, do not hear the Dharma, their body-mind and eyes being dark. The children and grandchildren of the Buddhist patriarchs, and their embryos, must not express such words. Masters who abide in and retain the state of Buddhist patriarchs 184c have never let these words of madness be heard. Recent second-rate teachers, people who have never heard the whole truth of the Buddha-Dharma, who lack complete devotion to the truth of the patriarchs, and who are ignorant

in regard to their own state, being excessively proud of one or two mere trifles, establish names of sects like those mentioned earlier. Once the names of sects are established, small children, because they have not learned the Way to pursue the substance, vainly follow the shadow. They do not have the spirit which adores the ancients; they have behavior which is corrupted by secular customs. Even secular people warn of the vileness of following the secular customs of the world.

[172] King Bunnō39 asks Minister Taikō, “Why is it that though a lord endeavors to employ sages, he does not reap the benefit, but social disorder gets more and more extreme, putting [the nation] in peril?”

Taikō says, “He employs sages but does not use them. So although he employs wise advisers in name, he does not get the real effect of their wisdom.”

Bunnō says, “Where does the fault lie?”

Taikō says, “The fault is in [the lord’s] fondness for using those who are praised by the world, instead of obtaining for himself true sages.”

Bunnō says, “What does it mean to like to use those who are praised by

the world?”

Taikō says, “To like to listen to those who are praised by the world is to think the unwise wise, to think the unintelligent intelligent, to think the disloyal loyal, and to think the untrustworthy trustworthy. If the lord sees those who are praised by the world as wise and intelligent, and sees those who are reviled by the world as unworthy, people who have many accomplices will advance, and people who have few accomplices will recede. Thus, when the false band together and block out the wise, loyal retainers die having committed no crime, and false retainers use empty reputations to seek court rank. For these reasons social disorder becomes more and more extreme, and so the nation cannot escape peril.”40

[173] Even secular people regret it when their nation and their principles are in peril. When the Buddha-Dharma and the Buddha’s truth are in peril, the Buddha’s disciples must inevitably regret it. The cause of peril is arbitrary following of the customs of the world. When we listen to the praises of the

185a world, we do not find true sages. If we want to find true sages, we should adopt a strategy of wisdom that illuminates the past and looks into the future. Those who are praised by the world are not always wise and not always

sacred. Those who are reviled by secular people are not always wise and not always sacred. Observing three times the case in which the wise invite vilification and the case in which the false are praised, we should not confuse those cases. Not to use the wise is the nation’s loss, and to use the unworthy is a matter for the nation’s regret. The present establishment of the names of five sects is an aberration of the secular world. Those who follow the customs of this secular world are many, but those who have understood the secular as the secular are few. We should see those who reform the secular as saints. To follow the secular may be the utmost foolishness. How could people who are willing to follow the secular know the Buddha’s right Dharma? How could they become buddhas and become patriarchs? [The Buddha-Dharma] has been received by rightful successor from rightful successor since the Seven Buddhas: how could this be similar to the establishment of the five versions of the Vinaya41 by people in India whose understanding depended upon sentences? So remember, the ancestral masters who made the right life of the Buddha-Dharma into [their own] right lives have never said that there are five sects. Someone who learns that there are five sects in Buddhism is not an authentic successor of the Seven Buddhas.

[175] My late master addresses the assembly: “In recent years the truth of the patriarchs has degenerated. Bands of demons, and animals, are many. They frequently discuss the lineages and customs of five sects. It is very distressing, very distressing.”

Thus, clearly, the twenty-eight generations of India in the west and the twenty-two patriarchs of China in the east have never proclaimed five sects. All ancestral masters who are fit to be called ancestral masters are like this. Those who uphold the names of five sects, claiming that each sect has its 185b own fundamental principle, are those who “deceive and delude people of the world” and are those of “scant knowledge and sparse understanding.” If everyone in Buddhism established their own individual truth, how could the Buddha’s truth have arrived at the present day? Mahākāśyapa would have established one of his own, and Ānanda would have established one of his own. If the principle of independent establishment were the right way, the Buddha-Dharma would have died out in the early days in India. Who could venerate principles that individuals had established independently? Among principles that individuals had established independently, who could

decide between the true and the false? If unable to decide between the true and the false, who could consider [a principle] to be the Buddha-Dharma or not to be the Buddha-Dharma? Without clarifying this truth it is hard to call anything Buddhism. The names of the five sects were not established during the lifetimes of the respective ancestral masters. Since the deaths of the ancestral masters who are called the ancestral masters of the five sects, flotsam in the stream of their lineages—people whose eyes were not clear and whose feet did not walk—without asking their fathers, and going against their forefathers, have established the names. The principle is evident and anyone can know it.

[177] Zen Master Daien42 of Daiizan43 is a disciple of Hyakujō Daichi44 and he lives as master of Isan Mountain at the time of Hyakujō, but he never says that the Buddha-Dharma should be called the Igyō45 sect. And Hyakujō does not say to Isan, “From your time onward, living as master of Isan Mountain, you should use the name ‘Igyō sect.’” Neither the master46 nor the patriarch47 uses the name, and so we should remember that it is a wrong name. And even though people arbitrarily use his name in the title of a sect, we should not necessarily single out Kyōzan.48 If it were appropriate [for Isan and Kyōzan] to call [a sect] by their own names, they would use their own names. Because it is not appropriate to use personal names, personal names were not used in the past, and personal names are not used today. We do not speak of the Sōkei sect, the Nangaku sect, the Kōzei sect, or the Hyakujō

sect.49 It was impossible for Isan, in his time, to differ from Sōkei; he could neither surpass Sōkei nor be equal to Sōkei. And the relation between Kyōzan and one word or half a phrase spoken by Daii is not always one staff being carried on the shoulders of two people.50 If people were going to establish the name of a sect, they should call it the Isan sect, or they should call it the Daii sect. There has never been any reason to use the name Igyō sect. If it were appropriate to use the name Igyō sect, the name should have been used when the two venerable patriarchs were in the world. What obstacle was it that caused them not to use a name that they might have used when they were in the world? Those who go against the truth of their father51 and their forefather52 and use the name Igyō sect, which was not used when the two were in the world, are disloyal children and grandchildren. This name is neither the original hope of Zen Master Daii nor the original intention of Old

Man Kyōzan. It has no authentic transmission from a true master. The fact is evident that it is a wrong name used by a group of wrong people. Never let it be heard through the whole universe in ten directions.

[180] Great Master Eshō,53 abandoning a sutra-lecturing school, became a disciple of Ōbaku.54 He tasted Ōbaku’s staff on three occasions, [receiving] sixty strokes altogether, and realized the state of realization while practicing in Daigu’s order.55 In the story he is in residence as the master of Rinzai-in Temple in Chinshū. Though not having perfectly realized Ōbaku’s mind, he still never says one word, or says half a word, to the effect that the Buddha Dharma he has received should be called the Rinzai sect; he does not [say so] by holding up a fist and does not [say so] by picking up a whisk. Nevertheless, flotsam among the members of his order, failing to preserve the conduct of their father and failing to keep the Buddha-Dharma, soon wrongly establish the name “Rinzai sect.” If it had been contrived during the human life of Great Master Eshō there would have been discussion to prevent the establishment of that name—because it clearly goes against the teaching of the ancestral patriarch himself. Moreover, as Rinzai is about to die, he entrusts [the Dharma] to Zen Master Sanshō Enen,56 saying, “After my death, do not destroy my right Dharma-eye treasury.” Enen says, “How could I dare to 186a destroy the master’s right Dharma-eye treasury?” Rinzai says, “If someone suddenly questions you, how will you answer?” Enen at once lets out a yell. Rinzai says, “Who is there that knows that my right Dharma-eye treasury, which is passing toward this blind donkey, will be destroyed?”57

[182]       The words spoken by master and disciple are like this. Rinzai never says “Do not destroy my Zen sect,” never says “Do not destroy my Rinzai sect,” and never says “Do not destroy my sect.” He only says, “Do not destroy my right Dharma-eye treasury.” We should clearly remember that the great truth authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha must not be called “the Zen sect” and must not be called “the Rinzai sect.” We must never even dream of calling it “the Zen sect.” Though “cessation”58 is the essence and form of the right Dharma-eye treasury, the transmission is passed on like this. “Being destroyed as it passes toward a concrete blind donkey” is truly the “Who knows?” state of the transmission. In Rinzai’s lineage Sanshō is alone. We should neither associate him with nor align him with his elder and younger brothers in the Dharma; truly “his place is under a bright window.”59 The story of Rinzai and Sanshō is [a story of] Buddhist patriarchs. The Rinzai transmission today is the Vulture Peak transmission of olden days. Thus, the principle that we should not use the name “Rinzai sect” is evident.

[183]       Great Master Kyōshin60 of Unmundane practiced in the past under Venerable Patriarch Chen,61 and so he may have been a descendant of Ōbaku. Thereafter, he succeeded Seppō. This Master [Unmown] also does not say that the right Dharma-eye treasury should be called “the Unmown sect.” But members of his lineage also, not knowing that the wrong names “Igyō sect” and “Rinzai sect” are wrong names, have established the new name “Unmown sect.” If the fundamental intent of Great Master Kyōshin aspired to a name that would establish a sect, then it would be difficult to affirm that he was

       the body-mind of the Buddha-Dharma. When people now use the name of

the sect, it is as if they are calling an emperor a peasant.62

[184]       Zen Master Dai Hōgen63 of Seiryō-in Temple is the rightful successor of [the master of] Jizō-in Temple,64 and a Dharma grandchild of [the master of] Gensha-in Temple:65 he possesses the fundamental teaching and is without wrongness. Dai Hōgen is the master’s title he uses when signing his name. There is not one word in a thousand words, and not one saying in ten thousand sayings, in which he has advocated the establishment of the name “Hōgen sect,” using his own title as a title for the right Dharma-eye treasury. However, members of this lineage also have established the name “Hōgen sect.” If Hōgen could influence the present, he would eradicate the speaking of the present wrong name “Hōgen sect.” Since Zen Master Hōgen has passed away already, there is no one to cure this disease. Even thousands or tens of thousands of years hereafter, people who wish to be loyal disciples of Zen Master Hōgen must refuse to treat this name “Hōgen sect” as a name. That is to remain fundamentally loyal to Zen Master Dai Hōgen. Broadly, the likes of Unmown and Hōgen are the distant descendants of the founding patriarch Seigen; the bones of the truth have been transmitted and the marrow of the Dharma has been transmitted to them.66

[186] The founding patriarch Great Master Gohon67 received the Dharma from Ungan.68 Ungan was the rightful successor of Great Master Yakusan.69 Yakusan was the rightful successor of Great Master Sekitō.70 Great Master Sekitō was the founding patriarch Seigen’s only son: there was no second or third to equal to him; the conduct of the truth was authentically transmitted to him alone. That the right life of the Buddha’s truth has survived in the Eastern Lands is by virtue of Great Master Sekitō having faultlessly received the authentic transmission. The founding patriarch Seigen, at the time of the eternal buddha Sōkei, taught on Seigen [Mountain] the teachings of Sōkei. To be asked to manifest himself in the world71 while [Sōkei] was in the world, and to experience manifestation in the world in that generation, he must have been a rightful successor above rightful successors and a founding patriarch among founding patriarchs: it is not true that the better course is learning under one’s master and the inferior course is manifesting oneself in the world. [But] practitioners should take note that the average in those days would be outstanding today. When the eternal buddha Sōkei was about to teach human 186c beings and gods by manifesting his parinirvāṇa,72 Sekitō, the story goes, steps up from his seat at the back73 and asks whom he should rely upon as a teacher. The eternal buddha then says “Visit [Gyō]shi.” He does not say “Visit [E]jō.” This being so, the eternal buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury is the authentic transmission of the founding patriarch Seigen alone. Although we acknowledge the excellent members of the order who attained the truth together with him, the founding patriarch walks alone as a truly excellent member.74 The eternal buddha Sōkei has made his own child into Seigen’s child, who, as the father of the father of the father of the child [Tōzan],75 evidently had attained the marrow and evidently was the rightful successor of the ancestral patriarchs. Great Master Tōzan, as the legitimate fourth-generation heir of Seigen, has received the authentic transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury, and has opened his eyes to the fine mind of nirvana. Besides this, there is no separate transmission and no separate sect. The great master has never shown to the assembly any fist or wink of an eye that advocated the use of the name “Sōtō sect.” Furthermore, there was no flotsam mixed in among his disciples, and so there was no disciple who used the name “Tōzan sect.” How much less could they speak of a “Sōtō sect”? The name “Sōtō sect” may be the result of including the name Sōzan.76 In such a case, Ungo77 and Dōan78 would have to be included too. Ungo is a guiding master in the human world and in the heavens above, and he is more venerable than Sōzan. We can conclude, in regard to this name “Sōtō,” that some stinking skinbag belonging to a side lineage, seeing himself as equal

[to Tōzan], has devised the name “Sōtō sect.” Truly, though the white sun is bright, it is as if floating clouds are obscuring it from below.

[189] My late master says, “Now there are many who ascend the lion seats of many districts and many who act as teachers of human beings and gods, but there is no one at all who knows the truths of the Buddha-Dharma.” Therefore, those who vie to uphold a sect among the five sects, and who remain wrongly stuck in words among sayings and words, are really the ene-

187a mies of the Buddhist patriarchs. In another case, a school has been named after Zen Master Nan of Ōryū,79 and has begun to be called “the Ōryū sect,” but before long that school will know their wrongness. In general, while the World-honored One was in the world, he never named a “Buddha sect,” nor named a “Vulture Peak sect,” nor spoke of a “Jetavana Park sect,” nor spoke of a “My Mind sect,” nor spoke of a “Buddha’s Mind sect.” In which of the Buddha’s words is a Buddhist sect named? For what reason do people today use the name “Buddha’s Mind sect”? Why should the World-honored One necessarily call the mind a sect? And why should a sect inevitably be related to the mind? If there is a Buddha’s Mind sect, there should be a Buddha’s Body sect, there should be a Buddha’s Eye sect, there should be a Buddha’s Ear sect, there should be sects for the Buddha’s nose, tongue, and so on. There should be a Buddha’s Marrow sect, a Buddha’s Bones sect, a Buddha’s Legs sect, a Buddha’s Realm sect, and so on. Now there are no such things. Remember, the name “Buddha’s Mind sect” is a false name. When Śākyamuni Buddha cites that all dharmas through the whole of the buddha lands in ten directions are real form, and when he preaches the whole of the buddha lands in ten directions, he does not preach that in the buddha lands in ten directions he has established some sect. If the naming of sects were the method of Buddhist patriarchs, it would have taken place in the Buddha’s reign. If it had taken place in the Buddha’s reign, the Buddha would have preached it. The Buddha did not preach it. Clearly, it was not a tool in the reign of the Buddha. The patriarchs do not speak of it. Clearly, it is not a utensil in the domain of the patriarchs. You might not only be laughed at by others, but also thwarted by the buddhas, and even laughed at by yourselves. So, please, do not give names to sects, and do not say that there are five sects in the Buddha-Dharma.

[193] Latterly there has been an infantile man named Chisō80 who made a collection of one or two sayings of ancestral masters and described the five sects. He called [this collection] Eyes of Human Beings and Gods.81 People 187b have not recognized it for what it is; beginners and late learners have thought it to be true, and there are even some who carry it hidden in their clothes. It is not the eyes of human beings and gods; it darkens the eyes of human beings and gods. How could it have the virtue of blinding the right Dharma-eye treasury? The aforementioned Eyes of Human Beings and Gods was edited by veteran monk Chisō at Mannenji on Tendaizan82 in around the twelfth lunar month of [the sixth year] of the Junki era.83 Even a work produced latterly, if its words are true, should be approved. [But] this work is deranged and stupid. It has no eyes of learning in practice and no eyes of a journey on foot. How much less could it have the eyes of meeting Buddhist patriarchs? We should not use it. We should not call [the author] Chisō, which means “Wise and Clear”; we should call him Gumō—“Stupid and Dark.” One who does not know a true person, and who does not meet a person, has gathered together sayings without picking up the sayings of people who are true people. It is clear that he does not know a person.84 The cause of students of the teaching in China using the names of sects was the presence of [masters of] this and that [lineage] who could rival each other. Now the transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs’ right Dharma-eye treasury has passed from rightful successor to rightful successor, with whom there can be no rival. There are no [other masters of] this and that [lineage] who might be included in the same class. Even so, unreliable old veterans today constantly use the names of sects at random. Scheming in their own interests, they are not in awe of the Buddha’s truth. The Buddha’s truth is not your own Buddha’s truth; it is the Buddha’s truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, and it is the Buddha’s truth of the Buddha’s truth. Minister Taikō says to King Bunnō, “The whole country is not the whole country of one person: it is the whole country of the whole country.”85 Thus, even a layman has this wisdom and has these words. Children in the house of the Buddhist patriarchs must not arbitrarily allow the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs to follow the stupid and the dark, by calling themselves a sect. That is a great violation, and [one who commits it] is not a person of the Buddha’s truth. If we should call ourselves by the name of a sect the World-honored One himself would have used the name. Given that the World-honored One did not name his own sect, what reason 187c could we have, as his descendants, to use names after his death? What person

could be more skillful than the World-honored One? Those without skillfulness are likely to produce no benefit. Again, given that the Buddhist patriarchs have not contravened the time-honored truth by establishing their own sects, who among the Buddha’s descendants could see their own sect as a sect? Learn in practice by illuminating the past and reflecting the present; do not be arbitrary. Hoping not to differ one jot from the World-honored One when he was in the world, his bereaved disciples solely have in their mind the regret of not being able to achieve or the joy of having achieved, and the desire not to go against, even a millionth [of his teaching]. Thus we should vow to find him and to serve him in many lives. Thus we should desire to meet Buddha and to hear the Dharma in many lives. Those who would deliberately go against the teaching of the World-honored One when he was in the world and establish the name of a sect are neither the disciples of the Tathāgata nor the descendants of the ancestral masters. [Their sin] is heavier than the heavy and the deadly [sins].86 By rashly disregarding the importance of the Tathāgata’s supreme truth of bodhi and by acting only in the selfish interests of their own sect, they make light of their predecessors and go against the predecessors. We can say that they do not even know the predecessors, and they do not believe in the virtues that were present in the World-honored One’s day. The Buddha-Dharma cannot abide in their houses. In conclusion, if you want to receive the authentic transmission of the conduct of the truth as one who follows the Buddha, do not see or hear the names of sects. That which every buddha and every patriarch transmits and authentically receives is the right Dharma-eye treasury and the supreme truth of bodhi. The Dharma that the Buddhist Patriarch possessed has been transmitted in its entirety by buddhas, and there are no innovations to be added to the Dharma at all. This principle is the bones of the Dharma and the marrow of the truth.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Butsudō

188a                                                 Preached to the assembly at Kippōji in the                                     Yoshida district of Esshū, on the sixteenth day                                     of the ninth lunar month in the first year of                                     Kangen.87

Notes

1 third patriarch, and the Sixth Patriarch in China. Master Daikan Enō (638–713), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin. He is the thirty2 Sixth Patriarch’s Dharma Treasure Paraphrased in Japanese from the Rokusodaishihōbōdankyō ). (Platform Sutra of the 3 muni. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the seven ancient buddhas, the seventh being Śākya-Busso. 4 Zenna-su. Zennareflection.” Su literally means “child” or “disciple.” is a transliteration of the Sanskrit dhyāna, literally, “thought or

5 in 1107. It was compiled by Master Kakuhan Ekō (1071–1128), who is also sometimes Sekimonrinkanroku (Sekimon’s Forest Record) is a two-volume work first published located. Referred to as Sekimon, which was the name of the district where his temple was 6 Zenna is another transliteration of the Sanskrit dhyāna.

7     The same passage is quoted in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 193.

8     Vipaśyin Buddha is the first of the Seven Buddhas. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

9     The large robe. See Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Kesa-kudoku.

10    butsuketsugikyōQuoted from the (NengeSutra of Questions and Answers between Mahābrahman and the Shinji-shōbōgenzō,(“Picking Up of a Flower”) chapter of the pt. 3, no. 54; Chapter Sixty-eight, Daibontenōmon-Udonge.

Buddha). See also

11    Master Bodhidharma, the First Patriarch in China.

12    is slightly different in the two versions. This story is also quoted in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 216. The wording

13    uddānaHōin (Dharma seal) represents the meaning of the Sanskrit (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). Sometimes three seals are enumerated,anitya (inconstant, impermanent), as dharmoddānaanātmanor dharma-(not namely investigation of reality as

Dharma.not bear these three “seals,” or distinguishing features, is not regarded as the Buddha-self, non-spiritual), and as nirvana (extinct, devoid of illusion). A teaching that does

103

14    sinuation of Buddhist effort endlessly into the past and future. See also Chapter Forty-Shinsen-shingo,eight, Sesshin-sesshō,“before the body and after the body,” suggests the momentary con-note 17.

15    Shinjō-shinge, mind.”     or “on [the basis of] the mind and outside [the conceptual area] of

16    Master Seigen Gyōshi (d. 740) and Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744) were both disciples through Master Seigen. The Rinzai lineage is through Master Nangaku. of the Sixth Patriarch in China, Master Daikan Enō. Master Dōgen’s Sōtō lineage is

17    Musai is his posthumous title. Master Sekitō Kisen (700–790), successor of Master Seigen Gyōshi. Great Master

18    Hōmon The translation “Dharma gate” has been preferred, however, to avoid any suggestion of separation of means (gate) and end (Dharma). In the describes zazen as may be interpreted as “gate to the Dharma,” i.e., “way of teaching Buddhism.”anraku [no] hōmon, “peaceful and joyful gate of Dharma.”Fukanzazengi Master Dōgen

19    kṣantiZenjō-shōjin, “zen-balance and diligence,” represent the Sanskrit pāramitādiligence), s, viz., dhyānadāna(balanced reflection), and (free giving), śīladhyāna(moral integrity),prajñāand vīrya.(real

These are two of the six wisdom).(fortitude), vīrya ( 20 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 14.

21       Go-u-shōbōgenzō-fuzoku.in paragraph 157: “I have the right Dharma-eye treasury . . . and I transmit. . . .”These characters are taken from the Buddha’s preaching quoted

22       Go-shi. Shi functions as a particle which makes go, “I,” into “my.” 23 Go-u, “I have,” “I possess,” or “my possession.”

24    nyotoku-gozui,Gozui, “my marrow,” alludes to Master Bodhidharma’s words to Master Taiso Eka: “you have got my marrow.” See Chapter Forty-six, Kattō.

25    Fuzoku, taken from the Buddha’s words (“I transmit. . .”), suggests the transmission

Master Bodhidharma, and from Master Sekitō Kisen is the same transmission. From the Buddha to Master Mahākāśyapa. The transmission from the Buddha, from 26 symbolize the state of oneness of subject and object in the transmission of the Dharma.Nyotoku. Master Bodhidharma’s words nyotoku-gozui, “you have got my marrow,”

27    old. After that, Master Sekitō became the disciple of Master Daikan Enō’s successor, Master Daikan Enō died in 713, when Master Sekitō was thirteen or fourteen years

Master Seigen.

28    Master Baso Dōitsu (709–788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejō and a contemporary of Master Sekitō. The Rinzai lineage is through Master Baso.

29    Ushū. U means existence or possession. Shū means sect or religion.

Chapter Forty-nine

30    Kūshū. Kinessence or abstract ideals. The opposition of means that which is empty, void, or immaterial: for example, spiritualkūshū and ushū suggests the opposing standpoints of idealism and materialism.

31    of Zen Master Rinzai GigenSangen (“three kids of profundity”), in the ). Rinzaizenjigoroku (Record of the Words 32 Sanyō (“three pivots”), also contained in Rinzaizenjigoroku.

33       Shiryōken training: 1) to take away the person but not to take away circumstances; 2) to take(“four thoughts”) are four ways of considering subject and object in Buddhist circumstances; and 4) not to take away either person or circumstances. Also contained in the away circumstances but not to take away the person; 3) to take away both person andRinzai zenjigoroku.

34       ShishōyōRinzai concerning a master’s guidance of a disciple: 1) reflect first, act later; 2) act(“four relations between reflection and action”) is another teaching of Master tenuousness. first, reflect later; 3) reflect and act simultaneously; 4) reflect and act beyond simul35 testing or guiding a disciple .Kyutai, lit., “nine belts,” are nine standards established by Master Fuzan Hōen for 36 Sanku.Unmon were used in the training of monks.In the Unmown sect, for example, three short phrases conceived by Master 37 Tōzan and modified by Master Sōzan. See also Chapter Sixty-six, Go-i, five relative positions of the absolute and the relative, expounded by MasterShunjū.

38    Ju-dōshinchi, expounded by Master Fun’yō Zenshō.

39    the Zhou dynasty. The Zhou dynasty was the predominant dynasty in China for 867 years from the reign B.C.E. Bunnō was Buō’s predecessor as head of of King Buō, which began in 1122 40 From the Daoist text Rikutō (Six Strategies).

41       Ritsu no gobu. It is said that, by the time of Master Upagupta (the fourth patriarch in the Vāsīputrīyas. See of the Mahīsāsakas; 4) the India), five separate versions of the Vinaya had been established in India, namely: 1)the Vinaya of the Dharmaguptakas; 2) the Vinaya of the Sarvāstivādins; 3) the VinayaJapanese-English Buddhist Dictionary: goburitsu.Prātimokṣa-sūtra of the Kāśyapīyas; and 5) the Vinaya of

42       Master Isan Reiyū (771–853), successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. The Tang emperor Sensō awarded him the posthumous title Zen Master Daien.

43       to either as Isan or as Daii.Daiizan, Great Isan Mountain. In Master Dōgen’s commentary Master Isan is referred

44       is his posthumous title. Master Hyakujō Ekai (749–814), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Zen Master Daichi

105

45       ciple Master Kyōzan Ejaku—taking Igyō. This represents the combination of the names of Master Isan Reiyū and his dis-“i” from Isan and “gyō” (“kyō”) from Kyōzan.

46       Master Isan.

47       Master Hyakujō.

48       Master Kyōzan Ejaku (807–883), successor of Master Isan Reiyū.

49       Mountain, to Master Nangaku Ejō, to Master Baso Dōitsu who lived in Kōzei district, These four names follow the lineage from Master Daikan Enō who lived on Sōkeito Master Hyakujō Ekai. Master Isan Reiyū, as a successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai, is a fourth-generation descendant of Master Daikan Enō.

50       bearing each end of a staff on their shoulders. Master Dōgen used this as a symbol In a monastery two monks might carry a heavy bucket of water, for example, by of oneness of two factors.

51       Master Kyōzan.

52       The patriarch Isan.

53       Eshō is his posthumous title. Master Rinzai Gigen (815?–867), successor of Master Ōbaku Kiun. Great Master 54 of Master Hyakujō Ekai.Master Ōbaku Kiun (d. between 855 and 859), like Master Isan Reiyū, is a successor

55    shōbōgenzō, Master Kōan Daigu (dates unknown), successor of Master Kisū Chijō. See pt. 1, no. 27.     Shinji-

56    Master Sanshō Enen (dates unknown), successor of Master Rinzai. 57 Gotōegen, chap. 9.

58    accumulation, cessation, and the Way. “universe, and it is also the third of the Four Noble Truths, Mekkyaku,shōmetsu, “arising and passing, “ which expresses the instantaneousness of the translated in the story as “destroy.” Metsuku, shū, metsu, disappears in the compound “suffering,

59    of an excellent student. The source, however, has not been traced. Under a bright window is a convenient location for reading sutras. These words might have been said to an attendant monk by a master who has recognized the potential

60    Kyōshin is his posthumous title. Master Unmown Bun’en (864–949), successor of Master Seppō Gison. Great Master 61 Master Bokushū Dōmyō (dates unknown), successor of Master Ōbaku Kiun. 62 To ancient Chinese, that represented a man of low social status.Hippu, lit., “single husband”; that is, a man who is the husband of only one woman.

Chapter Forty-nine

63    Master Hōgen Bun’eki (885–958), successor of Master Rakan Keichin. He received the title Zen Master Dai Hōgen by imperial decree during his lifetime.

64    title is Great Master Shinō of Jizō-in. Master Rakan Keichin (867–928), successor of Master Gensha Shibi. His posthumous

65    Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison.

66    the lineages of Masters Unmown and Hōgen stem from Master Seigen Gyōshi. MasterWhereas the lineages of Masters Isan and Rinzai stem from Master Nangaku Ejō,

Seigen Gyōshi.Dōgen’s own lineage, that through Master Tōzan Ryōkai, also stems from Master

67    Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869).

68    Master Ungan Donjō (782–841). 69 Master Yakusan Igen (745–828).

70    Master Sekitō Kisen (700–790), successor of Master Seigen Gyōshi.

71    Shusse, “to manifest oneself in the world,” means to become a temple master. 72 When Master Daikan Enō was about to die.

73    At the time of Master Daikan Enō’s death, Master Sekitō would have been in hisearly teens, so he would have been seated relatively far from the master.

74    is a play on the expression which was used to describe an excellent member of a Buddhist order. See Vol. I,Shō-jinsoku no doppo nari, literally, “he is a true mystical foot’s solitary step.” Thisjinsoku, “mystical foot” (from the Sanskrit ṛddipāda),

Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

75    Ungan Donjō, who was the master of Master Tōzan Ryōkai.Master Sekitō was the master of Master Yakusan Igen, who was the master of Master 76 and the second character is the Master Sōzan Honjaku (840–901). The first character of of Sōtō is the “tō” of Tōzan. Master Sōzan was a successor of“sō” of Sōzan cessors, Master Ungo Dōyō.Master Tōzan, but Master Dōgen’s lineage is through another of Master Tōzan’s suc-

77    Master Ungo Dōyō (835?–902).

78    Master Dōan Dōhi (dates unknown), successor of Master Ungo Dōyō.

79    Master Ōryū Enan (died in 1069, at the age of sixty-eight), successor of Master JimyōSoen. 80 Also known as Zen Master Kaigen Chisō.

81    in 1188. The first two volumes outline the so-called five Chinese sects and evaluate Ninden [no] ganmoku (Eyes of Human Beings and Gods), three volumes published the words of ancient masters categorized as belonging to those sects.

107

82    the original training place of the Tendai sect. A mountain in Zhekiang province where Master Tendai Chigi (538–597) established

83    1188. Here Master Dōgen uses the Chinese dating system only.

84    a person is true. Master Dōgen esteemed this ability very highly. See the end of Hito o shiru, “to know a person,” means the intuitive ability to know whether or notBukkyō.

Chapter Fifty-two,

85    From the Rikutō (Six Strategies).

86    Jūgyaku flattery, abusive speech, duplicitous speech, greed, anger, and wrong views) and stands for “five deadly sins,” (i.e., to kill one’s mother, to kill one’s father, to kill a jū-jūzai, “ten heavy sins” (i.e., killing, stealing, adultery, lying,goa Buddhist order).sacred person, to cause the Buddha’s body to shed blood, and to disrupt and divide gyakuzai,

[Chapter Fifty] Shohō-jissō

All Dharmas are Real Form

Translator’s Note: Sho expresses plurality; it means “all,” “various,” or “many.” means “dharmas,” both physical things and mental phenomena. Jitsu means “real.” means form. The Lotus Sutra teaches the most important and fundamental theory in Buddhism, that “all things and phenomena are real form.” Because Buddhism is a philosophy of realism, its viewpoint is different from idealism and materialism. The idealist sees only phenomena, which cannot be confirmed to be substantially real. Idealists thus doubt that phenomena are real form. The materialist looks at the detail, breaking things into parts, thus losing the meaning and value that is included in the whole. Buddhism says that reality is all things and phenomena existing here and now and reveres them as real substance: reality itself. This teaching is found in the Lotus Sutra, expressed with the words “all dharmas are real form.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the meaning of the Lotus Sutra’s teaching.

[201] The realization of the Buddhist patriarchs is perfectly realized real form. Real form is all dharmas. All dharmas are forms as they are,1 natures as they are, body as it is, the mind as it is, the world as it is, clouds and rain as they are, walking, standing, sitting, and lying down, as they are; sorrow and joy, movement and stillness, as they are; a staff and a whisk, as they are; a twirling flower and a smiling face, as they are; succession of the Dharma and affirmation, as they are; learning in practice and pursuing the truth, as they are; the constancy of pines and the integrity of bamboos, as they are.

[203] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Buddhas alone, together with buddhas, are directly able to perfectly realize that all dharmas are real form. What is called ‘all dharmas’ is forms as they are, natures as they are, body as it is, energy as it is, action as it is, causes as they are, conditions as they are, effects

as they are, results as they are, and the ultimate state of equilibrium of substance and detail, as it is.”2

The Tathāgata’s words “the ultimate state of equilibrium of substance and detail” are the self-expression of “the real form of all dharmas,” are the self-expression of an ācārya, and are the learning in practice of total equilibrium. Because learning in practice is in the state of total equilibrium, “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,” are “the real form of all dharmas”; and “the real form of all dharmas” is “buddhas alone, together with buddhas.” “Buddhas alone” are “real form,” and “buddhas together” are “all dharmas.” Hearing the words “all dharmas,” we should understand them neither as a description of the one nor as a description of the many. Hearing the words “real form,” we should learn them neither as a negation of voidness3 nor as a negation of nature.4 “The real” is “buddhas alone,” and “form” is “buddhas together.” “Directly being able” is “buddhas alone,” and “perfect realization” is “buddhas together.” “All dharmas” are “buddhas alone,” and “real form” is “buddhas together.” We call the state in which “all dharmas” are just “all dharmas” “buddhas alone” and we call the state in which “all dharmas” are just “real form” “buddhas together.” Thus, there are “forms as they are” and there are “natures as they are” in which “all dharmas” exist as “all dharmas”

themselves. And there are “forms as they are” and there are “natures as they are” in which “real form” is just “real form.” “Appearance in the world”5 as “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,” is the preaching, practice, and experience of “all dharmas are real form.” This preaching is the “perfect realization” of “momentarily being able.” Though it is “perfect realization,” at the same time, it may be a “momentary ability.”6 Because it is beyond beginning, middle, and end, it is “forms as they are” and “natures as they are,” and for this reason it is called “good in the beginning, middle, and end.”7 The meaning of “perfect realization” as “momentarily being able” is “real form as all dharmas.” “Real form as all dharmas” is “forms as they are.” “Forms being as they are” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize natures as they are.”8 “Natures being as they are” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize body as it is.” “Body being as it is” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize energy as it is.” “Energy being as it is” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize action as it is.” “Action being as it is” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize causes as they are.” “Causes being as they are” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize conditions as they are.” “Conditions being as they are” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize effects as they are.” “Effects being as they are” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize results as they are.” “Results being as they are” is “momentarily being able to perfectly realize the ultimate state of equilibrium of substance and detail as it is.” Because the expression “the ultimate state of equilibrium of substance and detail” is truly the realization of “reality as it is,”9 “effects,” that is, individual and real effects,10 are beyond the effects of “cause and effect.” For this reason, the effects of cause-and-effect are just “effects,” that is, individual and real effects. Because these “effects” and “forms, natures, body,” and “energy” directly obstruct each other, the “form, nature, body,” and “energy,” and so on of “all dharmas”—however countless and boundless they may be—are “real form.” And because these “effects” do not restrict “forms, natures, body,” and “energy,” the “form, nature, body,” and “energy” of “all dharmas” each are “real form.” When these “forms, natures, body, energy,” and so on, and “effects, results, causes, conditions,” and so on, are left to obstruct each other, there is expression of eighty- or ninety-percent realization. And when these “forms, natures, body, energy,” and so on, and “effects, results, causes, conditions,” and so on, are left not to restrict each other, there is expression of total realization. What has been called “forms as they are”11 is not a single form, and “form as it is” is not a uniform reality as it is: it is countless, boundless, inexpressible, 188c and unfathomable reality as it is. As a measure, we should not use a measure of hundreds and thousands. We should use as a measure the measure of “all dharmas,” and we should use as a measure the measure of “real form.” The reason is that “buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can12 perfectly realize that all dharmas are real form”; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are the real nature; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real body; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real energy; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real action; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real causes; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real conditions; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real effects; buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are real results; and buddhas alone, together with buddhas, can perfectly realize that all dharmas are the real ultimate state of equality of substance and detail.

[210] Because of the existence of truths like these, “the buddha lands of the ten directions”13 are only “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,” and there is no one, or even half a one, who is other than “buddhas alone, together with buddhas.” The relation between “alone” and “together” is, for example, “body” being provided with “body” and “forms” having experienced “forms.” Or it is like “natures,” through “body,” being maintained as “natures.”14 On this basis [the Buddha] says, “I, and buddhas in the ten directions, am directly able to know these things.”15 Thus, the very moment of “directly being able to perfectly realize” and the very moment of “directly being able to know this” are both individual instances of existence-time. If “I” were different from “buddhas in the ten directions,” how could “I” realize the expression “and buddhas in all directions”? Because at this concrete place there are no “ten directions,” “the ten directions” are this concrete place. Therefore, “real form” meeting “all dharmas” means spring getting into flowers, a person meeting spring, the moon illuminating the moon, and human beings meeting themselves. Again, a person looking into water is this same truth of mutual realization.16 For this reason, we see the learning in practice of “real form” by “real form” as the Dharma succession of

189a Buddhist patriarchs by Buddhist patriarchs. It is the affirmation of “all dharmas” by “all dharmas.” “Buddhas alone” transmit the Dharma for the benefit of “buddhas alone.” “Buddhas together” receive the Dharma for the benefit of “buddhas together.” On this basis living-and-dying and coming-and going exist. On this basis the establishment of the mind, training, bodhi, and nirvana exist. Utilizing the establishment of the mind, training, bodhi, and nirvana, we investigate in practice and clinch in action that “living-and dying and coming-and-going are the real human body”; and as we do so, we hold firm and we let go. With this as their lifeblood, flowers open and fruits are borne. With this as their bones and marrow, Mahākāśyapa and Ānanda exist. “The forms as they are” of wind, rain, water, and fire are “perfect realization” itself. “The natures as they are” of the blue, the yellow, the red, and the white are “perfect realization” itself. Relying upon this concrete “body-energy,” we turn the common into the sacred. Relying upon these concrete “effects-and-results,” we transcend buddha and go beyond patriarchs. Relying upon these concrete causes-and-conditions, soil is grasped and made into gold. Relying upon these concrete effects-and-results, the Dharma is transmitted and the robe is given.

[213] The Tathāgata speaks of “preaching for others the seal of real form.”17 Let me interpret this: he practices for others the seal of real form; he hears for others the seal of real nature; and he experiences for others the seal of real body. We should investigate [his words] like this, and we should perfectly realize them like this. The state they indicate is, for example, like a pearl spinning around a bowl and like the bowl spinning around the pearl.18 [214] Buddha Sun Moon Light19 says: The truth that all dharmas are real form Has been preached for you all.20

Learning this expression in practice, we should realize that the Buddhist patriarchs have inevitably seen preaching the truth of real form as “the one great matter.”21 Buddhist patriarchs proclaim the truth of real form in each of the eighteen spheres.22 Before their body-mind, after their body-mind, and at the very moment of their body-mind, they preach real form, nature, body, energy, and so on. Those who do not perfectly realize real form, who do not preach real form, who do not understand real form, and who do not transcend understanding of real form, are not Buddhist patriarchs. They are bands of demons, and animals.

[215] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “The anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi of all bodhisattvas totally belongs to this sutra. This sutra opens the gate of expedient methods and reveals true real form.”23

              “All bodhisattvas” means all buddhas. Buddhas and bodhisattvas are 189b

not different species; they are without differences in maturity and without differences in excellence. This bodhisattva and that bodhisattva are not two people,24 they are beyond self and others, and they are not personages of the past, present, and future; rather, becoming buddha is their Dharma-behavior of “practicing the bodhisattva way.”25 They realize buddha in their first establishment of the mind, and they realize buddha in the state of fine reflection.26 There are bodhisattvas who have become buddha countless hundred thousand myriad koṭis of times. Those who say that after becoming buddha [bodhisattvas] cease practice and have nothing further to do are common people who have never known the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs. Those who have been called “all bodhisattvas” are the original ancestors of all buddhas, and all buddhas are the original masters of all bodhisattvas. This supreme bodhi of the buddhas—whether they practice and experience it in the past or practice and experience it in the present or practice and experience it in the future, whether they practice and experience it in the moment before the body or practice and experience it in the moment after the mind—is in every case, in the beginning, middle, and end, “this sutra.” The subject of “belonging” and the object of “belonging” are both “this sutra.” At this very moment, “this sutra” really experiences “all bodhisattvas.” The sutra is not sentient, the sutra is not insentient, the sutra is not the product of doing and the sutra is not the product of nodding. Even so, when it experiences bodhi, experiences people, experiences real form, and experiences “this sutra,” it “opens the gate of expedient methods.” “The gate of expedient methods” is the supreme virtue of the Buddha’s ultimate state, it is “the Dharma abiding in the Dharma’s place,” and it is “the form of the world abiding in constancy.”27 The gate of expedient methods is not a temporary artifice; it is the learning in practice of the whole universe in ten directions, and it is learning in practice that exploits the real form of all dharmas. Although this gate of expedient methods is manifesting itself such that it covers the whole universe in ten directions with the universe in ten directions, those other than “all bodhisattvas” are not in its orbit.

[219] Seppō28 says, “The whole earth is the gate of liberation, but people are not willing to enter even if they are dragged.”29 So remember, even though the whole earth and the whole world is a gate, it is not left and entered easily,

189c and the individuals who get out of it and get into it are not many. When people are dragged they do not get in and do not get out, and when they are not dragged they do not get in and do not get out. The progressive blunder and the passive falter. Going further, what can we say? If we take hold of the person and force it to leave or to enter the gate, the gate becomes more and more distant. If we take hold of the gate30 and get it to enter the person, there are chances for departure and entry. “Opening the gate of expedient methods” means “revealing true real form.” “The revealing of true real form”

covers the whole of time, and it is separated into moments of beginning, middle, and end. In “opening the gate of expedient methods,” the principle of momentary “opening” opens the gate of expedient methods through the whole universe in ten directions. When, at this very moment, we glimpse the whole universe in ten directions, the situation is one that we have never experienced before: by grasping the whole universe in ten directions once and twice as a concept and a third and fourth time as a concrete thing, we cause it to open the gate of expedient methods. It may appear to follow from this that [the universe in ten directions] is completely the same as “the opening of the gate of expedient methods,” but it seems to me that limitlessly abundant universes in ten directions have borrowed a small fraction of “the opening of the gate of expedient methods” to use as their real features. Such elegance is entirely by virtue of “belonging to the sutra.” “To reveal true real form” means to overhear the saying that all dharmas are real form spoken through the whole universe, and to realize the truth through the whole universe. It means making the truth that “real form is all dharmas” evident to the whole of humanity and making it manifest through the whole of the Dharma. In sum, the supreme truth of bodhi of the forty31 buddhas and forty patriarchs totally belongs to “this sutra.” It belongs to “this sutra” and “this sutra” belongs to it. The state in which a round cushion and a zazen board32 are the supreme truth of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi totally belongs to “this sutra.” The picking up of a flower and a face breaking into a smile, and prostrations and attainment of the marrow, both “totally belong to this sutra.” They are the belongings of “this sutra.” They “open the gate of expedient methods and reveal true real form.”

[222] Nevertheless, recent unreliable people in the great kingdom of Song, not knowing a place to settle down and not seeing the place of treasure, 190a treat the words “real form” as if they were empty elaboration, and so they go on to study the sayings of Laozi33 and Zhuangzi,34 and they say that these are the same as the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs. Furthermore, they say that the three teachings35 may be of one conclusion. Or they say that the three teachings are like the three legs of a tripod, which would overturn if even one were missing. There is nothing to use as an example of the enormity of their foolishness. We should not concede that people in whom such words are present have ever listened to the Buddha-Dharma. Why? Because the

origin of the Buddha-Dharma is India in the west. For eighty years in the world and for fifty years of preaching the Dharma, [the Buddha] did his utmost to educate human beings and gods; “he transformed all living beings and caused them all to enter the Buddha’s truth.”36 Thereafter the authentic transmission was received by the twenty-eight patriarchs. We esteem this as the utmost, as the subtle and fine, and as the supremely venerable. All kinds of non-Buddhists and celestial demons were completely defeated. Unknown numbers of human beings and gods realized buddha and became patriarchs. But they never said that, because they had not investigated Confucianism and Daoism in China, the Buddha’s truth was insufficient for them. If the three teachings are inevitably of one conclusion, then when the Buddha Dharma manifested itself Confucianism and Daoism should have manifested themselves in India at the same time. But the Buddha’s Dharma is that “In the heavens and under the heavens, I alone am the Honored One.”37 We should think back to the events of that time; we should not make mistakes through forgetfulness. Talk of the three teachings reaching one conclusion is worth less than the babbling of little children. It is [talk] of people who are out to destroy the Buddha-Dharma. People like this are very numerous. Some have manifested the purport of being the guiding teachers of human beings and gods, and some have become the masters of emperors and kings. It is the time of the degeneration of the Buddha-Dharma in great Song [China]. 190b My late master, the eternal buddha, strongly cautioned against this matter. Such people are the embryos of the two vehicles and non-Buddhists. Their kind has already passed two or three hundred years without even knowing that “real form” might exist. They speak only of learning the right Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs in order to depart from the cycle of life and death. Many of them do not even know what it is to learn in practice the right Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs; they believe that just to live in a temple is to emulate the ancients. It is pitiful that the truth of the ancestral patriarchs has died out. Venerable patriarchs in whom the truth is present greatly regret it. We should not listen to the sayings spouted by people like those mentioned earlier; we should feel sorry for them. Zen Master Engo38 says, “Living-and dying, coming-and-going, is the real human body.” Picking up this expression, we should know ourselves and should consider the Buddha-Dharma. Chōsha39 says, “The whole universe in the ten directions is the real human body. The

whole universe in the ten directions is inside the brightness of the self.” Old veterans in all quarters of the great kingdom of Song today generally do not even know that an expression like this is a truth to be learned; how much less could they [actually] learn it? If we quoted it to them, they would only go red in the face and be without words.

[227]  My late master, the eternal buddha, says, “Old veterans in all directions today have no illumination of the past and no illumination of the present; they have never possessed the truths of the Buddha-Dharma.40 The whole universe in ten directions and suchlike are showing themselves like this! How can they be known? In other orders they seem never to have listened.” After hearing this I questioned old veterans in all directions and, in truth, few had listened. It is pitiful that they desecrate positions in which they have been installed without reason.

[228]  Zen Master Ōan Donge41 on one occasion addresses the venerable monk Tokki, “If you want to understand easily, just keep facing the state of arising mind and moving images through the twelve hours.42 When, just following this movement of images, you suddenly gain insight here and now, the ungraspable is like vast space. At the same time it is without spatial form and demarcation. Outside and inside are oneness. Intelligence and objects 190c both disappear. Profundity and lucidity both vanish. The three times are in equilibrium. Those who arrive at this state43 are called ‘people at ease in the truth who are through with study and free of doing.’”44

These are words spoken by Old Man Ōan in the state of using all his energy to express the truth. But it seems that he is only chasing shadows and never knows rest. When we are not in the state of “oneness of outside and inside,” can there be no Buddha-Dharma? What is this outside and inside? Furthermore, that “space has form and demarcation” is an expression of Buddhist patriarchs. What does he see as “space”? It may be supposed that Ōan has never known space, has never seen space, has never grasped space, and has never struck space. He speaks of “arising mind and moving images,” but there is a truth that the mind never moves: how could there be “arising mind” through the twelve hours? “Mind” cannot come into the reality of the twelve hours,45 and “twelve hours” do not enter the reality of the mind of the [concrete] twelve.46 How much less could there be “arising mind”? And what are “moving images”? Do images move and not move, or are they beyond movement and non-movement? What is movement like? Again, what is non-movement like? What does he call “images”? Do images exist in the reality of the twelve hours? Do the twelve hours exist inside the image of reality?47 Is it possible for there to be a time beyond the two factors? He says that “if we just keep facing . . . through the twelve hours, it will be easy to understand,” but what is the matter to be understood easily? Does “easy understanding” refer to the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs? If so, [he should know that] the Buddha’s truth is beyond easy understanding and difficult understanding. That is why Nangaku and Kōzei long pursued the truth following their masters. [Ōan] speaks of “suddenly gaining insight into the ungraspable,” but he has never seen the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs even in a dream. How can one of such ability be up to “wanting to understand easily”? Clearly, he has not mastered the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs.

191a If the Buddha-Dharma were like that, how could it have reached today? Even Ōan is like this. If we search among the old veterans of mountain-temples of the present for a person like Ōan, even in consecutive kalpas we will not meet one. Even if we searched until our eyes were growing dim, we might not find another old veteran to equal Ōan. Most people of recent times affirm Ōan, but it is hard for me to affirm that the Buddha-Dharma reached him. I would say only that he is [worth] a junior’s seat in the monastery and that he is of average standard. Why? Because Ōan has the mental agility to be able to know a person. People today do not have the ability to know a person, because they do not know themselves. Even though Ōan has not arrived, he has experience of learning the truth. The old veterans of today have no experience of learning the truth. Ōan hears good words; it is just that they do not enter his ears and he does not see them with his ears: [further,] they do not enter his eyes and he does not hear them with his eyes.48Although Ōan used to be like this, now, through his own efforts, he may be in the state of realization. Old veterans in the mountain temples of great Song [China] today do not glimpse the inside or the outside of Ōan; their sounds and features are completely foreign to his state. Such people cannot even recognize whether the “real form” expressed by Buddhist patriarchs is the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs or is not the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs. For this reason, the old veterans and unreliable people of the last two or three hundred years have neither seen nor spoken of “real form” at all.

[234] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, says one night during

informal preaching in the abbot’s quarters:

There are calves49 on Tendō Mountain tonight,

And golden-faced Gautama is manifesting real form.

If we wanted to buy it, how could we afford the impossible price? The cry of a cuckoo above50 a solitary cloud.

Being like this, those who are accomplished in the Buddhism of venerable patriarchs speak of “real form.” Those who do not know the Buddha-Dharma, and in whom there is no learning in practice of the Buddha’s truth, do not 191b speak of “real form.” The above words [come about] as follows: It is approaching the fourth watch51 of a night in the third lunar month in the spring of the second year of the great Song era of Hōgyō,52 when three beats of the drum sound from above.53 Taking the prostration cloth, and putting on the kaṣaya, I leave the cloud hall through the front entrance, and [find that] the sign for entry into the [master’s] room has been hung up. First I follow other monks to the vicinity of the Dharma hall. Via the west wall of the Dharma hall, I climb the west stairs of Jakkōdō, the Hall of Serene Light.54 I pass before the west wall of the Hall of Serene Light and climb the west stairs of Daikōmyōzō, the Vault of Great Brightness.55 The Vault of Great Brightness is the abbot’s quarters. Via the southern end of a screen along the west side, I reach the incense stand, and burn incense and do prostrations. I am expecting that lines will have formed here for entry into the [master’s] room, but I do not see even one monk. The myōkōdai, the elevated stage,56 has been screened off by bamboo blinds. The Dharma sound of the abbot, the Great Master, is faintly audible. Then Supervising Monk Sokon57 from Saisen58 arrives and he also burns incense and does prostrations. After that, peering stealthily toward the elevated stage, [we see that] monks are standing in a packed audience without regard to east or west. The informal preaching is now in progress, so we stealthily enter behind the other monks and, standing up, we listen. The story of the life in the mountains of Zen Master Hōjō of Daibai59 is quoted. At the part about his wearing clothes made from lotus leaves and eating pine nuts,60 many of the monks shed tears. The story of Śākyamuni Buddha’s retreat on Vulture Peak is quoted in detail. Many in the audience shed tears. “The retreat on Tendōzan is approaching. Now it is spring, and

it is neither cold nor hot. It is a lovely time to sit in zazen. Brothers, how could we not sit in zazen?” After such informal preaching, there is the poem. On finishing the poem, [the master] strikes the right arm of his zazen chair once with his right hand and says, “You may enter.”61 For the interview, he says, “A

191c cuckoo cries and bamboos on the mountain split.” The words of the interview are [only] like this; there is no other talk. The monks present, though many, say nothing; they are just awed. This method of entering the [master’s] room was never practiced in other districts. Only my late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, practiced this method. During the informal preaching the [master’s] chair was surrounded by screens around which the monks stood in a crowd. All the monks remained standing while the interviews continued from whichever monk was ready to enter, and people who had completed their interview left through the doors of the abbot’s quarters in the usual manner. The people who remained, still standing as before, could witness everything—the dignified behavior of stepping forward and stopping by the person entering for the interview, together with the behavior of the venerable abbot and his talk in the interview. This method has never been present in other districts, and it may be a method impossible for other old veterans to realize: During entry into the room of other masters, people wanted to enter the room before other people. In the case of this entry into the [master’s] room, people want to enter the room after other people. We should not forget [that there are such] differences in people’s minds and ways. From that time until this first year of the Japanese era of Kangen,62 in an atmosphere of brightness, all of eighteen years have swiftly passed. I have no idea how many mountains and rivers there are between Tendō Mountain and this mountain here, but the scene expressed as “real form” in those beautiful expressions and wonderful words has remained engraved on my body, mind, bones, and marrow. I imagine that the informal preaching and the entry into the [master’s] room that took place that night have been unforgettable for most of the monks present. On that night a crescent moon came peeping out from behind the high temple buildings, and even though the cuckoos were crying frequently, the night was silent.

[240] While Great Master Shūitsu63 of Gensha-in Temple is preaching informally,64 he hears the chirping of swallow chicks, and says, “[This is]

192a profound preaching of real form, and skillful expounding of the pivot of the Dharma.” He gets down from his seat.

Afterward a monk requests instruction, saying “I do not understand.” The master says, “Go away! No one believes you.”65

As regards the meaning of “profoundly preaching real form,” we might interpret Gensha’s words as saying that only the swallow chicks are profoundly preaching real form. But that is not so. During the informal preaching, the chirps of swallow chicks are heard. It is not that the swallow chicks profoundly preach real form, it is not that Gensha profoundly preaches real form, and it is not a cross between the two factors: rather, the ineffable state just in the moment is “profound preaching of real form.” We should take a short while to investigate this episode. Informal preaching is in progress. The chirping of swallow chicks is heard. The words “profoundly preaching real form, and skillfully expounding the pivot of the Dharma” are spoken. There is the act of getting down from the seat. Afterward there is the monk’s request for instruction: “I do not understand.” And there is the master’s statement “Go away! No one believes you.” “I do not understand” need not always be a request for instruction on real form, but it is the very lifeblood of the Buddhist patriarchs and the bones and marrow of the right Dharma-eye treasury. Remember, even if this monk, in requesting instruction, says “I have understood it” or says “I can expound it,” in every case Gensha should still say to him “Go away! No one believes you.” The reason he says “Go away! No one believes you” is not that [the monk] has understood but requests instruction by pretending not to understand. Truly, though it may be any third son of Zhang or fourth son of Li other than this monk, and though all [other] dharmas are [also] real form, at the time and place that someone cuts directly through to the lifeblood of the Buddhist patriarchs, learning in practice of real form is realized like this.66 In Seigen’s lineage this state has been realized.67 Remember, real form is the right lifeblood that has been transmitted and received from rightful successor to rightful successor; all dharmas are the perfectly realized state of buddhas alone, together with buddhas; and the state of buddhas alone, together with buddhas, is the loveliness of form as it is.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shohō-jissō

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippōji in Esshū,68                                     Japan, on a day in the ninth lunar month in the                                     first year of Kangen.69

 

Notes

1            Nyoze-sō means “form as it is” or “forms as they are.” 2 Lotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.68.

3             Kyo, “void,” is opposed to the jitsu, “real,” of jissō, “real form.” 4 Shō, “nature,” is opposed to the sō, “form,” of jissō, “real form.” 5 Shutsugen-o-se. See, for example, LS 1.88–90.

6         Nainō,the Lotus Sutra “momentary ability,” is translated in the quotation as “are directly able.” In(LSW), for example, the character is ignored in translation: “Only athe function of nai, sunawa[chi] is emphatic; thus in The Threefold ingle”) or direct juxtaposition in time (“whereupon”). By extension, in Master Dōgen’s time, buddha together with a buddha can fathom the reality of all existence.” At the same Lotus Sutranai, sunawa[chi] expresses direct juxtaposition in a logical sequence (“accord buddhas have attained perfection, their ability is instantaneous or momentary. usage, it expresses instantaneousness. The point of this sentence is that, even though

7         Sho-chū-ko zen. See LS 1.40.

8         Reality itself, and the subject’s ability to realize reality, cannot be separated.

9         Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Nyoze, used here as a noun: “reality as it is.” This usage also occurs, for example, in Hokke-ten-hokke, note 85. 10 Kaka no ka, literally, “effects that are effect-effect.” The point is to distinguish between effects as reality and effects as a concept.

11    Nyoze-sō. See note 1.

12    Nainō. See note 6.

13    Juppō-butsudō. See LS 1.106.

14 not an abstract essence but a natural state, or natural function, which includes both Shō means “nature,” or “essence.” In Master Dōgen’s philosophy, however, shō means

Twenty-two (Vol. II), essential character and its physical manifestation in action. See, for example, Chapter Busshō.

15    Ga-gyū-juppō-butsu, nai-nō-chi-ze-ji. See LS 1.70.

16    The person looks into the water and the water reflects the person.

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17    world,/Am worshipped by countless multitudes/For whom I preach the seal of real Lotus Sutra, Hōben: “I, body adorned with signs,/And brightness illuminating the jisso-in, from the Sanskrit dharmaform.” (LS 1.108.) “The seal of real form” is svabhāva-mudrā,Sanskrit Terms. A seal suggests the concrete as opposed to the abstract. which literally means “the seal of reality itself.” See Glossary of

18    Alludes to the words of Master Engo Kokugon quoted in Chapter Sixty-six, Shunjū. very vigorous situation in which subject and object are in mutual relation.A pearl spinning around a bowl and the bowl spinning around the pearl suggests a

19    Terms. Jitsugetsutōmyōbutsu, from the Sanskrit Candrasūryapradīpa. See Glossary of Sanskrit

20    dharma preached this Flower of Dharma/And caused the assembly to rejoice,/Then he, on that very day,/Proclaimed to the gathering of gods and people:/’The truth that all Lotus Sutra, Jos are real form/Has been preached for you all. . . .’” (LS 1.58)(“Introductory”) chapter: “When the Buddha [Sun Moon Light] had

21    Ichidaiji. See LS 1.88–90.

22    The six sense organs, the six objects of the sense organs, and the six sense functions. 23 Terms. Lotus Sutra, Hōsshi methods” is hōben-mon, (“A Teacher of the Dharma”). See LS 2.156. “The gate of expedient from the Sanskrit dvāra-bhūtāni. See Glossary of Sanskrit

24    They are in the same state.

25    Gyō-bosatsudō. See, for example, LS 3.20.

26    Myōkaku-chi, the ultimate state of a bodhisattva.

27    of the world is constantly abiding./Having recognized this in a place of the truth,/Guid-Lotus Sutra, Hōben: “The Dharma abides in its place in the Dharma,/And the form ing teachers teach it by expedient means.” (LS 1.120.)

28    Master Seppō Gison (822–907), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan.

29    Rentōeyō, chap. 21.

30    Mon o ko shi te, “to take hold of the gate,” means to focus on practice itself.

31    third patriarch, Master Daikan Enō. Forty suggests the seven ancient buddhas plus the historical patriarchs to the thirty-

32    long time and gets tired. The board is held close to the body, with the chin resting on Zenpan. This is a board used as a support in zazen when a practitioner is sitting for a the wall, and uses the hole to make a reference point on the floor for the eyes.temples the practitioner lays the board down on the zazen platform, at right angles to and its thickness is three or four top of the board, and the bottom of the board resting in the hands. Traditionally itslength is one shaku and seven or eight bu (1.2sun cm). It has a hole cut out at the top. In some(about 55 cm), its width is two sun (6 cm),

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33    Laozi (born ca. 604 name, in the womb and emerged with gray hair.rōshi, literally means “aged child”; legend says that he spent eighty-one yearsB.C.E., during the Zhou dynasty), the founder of Daoism. His 34 Zhuangzi. Over a hundred thousand words of Daoist philosophy were attributed tohim.

35    Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism.

36    Alludes, for example, to they desire to cause living beings to enter the truth that is the wisdom of the Buddha.” LS 1.88–90)        Lotus Sutra, Hōben: “[Buddhas] appear in the world because

(

37    Legend says that when the Buddha was born he took seven steps in each of the four other, he said these words. Directions and, pointing to the sky with one hand and pointing to the ground with the

38    Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Master Goso Hōen.

39    Master Chōsha Keishin (?–868), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. See Chapter Sixty, Juppō.

40    in action, and the principle that just sitting is beyond intellectual understanding. The truths of the Buddha-Dharma are, for example, the principle of practicing for the sake of practice itself, the law of cause-and-effect, the oneness of subject and object

41    Master Ōan Donge (d. 1163), successor of Master Kokyū Shōryū.

42    That is, twenty-four hours, all day long.

43    Denchi. See Chapter Forty-eight, Sesshin-sesshō, note 31.

44    try to get rid of delusion and does not want to get reality.” Zetsugaku mui“ A person at ease in the truth, who is through with study and free of doing, does not( [no] kandō-nin. In the poem Shōdōka, Master Yōka Genkaku says:Ōandongezenjigoroku

Record of the Words of Zen Master Ōan Donge), chap. 7.

45    Jūni-ji-chū.Dōgen uses the character to mean “the reality of.” This usage of ShōbōgenzōIn Master Ōan’s words . See, for example, Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II), chu means “during” or “through,” but here MasterChef occurs frequently Muchū-setsumu. in

46    Jūni-shin-chū. Here a definite number (twelve) represents the concrete and definite as opposed to the general.

47    Nenri. Ri Forty-eight, means “inside,” “backside,” or “in the concrete place of.” See also Chapter Sesshin-sesshō, notes 24 and 38. Nen has two meanings: 1) abstract Fukanzazengi, Shinpitsubon,” and “If an image arises, just be conscious. If you are conscious of it, it will Master Dōgen writes, “Cease intellectual consideration of images, thoughts, reflec-image, idea, thought, wish, etc. For example, in the the vanish at once.” 2) The image, or the mental face of, reality itself. For example, inFukanzazengi, Shinpitsubon, Master Dōgen writes shōnen-genzen, “the right

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“Dharma, reality,” interchangeably, in order to describe the same experience in zazen.manifesting itself before us.” In this way, Master Dōgen uses Fukanzazengi, Rufubon,image manifesting itself before us.” Further, in the corresponding section of the later he writes of shōbō-ji-genzen, “the right Dharma natural Lynen, “image,” and hō,

48    Seeing with the ears and hearing with the eyes suggests intuitive perception.

49    Calves symbolize Buddhist practitioners in a peaceful state.

50    Ue, of the last line—the poem leaves the reader thinking upward and onward. “above,” receives emphasis in the original Chinese by being the last character 51 In China and Japan, the night was divided into five watches of two hours each. 52 1226.

53    Traditional Temple Layout. The abbot’s quarters were located high up the mountain; see Volume I, Appendix V,

54    hall for patriarchs’ images (3) or the donors’ hall (9) in the ground plan shown in Vol-Jakkōdō is a proper name. The location of this hall would correspond to that of theme I, Appendix V, Traditional Temple Layout.

55    Daikōmyōzō is also a proper name.

56    by bamboo blinds into the elevated stage and an area for waiting and burning incense. Myōkōdai is literally “fine and high stage.” The abbot’s quarters were likely divided

57    karma-dāna. The inō, supervisor of monks in the zazen hall, or rector; represents the Sanskrit The job of the inō centers on maintaining discipline in the zazen hall.

58    A region of Sichuan province in southwest China.

59    quotes the story in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Master Daibai Hōjō (752–839), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Master DōgenGyōji, paragraph 141.

60    Master Daibai’s poem says: “I shall never outwear the lotus leaves in the pond./The people in the world./I shall move my shack deeper into seclusion.” Ibid. flowers of a few pines are more than a meal./Now my abode has been discovered by

61    Nyushitsu ,temple. In this case, since the monks are already on the elevated stage with Master “to enter the room,” means to have an interview with the master of a chair was likely surrounded by screens forming three sides of a square.Tendō, it means to come forward one by one before the master’s chair. The master’s

62    1243.

63    Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison.

64    in the master’s room. San is short for shōsan, which means unscheduled informal preaching, usually done 65 Rentōeyō, chap. 23; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 42.

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66    In the state of not understanding.

67    Dōgen also belongs to Master Seigen’s lineage. Master Gensha is a seventh-generation descendant of Master Seigen Gyōshi. Master

68    Corresponds to modern-day Fukui prefecture.

69    1243.

 

[Chapter Fifty-one]

                                                   Mitsugo                                             

Secret Talk

Translator’s Note: Mitsu means “secret,” or “mystical,” in the sense of not apparent to the senses or the intellect, but experienced directly or immediately—as if two things are touching. Go means “words” or “talk.” So mitsu- go means “secret talk,” that is, something communicated directly without sound. In Buddhism it is said that there is secret talk that can be recognized and understood even though it has no sound. So “secret talk” suggests the existence of intuitive perception. It is a fact that we can sometimes discover meaning, or secrets, without receiving any external stimuli, but we need not see the fact as particularly mystical. An analogy that helps to understand such facts is the sympathetic resonance of tuning forks.

[3]       When the great truth, “that which buddhas guard and desire,”1 is realized as the real universe, the state [expressed] “You are like this, I am like this,” and “each must guard it well,”2 is experienced exactly in the present.

[4]       Great Master Kōkaku3 of Ungozan, the story goes, is served offerings by a government official, who asks, “The World-honored One has secret talk;4 for Mahākāśyapa nothing is concealed. What is the World-honored

One’s secret talk?”

The great master calls out, “Minister!” The man responds.

The great master says, “Do you understand or not?” The official says, “I do not understand.”

The great master says, “If you do not understand, it is the World-honored One’s secret talk. If you understand, it is Mahākāśyapa’s state of nothing being concealed.”

[5]       The great master, manifesting himself as the legitimate descendant, after five generations, of Seigen,5 is a master of gods and human beings and

a great good counselor through the whole universe in the ten directions. He transforms the sentient and transforms the insentient. As the forty-sixth buddha in the legitimate succession of buddhas, he preaches the Dharma for Buddhist patriarchs.6At his hermitage on Sanpō Mountain, he was sent offerings from the kitchens of gods. But after receiving the transmission of the Dharma and attaining the truth, he transcended the state which is sent [heavenly] offerings.7 The expression quoted now that “The World-honored One has secret talk; for Mahākāśyapa nothing is concealed,” is the legacy of forty-six buddhas. At the same time, as the original features of the forty-six buddhas, “it is not got from others,” “it does not come from outside,” “it is not inherent,” and “it has never been something new.”8 With regard to the realization of this matter of secret talk, not only the World-honored Śākyamuni has secret talk: all the Buddhist patriarchs have secret talk. A World-honored One always has secret talk. And one who has secret talk inevitably has Mahākāśyapa’s state of nothing being concealed. We should learn in practice and should not forget the truth that if there are a hundred thousand World-honored Ones there are a hundred thousand Mahākāśyapas. “Learning in practice” means

192c not intending to understand at once but striving painstakingly hundreds of times, or thousands of times, as if working to cut a hard object. We should not think that when a person has something to relate we will be able to understand at once. It may be that now, having already become the World-honored One, [the master of] Ungozan is equipped with secret talk and possesses the state of Mahākāśyapa in which nothing is concealed. Do not learn that calling “Minister!” and the official’s response, are secret talk itself.9

[7] The great master, in the story, says to the minister, “If you do not understand, it is the World-honored One’s secret talk. If you understand, it is Mahayana’s state of nothing being concealed.” We should resolve unfailingly to pursue the truth of this expression for many kalpas. He is saying “When you are in the state beyond understanding, that is the World honored One’s secret talk”; he does not call being momentarily dumbfounded “not understanding,” and he does not call ignorance “not understanding.” The principle of the words “If you do not understand. . .” is to sanction a course of quietly learning in practice. We should consider this through effort in pursuit of the truth.10 Further, when he says “If you understand. . .” he is not discussing a state of now having understood already.11 In learning the

Chapter Fifty-one

Buddha-Dharma in practice, there are many processes. Among them there are the pivotal matters of understanding the Buddha-Dharma and of not understanding the Buddha-Dharma. Those who, not having met a true teacher, do not even know that [these matters] exist, have misunderstood that secret talk exists at random, in conjunction with eyes and ears that are cut off from sight and hearing.12 [Master Ungo] is not saying that you understanding is a condition for Mahākāśyapa’s state of nothing being concealed: there are also cases of nothing being concealed in non-understanding. Do not learn that anyone can observe nothing being concealed: the state here and now is already nothing being concealed—[or] it may be that there is no place where nothing is concealed.13 Just at the moment of the present we should investigate this by experiment. Thus, we have not been learning that states which are unknown to us are secret talk. The very moment of not understanding the Buddha Dharma is one concrete instance of secret talk. It is, in every case, the World-

honored One’s existence,14 and the existent World-honored One.15                                              

[9] Nevertheless, people who do not hear the instruction of a true teacher, although they sit upon the lion seat,16 have never seen this truth even in a dream. They speak without reason as follows:

“The World-honored One has secret talk” describes his picking up a flower and winking an eye before the assembly of millions on Vulture Peak. That is because verbal Buddhist preaching is shallow and seemingly concerned with name and form, but picking up a flower and winking an eye, being non-verbal preaching, are instances of establishing the teaching with secret talk. The assembly of millions cannot comprehend [the non-verbal preaching]. Therefore, for the assembly of millions, it is secret talk.17 “Mahākāśyapa’s state of nothing being concealed” describes Mahākāśyapa breaking into a smile as if he knew beforehand that the World-honored One would pick up a flower and wink an eye. Therefore it is said that, to Mahākāśyapa, nothing is concealed. This is the true essence of the teaching, which has been transmitted and received one-to-one.

People who believe this when they hear it are as [numerous as] rice plants, flax plants, bamboos, and reeds; they make up the monasteries of the nine states.18 It is pitiful. That the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs has been

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ruined originally stems from this cause. A man of clear eyes should surely be able to defeat [these opinions] one by one. If the World-honored One’s speech is seen as shallow, picking up a flower and winking an eye must also be shallow. If people consider the speech of the World-honored One to be [mere expression of] name and form, they are not students of the Buddha Dharma. They know that speech is names and forms, but they have not yet realized that the World-honored One is free of name and form: they have yet to shed the sentiments of the common person. All that is permeated by the body-mind of a Buddhist patriarch is liberation, is the preaching of Dharma, and is verbal preaching; and it turns the Dharma wheel. Those who gain benefit from witnessing it are many. People of devotional practice19 and of Dharma practice20 are covered by its influence at places where there are Buddhist patriarchs and they share in its influence at places where there are no Buddhist patriarchs. How could the assembly of millions fail to witness

193b picking up a flower and winking an eye as picking up a flower and winking an eye? [The assembly of millions] may be on the same level as Mahākāśyapa and they may be living the same life as the World-honored One. They may be experiencing the same state and establishing the mind at the same time as the assembly of millions. They are in the same state of truth and in the same national land. They are meeting Buddha and hearing the Dharma with knowing wisdom and they are meeting Buddha and hearing the Dharma with unknowing wisdom. Having initially met one buddha, they will go on to meet buddhas as numerous as sands of the Ganges. There may be multitudes [numbering] millions of koṭis in attendance at every single Buddhist gathering. Revelations by each of the buddhas of the picking up of a flower and the winking of an eye may all be witnessed taking place in the same moment. Eyes are not dim. Ears are sharp. We have mental eyes and physical eyes. We have mental ears and physical ears. How do those others understand Mahākāśyapa’s breaking into a smile? Let them try to say something! If it is as they say, this [smile] should also be called “secret talk.” But they call it “nothing being concealed.” This is doubly foolish.21 Later the World honored One says, “I have the right Dharma-eye treasury, and the fine mind of nirvana. I transmit them to Mahākāśyapa.” Is such an expression speech or is it non-verbal communication? If the World-honored One hated speech but loved picking up flowers, he would have picked up a flower at the later

Chapter Fifty-one

time too. [And even in that case,] how could Mahākāśyapa fail to understand, and how could the assembly fail to hear? The tales told by the people described above are not to be relied upon.

[14] In sum, the World-honored One has secret talk, secret action, and secret experience. Stupid people, however, think that “secret” means other people do not know but the subject knows, and that there are initiated people and uninitiated people. Learning in practice of the Buddha’s truth has never been present in those who have thought and said so in India in the west and in the Eastern Lands, from the ancient past till the present. In such a case, both in the secular world and beyond the secular world22 there would be much secrecy among the uneducated and little secrecy among the learned. 193c For people of wide learning can nothing be secret? Still more for those equipped with supernatural eyes, supernatural ears, Dharma-eyes, Dharmaears, the Buddha’s eyes, the Buddha’s ears, and so on, we would have to say that there could be no secret talk and no secret will at all. Secret talk, secret will, secret action, and so on in the Buddha-Dharma are beyond such reasoning. When we meet a human being, that is just when we hear secret talk and talk secret talk. When we know ourselves, we know secret action. Moreover, a Buddhist patriarch is able thoroughly to penetrate and to discern the secret will and the secret talk described previously. Remember, in the momentary state of a Buddhist patriarch, secret words and secret acts vie to be realized. What has been described as “secret” is the truth of immediacy.23 It is the absence of any gap. It is total containment24 of a Buddhist patriarch, total containment of you, total containment of me, total containment of action, total containment of an age, total containment of virtue, and total containment of secrecy. Even the Buddha’s eyes cannot glimpse the coming together of secret talk and a human being in the secret state. Action in the secret state is beyond the recognition of self and others; only I in the secret state can know it; and every other individual in the secret state “does not understand” it.25 Because secrecy surrounds you, everything relies on secrecy, and a single or half a thing relies on secrecy. We should consider such truths in detail and learn them in practice. In conclusion, that places of teaching people and moments of intuition and affirmation are, in every case, the manifestation of secrecy, is the authentic tradition transmitted by buddhas and patriarchs.

Because the present is an ineffable moment26 it is secret to the self, it is secret

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to others, it is secret to Buddhist patriarchs, and it is secret to alien beings. For this reason, [the present,] on the basis of secrecy, is newly secret. Because teaching, practice, and experience like this are just the state of a Buddhist patriarch, they clear up and pass through the secrecy of a Buddhist patriarch, and thus they clear up and pass through secrecy itself.

[18] My master’s master Setchō27 addresses the assembly:

The World-honored One has secret talk, For Mahākāśyapa nothing is concealed. Through the night a rain of falling flowers,

Water flowing through the city is fragrant.28

Here and now, Setchō’s expression “Through the night a rain of falling flowers,/Water flowing through the city is fragrant” is immediacy itself.

194a Picking it up, we should examine the eyeballs and the nostrils of a Buddhist patriarch. It is beyond Rinzai and Tokusan. We should explore the opening of nostrils in the eyes and should sharpen the tip of the nose in the ears.29 Indeed, it is inside the ears, the nose, and the eyes that we realize the whole body-mind which is neither old nor new. We esteem this as the truth that “the raining of flowers is the occurrence of the world.”30 In the Old Master’s words “Water flowing through the city is fragrant,” the body is concealed yet its figure is ever more conspicuously revealed.31 Thus, in everyday life inside the house of the Buddhist patriarchs, we investigate and pass through “the World-honored One’s having secret talk” and “Mahākāśyapa’s nothing being concealed.” The Seven World-honored Buddhas are learning it in practice as [we are] now. Mahākāśyapa and Śākyamuni alike have penetrated and discerned it as [we are doing] now.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Mitsugo

                                    Preached to the assembly at old Kippō Temple                                     in the Yoshida district of Esshū,32 on the twentieth day of the ninth lunar month in the first  year of Kangen.33

Notes

1     dentōroku, ancestral masters of India were also like this.” Master Daikan Enō said to Master Nangaku Ejō, “Just this untainted state is that which buddhas guard and desire. You are also like this. I am also like this. And the chap. 5. See also Chapter Seven (Vol. I), Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Senjō. pt. 2, no. 1; Keitoku-

2     substance of the mind transmitted by the buddhas and patriarchs of the past. Now you Zen-ji-goji. From Master Bodhidharma’s words to Master Taiso Eka: “That is just the Sesshin-sesshō. have got it, you yourself must guard it well.” See Chapter Forty-eight, 3 Master Ungo Dōyō (835?–902), successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai.

4         Mitsugo. Mitsu that mitsu describes the state of direct contact with reality, which is “secret” only in means “secret” or “close.” Master Dōgen explains later in this chapter Go is literally “words.” the sense that it is beyond explanation—it is not esoteric. Here it means not only verbal communication but “talk,” as in the sense of “bird-talk,” or as in the sense that a tree talks to us.

5         Master Seigen Gyōshi (d. 740), successor of Master Daikan Enō.

6         Vipaśyin Buddha, the first of the Seven Buddhas. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Master Ungo is the forty-sixth buddha in Master Dōgen’s lineage counting from Busso. 7 Alludes to the legend that when practitioners are pursuing enlightenment they are served meals by angels. See also Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 132. 8 These four aphorisms are in the style of quotations from Chinese, but their source has not been traced.

9     Secret talk is not just communication in words.

10    Kufu-bendō means zazen.

11    By “understanding” Master Ungo means practical realization in the moment, not intellectual understanding.

12    Dōgen, however, secret talk is a mystery in that it is real, and therefore cannot be People misunderstand that secret talk is something esoteric. According to Master explained, but it is open to everyone—because reality is always talking secret talk.

13    Master Dōgen described the same reality with two opposing expressions. 14 Seson-u, translated in the story as “The World-honored One has. . . .”

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15    U-seson.

16    Shishi-za means a buddha’s seat of preaching. See, for example, LS 2.186–88.

17    In this (wrong) view “secret” means esoteric, inaccessible to the uninitiated. 18 Kyūshū, the nine states of China.

19    the practice of the Pure Land sects. Shingyō, “devotional practice” or “practice based on belief” suggests, for example,

20    Hōgyō ,called Zen sects. “practice based on Dharma,” suggests, for example, the practice of the so-

21    should also be called “secret words,” so to call it nothing being concealed is doubly The interpretation that “secret words” must mean nonverbal, esoteric conduct is foolish. But on the basis of that interpretation, the conduct of Master Mahākāśyapa foolish.

22    Seken-shusseken; that is, both among laypeople and among monks.

23    Shinmitsu. ShinShinmitsu means intimacy, closeness, or immediacy. Means intimacy or familiarity. Mitsu means secrecy or closeness. 24 Gai as a noun means a lid or a cover, and as a verb means to cover as if with a lid; to cover totally.

25    Fu-e su, that is, “transcends understanding of it”—as in the story.

26    Nan no jisetsu, literally, “what time,” that is, a time that cannot be expressed in hours and minutes, a real time.

27    “master old man,” is a term of respect for the master of one’s own master—Master Setchō Chikan (1105–1192), successor of Master Tendō Sōgyoko. Shiō, lit.,

Setchō was the master of Master Tendō Nyojō.

28    Kataifutōroku, chap. 17.

29    We should make our sight (or intuition) and hearing (or discernment) vivid and accurate.

30    poem, for Ke-u-sekai-ki.phenomena and reality. Master Dōgen substituted occurrence of the world.” These words of Master Prajñātara describe the oneness ofkai, The usual expression is “to open.”   ke-kai-sekai-ki,u, “to rain,” from Master Setchō’s “the opening of flowers is the

31    Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Mi o zō shi te kage iyo-iyo arawa ruru.Butsu-kōjō-no-ji, paragraph 68: “Dōyō springs in through his A related expression appears in Chapter brain and conceals himself in his body. And while concealed in his body, he conspic-Dōgen describes the transmission between Mahākāśyapa and Ānanda as Ānanda con-uously reveals his figure.” Also, in Chapter Forty-six, Kattō, paragraph 100, Master ceiling his body in Mahākāśyapa and Mahākāśyapa concealing his body in Ānanda.

 

[Chapter Fifty-two]

Bukkyō

The Buddhist Sutras

Translator’s Note: Butsu means “buddha” or “Buddhist,” and kyō means “sutra” or “scripture.” So bukkyō means Buddhist sutras. Chapter Twenty-four in Volume I is also called Bukkyō, but in that chapter, kyō is a different word meaning “teaching.” In Buddhism, there are fundamentally two ways that are useful in pursuing the truth. One is practicing zazen, and the other is reading sutras. But some people emphasize the value of practicing zazen so strongly that they are blind to the value of reading Buddhist sutras, and so they deny the value of reading them. They insist that Buddhism is not philosophical theories, and therefore that to attain the truth we need only practice zazen, and that reading Buddhist sutras is useless or even detrimental to pursuing the truth. But Master Dōgen did not think so. He esteemed the value of reading sutras, and he thought that it was necessary to read Buddhist sutras in order to attain the truth. Therefore he recorded the true meaning of reading Buddhist sutras in this chapter. Furthermore, in Master Dōgen’s thought, Buddhist sutras are not only Buddhist scriptures, but they are also the universe itself, which shows us and teaches us the true meaning of our life.

[21] “The method of teaching bodhisattvas,”1 and the method of teaching buddhas, exist in the here and now.2 They are both tools of the great truth. The tools accord with the master, and the master uses the tools. For this reason, at the very moment of “sometimes following a good counselor”3 and “sometimes following the sutras,” which the Buddhist patriarchs of India and China have done without exception, establishment of the will, training, and experience of the effect, have no gap between each other at all. Establishing the will relies on the sutras and on a good counselor; training also relies on the sutras and on a good counselor; and experiencing the effect also is wholly intimate with the sutras and with a good counselor. The moment

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before, and a word after,4 are both in the same state as the sutras and as a

194b good counselor. The moment itself, and the inside of a word,5 are both in the same state as the sutras and as a good counselor.

[23] Good counselors, in every case, are thoroughly versed in the sutras. “They are thoroughly versed” means that they see the sutras as their national land, and see the sutras as the body-mind. They have seen the sutras as the means of establishing the teaching for others, they have seen the sutras as their sitting, lying down, and walking, they have seen the sutras as father and mother, and they have seen the sutras as children and grandchildren. Because they have made the sutras into practice and understanding, good counselors have mastered the sutras. A good counselor washing the face and drinking tea6 is the eternal sutra itself. The saying that “the sutras produce good counselors” describes sixty strokes of Ōbaku’s staff being able to produce children and grandchildren,7 and three strikes [on a stone mortar] on Mount Ōbai making possible the transmission of the robe and transmission of the Dharma.8 It describes not only that: realizing the truth on seeing the peach blossoms, realizing the truth on hearing the sound of a bamboo,9 and realizing the truth on seeing a bright star, are all examples of the sutras producing good counselors. There are skinbags and fists who get eyes then get the sutras, and there are wooden dippers and lacquered tubs who get the sutras then get eyes. What has been called “the sutras” is the whole universe in the ten directions itself; there is no time or place that is not the sutras. They use the characters of consummate philosophy and they use the characters of secular philosophy; they use the characters of the heavens above and they use the characters of the human world; they use the characters of the world of animals and they use the characters of the world of asuras;10 they use the characters of the hundred weeds and they use the characters of ten thousand trees. Therefore, the long, the short, the square, the round, the blue, the yellow, the red, and the white, which are arranged in dense profusion throughout the universe in ten directions, are all the characters of the sutras, and they are the concrete surface of the sutras. We see them as the tools of the great truth, as the Buddhist sutras. This sutra is able to spread out over the whole of time and to spread throughout entire nations. It opens the gate of teaching people

and does not forsake any human household over the whole earth. It opens the teaching things and saves material beings throughout the earth.

In teaching buddhas and teaching bodhisattvas, it becomes the whole earth and the whole universe. It “opens the gate of expedient methods,”11 it opens the gate of “abiding in place,”12 and, not forsaking one person or a half of one, it “reveals true real form.” To get this sutra, at this very moment, with the thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization, and in the state without thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization, of buddhas or of bodhisattvas—though it is beyond the intentional doing of the individual—is the great aim of each person. The time of “decisively getting this sutra”13 is beyond past and present; because past and present are moments of getting the sutra, what is manifested before our eyes as the whole universe in ten directions is just “the getting of this sutra.” When we read, recite, and become versed in this sutra, the buddha-wisdom, natural wisdom, and untutored wisdom14 are realized prior to the mind and are realized prior to the body. At this time we do not have the doubt that [wisdom] may be a new and special state. When this sutra is being received, retained, read, and recited by us, the sutra is enfolding us. The situation before a line and around a word, and in scanning down and dwelling on a sentence, is, instantly, the scattering of blossoms and the making of garlands. We call this sutra the Dharma itself, and in it there are eighty-four thousand accumulations of Dharma preaching. In this sutra there are characters which are buddhas who have realized the balanced and right state of truth, there are characters which are buddhas who are presently living in the world, and there are characters which are buddhas who have entered parinirvāṇa. The arriving of reality and the leaving of reality15 are each a character in the sutra and are a line of Dharma written on the Dharma. Picking up a flower and winking an eye, and a face breaking into a smile, are just the eternal sutra authentically transmitted from the Seven Buddhas. Standing waist-deep in snow and cutting off an arm, doing prostrations and getting the marrow, are just the eternal sutra transmitted from master to disciple. The subsequent transmission of the Dharma and giving of the robe are just the arrival of the moment in which all volumes of the universal scripture are entrusted. Three strikes of the mortar and three sifts of the rice in the winnowing basket16 make the sutra hold out a hand to the sutra, and the sutra thus rightly succeeds the sutra. Furthermore, “This is 195a something coming like this”17 is a thousand sutras for teaching buddhas and is ten thousand sutras for teaching bodhisattvas. “To explain a thing does not

hit the target”18 nicely preaches the eighty thousand compilations and the twelve divisions [of the sutras].19 Furthermore, a fist and a heel, a staff and a whisk, are eternal sutras and new sutras, sutras of existence and sutras of emptiness. Being part of the assembly and pursuing the truth, making the effort of sitting in zazen, are originally the Buddhist sutras that are right at the beginning and the Buddhist sutras that are right at the end. They are sutras written on leaves of the bodhi tree, and sutras written on the faces of space. In sum, a Buddhist patriarch’s one instance of movement and two instances of stillness, and his or her holding on and letting go, are naturally the closing and opening of the Buddhist sutras. Because we learn in practice that there being no ultimate extreme is the ultimate standard, we receive sutras and expel sutras through the nostrils and we receive sutras and expel sutras through the tips of the toes— [as] sutras were received and sutras were expelled before the birth of our parents and [as] sutras were received and sutras were expelled before the time of the King of Majestic Voice.20 We receive sutras and preach sutras through mountains, rivers, and the earth, and we receive sutras and preach sutras through the sun, moon, and stars. Sometimes we retain sutras and transmit sutras with the self that precedes the kalpa of emptiness, and sometimes we retain sutras and transmit sutras with the body-mind that precedes face and eyes. We cause sutras like these to appear by breaking atoms, and we cause them to appear by breaking the Dharma world.

[30] The twenty-seventh patriarch, the Venerable Prajñātara, says:

My out-breath does not follow circumstances,

The in-breath does not belong in the world of aggregates.

I am constantly reciting sutras like this.

A hundred thousand myriad koṭis of scrolls.

Never only one scroll or two scrolls.21

Hearing these words of the ancestral master, we should learn in practice that sutras are recited in exhalation and inhalation. If we know [this] reciting of sutras, we will know the place where sutras exist. Because it is the reciter and the recited, reciting sutras and sutras reciting, it may be total knowing and total seeing.

195b [32] My late master constantly said, “In my order,22 we do not rely on burning incense, doing prostrations, reciting names of buddhas, practicing confession, or reading sutras. Just sit, direct your energy into pursuing the truth, and get free of body and mind.”

Few people clearly understand an expression like this. Why? Because to call “reading sutras” “reading sutras” is to debase it, and not to call it “reading sutras” is to be perverse. “You are not allowed to talk and not allowed to be mute: say something at once! Say something at once!” We should learn this truth in practice. Because this principle [of reading sutras] exists, a man of old23 has said, “To read sutras we must be equipped with the eyes of reading sutras.” Remember, if there had been no sutras from ancient times till today, there could be no expression like this. We should learn in practice that there is reading sutras that is “getting free,” and there is reading sutras that is “nonreliance.”24 This being so, each practitioner or half a practitioner who receives and retains the Buddhist sutras will inevitably become the Buddha’s disciple. Do not learn at random the wrong views of non-Buddhists. Because the right Dharma-eye treasury which is being realized in the present is itself the Buddhist sutras, all things that exist as Buddhist sutras are the right Dharma eye treasury. It is beyond unity and difference, and beyond self and others. Remember, the right Dharma-eye treasury is limitlessly abundant, but you will not clarify it entirely. Even so, you are exhibiting the right Dharma-eye treasury and you do not disbelieve it. The same should be true for the Buddhist sutras: they are limitlessly abundant, but you should hope to believe in and to practice a single verse or a single saying; you will not be able to understand eighty thousand. As one who is not a complete authority on the Buddhist sutras, never rashly say that the Buddhist sutras are not the Buddha-Dharma. Although those others25 can be heard boasting that they are the bones and marrow of the Buddhist Patriarch, when we look at them with right eyes they are just late learners who still rely on sentences. Some may be equal to those who have received and retained a single saying or a single verse, and there may be others who are inferior to those who have received and retained a single saying or a single verse. Never insult the Buddha’s right Dharma on 195c the basis of such sparse understanding. Nothing could have more virtue than the Buddhist sutras which are sound and form itself. Sounds and forms delude and disturb those others, who in any case still crave them. The Buddhist sutras do not delude and disturb those others. They should never insult the Buddhist sutras in their disbelief.

[35] Nevertheless, for the last two hundred years or so in the great kingdom of Song, certain unreliable stinking skin bags have said, “We must not keep in mind even the sayings of ancestral masters. Still less should we ever read or rely upon the teaching of the sutras. We should only make our bodies and minds like withered trees and dead ash, or like broken wooden dippers and bottomless tubs.” People like this have vainly become a species of no Buddhist or celestial demon. They seek to rely on what cannot be relied on, and as a result they have idly turned the Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs into a mad and perverse teaching. It is pitiful and regrettable. Even broken wooden dippers and bottomless tubs are the Buddhist patriarchs’ eternal sutra itself. Few Buddhist patriarchs have completely enumerated and classified the scrolls of this sutra. Those who say that the Buddhist sutras are not the Buddha-Dharma do not research the occasions on which the Buddhist patriarchs have relied upon the sutras, they do not study in practice the occasions on which Buddhist patriarchs manifest themselves following the sutras, and they do not know how deep the intimacy is between Buddhist patriarchs and the Buddhist sutras. Unreliable people like this are as [common as] rice, flax, bamboo, and reeds; they ascend the lion seat, and establish monasteries throughout the country as the teachers of human beings and gods. Because the unreliable have learned from the unreliable, they know no truths other than the unreliable. And because they do not know [the truth], they do not aspire to it, but “they pass from darkness into darkness.” It is pitiful. Because they have never had the body-mind of the Buddha-Dharma, they do not know what the behavior of the body and working of the mind should be

196a like. Because they do not clearly understand the principles of existence and emptiness, when someone asks them a question they randomly raise a fist, but they do not know the meaning of raising it. Because they do not clearly understand right and wrong ways, when someone asks them a question they hold up a whisk, but they do not know the meaning of holding it up. Sometimes, hoping to offer a guiding hand to others, they quote Rinzai’s “four thoughts” and “four relations between reflection and action,” Unmon’s “three phrases,” Tōzan’s “three paths” and “five relative positions,”26 and so on, and see them as the standard for learning the truth. My late master Tendō was constantly laughing at this, saying, “How could learning the state of buddha be like that? We cause the great truth authentically transmitted by

the Buddhist patriarchs to cover the mind and to cover the body again and again. When learning this state in practice, and aiming to master it, there is no time to spare; what free time could we have to fit in the sayings of later generations? Truly, we should know that old veterans in all directions have no will to the truth; it is evident that they do not learn in practice the body mind of the Buddha-Dharma.”

[39] My late master’s preaching was like this. Truly, Rinzai was a junior27 in Ōbaku’s order; he received sixty strokes of the staff before he eventually visited Daigu28 and had the conversation about the mind of an old granny, under the influence of which he reflected on his past conduct and went back again to Ōbaku. Because rumor of this episode has resounded like thunder, [people] have thought that the Buddha-Dharma of Ōbaku was transmitted to Rinzai alone. Moreover, [people] have thought that he was even more excellent than Ōbaku. That is not true at all. Rinzai had stayed a short while in Ōbaku’s order and followed the other monks, but when Venerable Patriarch Chen29 had prompted him, they say that Rinzai did not know what to ask. [Even] before clarification of the great matter, how could one 196b who is standing on the ground to listen to the Dharma,30 as a profound devotee of learning in practice, be dumbfounded like that? We should know that he is not of the highest makings. Further, Rinzai has never had more zeal than his master, and sayings [of Rinzai] that surpass those of his master have never been heard. Ōbaku has expressions that outshine his master, he has great wisdom31 surpassing that of his master, he has expressed truth never before expressed by buddhas, and he has understood Dharma never before understood by patriarchs. Ōbaku is an eternal buddha who transcends past and present, he is even higher than Hyakujō, and he is even more of a genius than Baso. Rinzai does not possess such excellence of spirit. Why? [Because] Rinzai does not express any saying that has never been expressed before, even in a dream. He seems only to understand the many, forgetting the one, or to realize the one, forgetting the many. How could we see “the four thoughts” and so on as criteria32 for learning the Dharma, as if the taste of the truth were present in them? Unmown is a disciple of Seppō;33 though he has been able to operate as a great master to human beings and gods, it must be said that he is still at the learning stage.34 How could we esteem these as having attained the root? They may be nothing more than sorry offshoots.

Before Rinzai had arrived, before Unmown had appeared, what did Buddhist patriarchs rely upon as standards for learning the truth? So remember, in the houses of [Rinzai and Unmown], Buddhist conduct of the truth is not transmitted. Because [people] lack that which can be relied upon, they randomly expound such outlandish and confused theories. Such fellows recklessly ridicule the Buddhist sutras. Others must not follow the habit. If the sutras were to be discarded, Rinzai and Unmown might also need to be discarded. If we cannot rely upon the Buddhist sutras, we are without water to drink, and without a dipper to scoop water. There again, the founding patriarch’s “three paths” and “five relative positions,” as kernels [of the truth], are beyond the area that the unreliable can know. He has received the authentic transmission of the fundamental principles, and has directly indicated Buddhist conduct; 196c his can never be the same as other lineages.

[43] Furthermore, unreliable people say that the teaching of the Dao, the teaching of Confucius, and the teaching of Śākyamuni may each amount to the same in their conclusion; they just have temporary differences in their gates of entry. Sometimes they compare it to the three legs of a tripod. This is a notion widely discussed by monks in the great kingdom of Song today. When such people speak like this, the Buddha-Dharma has for them already vanished from the face of the earth. Further, we should say that not so much as an atom of the Buddha-Dharma has ever come to them. People like this, rashly attempting to express insight into the Buddha-Dharma, mistakenly say that the Buddhist sutras are not useful, and that in the lineage of the ancestral master there is a fundamental teaching which is transmitted separately.35 They are small in nature, because they have not glimpsed the boundaries of the Buddha’s truth. They say that we should not rely on the Buddha’s sutras: then if they had sutras by the Patriarch36 would they rely on them, or would they not rely on them? There are many Dharmas in the Patriarch’s truth that are as described in the Buddhist sutras. Should they be relied upon or discarded? If the Patriarch’s truth were said to be separate from the Buddha’s truth, who could believe in the Patriarch’s truth? The ancestral master is the ancestral master because he has received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s truth. If there were an ancestral master who had not received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s truth, who could call him the ancestral master? We revere the First Patriarch because he is the twenty-eighth patriarch.

If we spoke of a Patriarch’s truth separate from the Buddha’s truth, it would be difficult for there to be ten patriarchs or twenty patriarchs. That we revere the ancestral master because he has received the transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor is due to the importance of the Buddha’s truth. With what features could an ancestral master who had not received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s truth meet face-to-face with human beings and gods? It would be more difficult still to turn around the profound will that adores the Buddha in order to follow anew an ancestral master who did not 197a belong to the Buddha’s truth. That the unreliable madmen of today idly scorn the Buddha’s truth is because it is impossible for them to decide which Dharmas belong to the Buddha’s truth. To compare, even for a moment, those teachings of the Dao and of Confucius, and the teaching of the Buddha, is not only pitifully stupid but is also the cause and conditions of wrong action and is the downfall of nations, because it is the undermining of the Three Treasures. The truths of Confucius and Laozi37 can never match the state of an arhat;38 how much less could they equal the state of balanced realization or the state of fine realization?39 [In] Confucianism and Daoism, they are able, barely, to discern in astronomical phenomena the vision and hearing of saints, but it is hard for them to clarify, in one life or in many lives, the cause-and-effect of the Great Saint. They are able, barely, to discern in nodding the movement and stillness of the body-mind, but they can never clarify, in the limitlessness of the moment,40 the reality of the whole universe in the ten directions. In short, the inferiority of the teachings of Confucius and Laozi to the teaching of the Buddha does not deserve to be discussed in terms of the separation of heaven and earth. Randomly to discuss them as one is to insult the Buddha Dharma and to slander Confucius and Laozi. Though there is some accuracy in the teachings of Confucius and Laozi, how could the old veterans of recent times understand even a fraction of them, much less grasp them as a great handle upon ten thousand ages? In those [teachings] too there is instruction and training which the flotsam of today could not easily enact. There is no one who could even attempt to practice them. Not even a single atom can be identified with another atom; how much less could the late learners of today determine what the profound and mystical Buddhist sutras are? Not clearly understanding either of two factors, they just randomly express outlandish theories and confused words about unity.

197b [49] In great Song [China] today such people sign their names under masters’ titles and occupy positions of temple master. Without shame before the past and present, they stupidly make nonsense of the Buddha’s truth. It is difficult to permit that the Buddha-Dharma is present in them. Old veterans like these, down to the last person, say: “Buddhist sutras are not the original intention of the Buddha’s truth; the Patriarch’s transmission is the original intention. In the Patriarch’s transmission the mysterious, the profound, and the fine have been transmitted.” Words like these are stupid in the extreme; they are the talk of madmen. There is no mystery in the authentic transmission from the ancestral Master that differs from the Buddhist sutras, or even from a single word or half a word therein. Both the Buddhist sutras and the Patriarch’s truth have been authentically transmitted and have spread from Śākyamuni Buddha. The Patriarch’s transmission has been received only by rightful successors from rightful successors, but how could [rightful successors] not know, how could they not clarify, and how could they not read and recite the Buddhist sutras? A past master says, “You delude yourself with the sutras. The sutras do not delude you.”41 There are many stories about past masters reading sutras. I would like to say to the unreliable as follows: If, as you say, the Buddhist sutras should be discarded, then the Buddha’s mind should be discarded and the Buddha’s body should be discarded. If the Buddha’s body mind should be discarded, the Buddha’s disciples should be discarded. If the Buddha’s disciples should be discarded, the Buddha’s truth should be discarded. If the Buddha’s truth should be discarded, how could the Patriarch’s truth not be discarded? If you discard both the Buddha’s truth and the Patriarch’s truth, you might become one person with a shaved head among a hundred secular people. Who could deny that you deserved to taste the stick? Not only would you be at the beck and call of kings and their retainers; you might also be answerable to Yamarāja.42

[51] Recent old veterans, on barely obtaining a note from a king or a retainer, proclaim themselves to be masters of Buddhist temples and on this basis they speak the insane words described previously. There is no one to

197c tell right from wrong. Only my late master laughed at these people [whose wrongness] was totally unrecognized by the old veterans of other temples. In general, we should not think that because monks are from a foreign land they must inevitably possess clear understanding of the truth, or that because

they teach the emperor of a great nation they must inevitably have accomplished something. The living beings of foreign lands do not all have the makings of monks; the good ones are good, and the bad ones are bad. It may be that types of living beings are the same in the limitless triple worlds of the universe. Furthermore, those who possess the truth are not always chosen to become the teachers of the emperors of great nations; emperors also have difficulty knowing who possesses the truth. They make appointments merely on the basis of the recommendations they hear from their retainers. In the past and present there have been emperors’ teachers who possessed the truth and many emperors’ teachers who did not possess the truth. In a corrupt age, those appointed are people who do not possess the truth. In a corrupt age, those not appointed do possess the truth. What is the reason? It is because there are times in which a [true] person is known43 and there are times in which a [true] person goes unknown. We should not forget the past example on [Mount] Ōbai of Jinshū.44 Jinshū was the teacher of emperors; he lectured on the Dharma before bamboo screens, and preached the Dharma before bamboo blinds.45 Moreover, he was the highest ranking of seven hundred noble monks. We should believe in the past example on Ōbai of temple servant Ro.46 By changing his occupation from woodcutter to temple servant he had escaped from hauling firewood; still, he made it his job to pound rice. That his position was low is regrettable, but his leaving of secular life and transcendence of the monkhood, his attainment of the Dharma and reception of the robe, are an example unheard of since ancient times and absent even in India in the west; they are a rare and noble precedent set only in the Eastern Lands. It seems that even the seven hundred noble monks could not measure up to him, and that the dragons and elephants of the whole country could not follow in his traces. He is the Buddha’s rightful successor, having properly taken his place in the succession as the thirty-third patriarch.47 If the Fifth 198a Patriarch were not a good counselor with the ability to know a person, how could it be so? Consider a truth such as this quietly; do not be hasty about it. Hope to get the ability to know people. To fail to know a person is a calamity for self and others, and a calamity for the whole nation. Wide knowledge and skill in handling important matters are not necessary, but we should urgently seek the eyes to know a person and the ability to know a person. Without the ability to know a person, we will sink into depression for long

ages. In conclusion, we should know that in the Buddha’s truth there are inevitably Buddhist sutras; we should learn in practice, as the mountains and the oceans, their universal text and their profound meaning; and we should make them our standard for pursuing the truth.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Bukkyō

                                    Preached to the assembly while lodging at                                     Kippōji in the Yoshida district of Esshū,48 in  the ninth lunar month in the autumn of the first  year of Kangen.49

Notes

1 ten-hokke;Kyō-bosatsu-hōand for example LS 1.52.suggests the Lotus Sutra itself. See Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke2 Given that in this chapter reality and the Buddhist sutras are identified, both translations Kono naka ni means either “in this [time and place]” or “in these [Buddhist sutras].” signify the same thing.

3         “A good counselor” means a teacher who can give concrete practical guidance on Chishiki, represents the Sanskrit how to apply the principles of Buddhism in daily life. Friend,” but in Master Dōgen’s philosophy See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. defines kalyāṇamitralit., “acquaintance,” is short for as “a friend of virtue; a well-wishing friend; a good counselor.”kalyāṇamitra. Monier-Williams’ Kalyāṇamitrazenchishiki,zen, “goodness” or “virtue,” is a practical lit., “good acquaintance,” which is often translated as “spiritual Sanskrit-English Dictionary Shoaku-makusa. rather than a spiritual matter. See, for example, Chapter Ten (Vol. I),

4         Kisen-kugo suggests action—intuition before, consideration after. 5            Kichū-kuri.

6 Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Senmen-kissa alludes to a story about Master Isan Reiyū and his two disciples. SeeJinzū; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 61. 7 Refers to the transmission between Master Ōbaku Kiun and his disciples RinzaiGigen, Bokushū Dōmyō, etc. See also note 27.

8     Refers to the transmission between Master Daiman Kōnin and Master Daikan Enō,Inmo, paragraph 99. described for example in Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II),

9     in nature are recorded in Chapter Nine (Vol. I), The stories of Master Reiun Shigon and Master Kyōgen Chikan realizing the truth Keisei-sanshiki.

10    Animals and s (angry demons), animals, hungry ghosts, and beings in hell. Asuras are two of the six states, rokudō: gods (devas), human beings, asura

11    true real form.” See LS 2.156; Chapter Fifty, Lotus Sutra, Hōsshi: “This sutra opens the gate of expedient methods and reveals Shohō-jissō.

12    truth,/Guiding teachers teach it by expedient means.” (LS 1.120)Alludes to the form of the world is constantly abiding./Having recognized this in a place of the Lotus Sutra, Hōben: “The Dharma abides in its place in the Dharma,/And

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13    Hittoku-zekyō. Source not traced.

14    ops intuitively without being taught. Mushi-chi, lit., “no-master-wisdom,” or untutored wisdom, means wisdom that devel15 Nyorai-nyoko. Nyorai, skrit Tathāgata, is an epithet of the Buddha commonly used in the Buddhist sutras. Lit., “[One to whom] reality has arrived,” representing the San16 Daikan Enō; see note 8 and Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Another reference to the transmission between Master Daiman Kōnin and Master Inmo. 17 two, Master Daikan Enō’s words to Master Nangaku Ejō. See, for example, Chapter Sixty-Hensan.

18    Master Nangaku Ejō’s words to Master Daikan Enō. Ibid.

19    Jūni-bu,Twenty-four (Vol. II), the twelve divisions of the sutras, or teaching, are explained in ChapterBukkyō.

20    King of Majestic Voice.” (LS 3.128)countless infinite, inconceivable Lotus Sutra, Jōfugyō-bosatsu I-on-nō, the name of an ancient buddha, from the Sanskrit Bhīsmagarjitasvararāja.(“Bodhisattva Never Despise”): “In the eternal past, asaṃkhya kalpas ago, there was a buddha named

21    Quoted from the Shōgaku. The poem is also quoted in Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Wanshijuko (Wanshi’s Eulogies of the Ancients), by Master WanshiKankin.

22    Ga-kori, literally, “in my concrete place.”

23    Master Unmown Bun’en (864–949), successor of Master Seppō Gison. Quoted in vol.3 of the Unmonkyōshinzenjikōroku (General Record of Zen Master Unmown Kyōshin). 24 Fuyō generally means nonessential, needless, or useless. Here, however, fuyō suggests

Twenty-four (Vol. II), sutras but a recommendation to get the real state of reading sutras. Similarly, in Chapter state of transcendence. Master Tendō’s words are not a denial of the value of reading Bukkyō, fuyō means 1) unnecessary, and 2) no necessity.

25       Nandachi, which literally means “you” in the plural, here refers to those who affirm the true relation between zazen and the sutras. Master Bodhidharma’s zazen but negate study of the sutras, without understanding

26       These various categories are discussed in Chapter Forty-nine, Butsudō.

27       Goshō.Masters Ōbaku and Daigu, recorded in the Dōgen also describes the episode in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), “[Rinzai] was in Ōbaku’s order for three years. Pursuing the truth with pure simplicity, Bokushū district, ‘What is the Great Intent of the Buddha-Dharma?’ whereupon he three times he asked Ōbaku, at the instruction of Venerable Patriarch Chen from These characters are taken from the story of Master Rinzai’s practice under Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Gyōji,pt. 1, no. 27. Master paragraph 170: tasted [the master’s] stick again and again, sixty times in all. Yet his zeal was not diminished. Then he went to Daigu and realized the great state of realization. . . .” Chapter Fifty-two

28       Master Kōan Daigu (dates unknown), successor of Master Kisū Chijō and, like Master Ōbaku, a second-generation descendant of Master Baso Dōitsu. 29 was Chen, and Venerable Patriarch Chen was his nickname. Master Bokushū Dōmyō (780?–877?), successor of Master Ōbaku. His secular name

30    of those who were eager to listen to the Buddha’s preaching on Vulture Peak. Ritsuchi-chōbō, “standing on the ground to listen to the Dharma,” suggests the attitude

31    Hyakujō Ekai (749–814).Daichi, “Great Wisdom,” is the posthumous title of Master Ōbaku’s master, Master

32    south.Shi-nan,vehicle topped by a wooden statue (on a magnetic base) whose arm always pointed literally, “pointing-south.” A shi-nan-sha was an ancient Chinese military

33    Master Seppō Gison (822–907), successor of Master Tokusan Senkan.

34    for arhathood. Gakuchi, “the learning state,” is opposed to mugaku, “being without study,” a synonym

35    ings.” Master Dōgen attacks this idea in Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), Betsuden refers to the idea kyōge-betsuden, “separate transmission outside the teach-Bukkyō. 36 “The Patriarch” means Master Bodhidharma. The people under discussion did not revere Buddhist sutras but claimed only to revere Bodhidharma’s Zen.

37    of Daoism.Laozi was a Chinese philosopher of the sixth century B.C.E., known as the founder

38    The ultimate state of a śrāvaka, or intellectual Buddhist. 39 The penultimate and ultimate states of a bodhisattva.

40 Mujin-saidan, completely cut off from past and future. Lit., “limitless separation,” means the moment of the present that is 41 This probably alludes to the story about Masters Daikan Enō and Hōtatsu. See Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke. 42 Yama is the name of the god supposed by ancient Indians to rule the spirits of the dead. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 43 Chijin, “knowing a person,” means the intuitive ability to know whether a person is true.

44    Ācārya Jinshū (d. 706), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin. He was the most excellent but could not match Master Daikan Enō who was living in the temple as a laborer. Of seven hundred monks in the order of Master Daiman Kōnin on Ōbai Mountain,Kōkyō.

Posthumously titled Zen Master Daitsu. See also Chapter Twenty (Vol. I),

45    Ācārya Jinshū was revered by the Tang emperor Chusō and Empress Wu (who usurped

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the throne from Chusō for twenty years from 684). The screens and blinds were toveil the emperors from view.

46    Ro-anja. Ro was the family name of Master Daikan Enō. Anja, “novice” or “temple view to becoming a monk or as a livelihood. Servant,” described someone who worked in the temple as a servant, either with a 47 Master Daikan Enō is the Sixth Patriarch in China, and the thirty-third patriarch count-ing from Master Mahākāśyapa.

48    Corresponds to modern-day Fukui prefecture.

49    1243.

[Chapter Fifty-three]

Mujō-seppō

Preaches the Dharma The Non-emotional

Translator’s Note: Mujō means the non-emotional and seppō means to preach the Dharma. Originally, mujō means inanimate or insentient things, so mujōseppō means inanimate things preach the Dharma. But Master Dōgen’s usage of the word mujō was wider than the usual usage, as if the words cover the whole of nature—human beings as well as mountains, rivers, and so on. Master Dōgen insisted that even inanimate things can preach the Dharma, and at the same time he insisted that human beings can preach the Dharma when they are not emotional. He insisted that any thing that is not emotional can preach the Dharma—a viewpoint that profoundly expresses the true nature of Buddhist preaching.

[57] Preaching the Dharma in preaching the Dharma is the realized universe that Buddhist patriarchs transmit to Buddhist patriarchs. This preaching the Dharma is the Dharma preaching. It is neither sentient1 nor insentient.2 It is neither intentional doing nor no doing. It is not causally connected with doing and no doing, and it is not something that arises from circumstances. At the same time, it does not follow the way of the birds; it is given to a Buddhist assembly. When the great state of truth is completely realized, preaching the Dharma is completely realized. When the Dharma treasury is transmitted, preaching the Dharma is transmitted. At the time of picking up a flower, preaching the Dharma is picked up, and at the time of transmitting the robe, preaching the Dharma is transmitted. For this reason, the buddhas 198b and the patriarchs have, in like fashion, paid homage to preaching the Dharma since prior to the King of Majestic Voice,3 and have practiced preaching the Dharma as their original practice since prior to the buddhas themselves. Do not learn only that preaching the Dharma has been orchestrated by Buddhist

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patriarchs; Buddhist patriarchs have been orchestrated by preaching the Dharma. This preaching the Dharma is not merely the expounding of the eighty-four thousand gates of Dharma; it includes countless and boundless gates of Dharma preaching. Do not learn that later buddhas preach as Dharma the Dharma preaching of former buddhas. Just as former buddhas do not come back as later buddhas, so it is also in preaching the Dharma: former preaching of the Dharma is not used as later preaching of the Dharma. For this reason, Śākyamuni Buddha says, “In the same manner that the buddhas of the three times preach the Dharma, so now do I also preach the Dharma that is without distinction.”4 Thus, in the same way that buddhas utilize preaching the Dharma, buddhas utilize preaching the Dharma. And in the same way that buddhas authentically transmit preaching the Dharma, buddhas authentically transmit preaching the Dharma. Therefore, having been authentically transmitted from buddhas of the eternal past to the Seven Buddhas, and having been authentically transmitted from the Seven Buddhas to today, there exists “the non-emotional preaching the Dharma.” In this non-emotional preaching the Dharma the buddhas are present, and the patriarchs are present. Do not learn that “I now preach the Dharma” expresses an innovation that differs from the authentic tradition. And do not experience the time-honored authentic tradition as if it were an old nest in a demon’s cave.

[61] National Master Daishō5 of Kōtakuji in the Western Capital6 in the great kingdom of Tang, the story goes, is asked by a monk, “Can the insentient really preach the Dharma, or not?”

The National Master says, “They are always preaching ardently;

they preach without interval.”

The monk says, “Why do I not hear it?”

The National Master says, “Whether or not you hear it yourself,

you should not disturb others who do hear it.”

The monk says, “I wonder what kind of person is able to hear it.”

The National Master says, “Saints are able to hear it.”

The monk says, “Does the Master hear it or not?”

The National Master says, “I do not hear it.”

The monk says, “If the Master himself does not hear it, how does

he know that the insentient preach the Dharma?”

The National Master says, “It is convenient that I do not hear it. If I heard it I would be on the level of the saints, and then you would 198c not be able to hear me preaching the Dharma.”

The monk says, “So living beings are without the means [to hear].”

The National Master says, “I preach for living beings. I do not

preach for saints.”

The monk says, “What are living beings like after they hear?”

The National Master says, “At that time they are beyond living

beings.”7

[62] Beginners and later students who wish to learn in practice the none motional preaching the Dharma should get straight into diligent research of this story of the National Master. “They are always preaching ardently; they preach without interval.” “Always” is a concrete time of many instants. “They preach without interval”: given that “preaching” is already manifest in reality, it is inevitably “without interval.” We should not learn that the manner in which “the insentient preach the Dharma” must necessarily be as in the case of the sentient.8 [To suppose that the manner in which “the insentient preach the Dharma]” might accord with the voices of the sentient, and with the manner in which the sentient preach the Dharma, and thus to wrest voices from the sentient world and to liken them to the voices of the insentient world, is not Buddhism. “The insentient preaching the Dharma” may not always be sound as matter—just as the sentient preaching the Dharma is not sound as matter.9 Now, asking ourselves and asking others, we must endeavor to learn in practice what is the sentient state and what is the insentient state. That being so, we should painstakingly apply our mind to learning in practice how the non-emotional might preach the Dharma. Stupid people think that the rustling of trees in the forest, and the opening and falling of leaves and flowers, are the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, but they are not practitioners of the Buddha-Dharma.10 If it were so, who could fail to know the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, and who could fail to hear the none motional preaching the Dharma? Let us reflect for a while: in the non-emotional world are there any “grass,” “trees,” and “forests” or not? Is the none motional world infiltrated by “the emotional world” or not? [No.] To recognize, on the contrary, that grass, trees, tiles, and pebbles are the non-emotional is to be incomplete in learning. And to recognize the non-emotional as grass, trees, tiles, and pebbles, is not to have experienced satisfaction. Though we shall now consider the grass, trees, and so on that are seen by human beings, and discuss them as the non-emotional, those very grass, trees, and so on are beyond the common intellect. For there are great differences between the forests of the heavens above and those of the human world; the produce of a civilized nation is not the same as that of a remote land; and grass and trees in the ocean are totally unlike those in the mountains. Still more, there are trees that grow in space and there are trees that grow in clouds. Among the hundred weeds and myriad trees that sprout and grow amid wind, fire, and so on, there are generally those that can be understood as sentient, those that are not recognized as insentient, and those weeds and trees which seem to be humans and animals: sentient and insentient have never been clearly distinguished. Still more, when we see a hermit’s trees, stones, flowers, fruits, hot springs, and cool waters, they are utterly beyond doubt—but how could they not be difficult to explain? Barely having seen the weeds and trees of China, or having become familiar with the weeds and trees of Japan, do not think that similar situations may be present through the whole universe in myriad directions.

[66] The National Master says, “The saints are able to hear it.” That is, in orders where the non-emotional preaches the Dharma, the saints stand on the ground to listen.11 The saints, and the non-emotional, both realize hearing and realize preaching. The non-emotional does indeed preach the Dharma to saints, but is it sacred12 or is it common? [It is neither.] In other words, after we have clarified the manner in which the non-emotional preaches the Dharma, we are able to realize in physical experience that what the saints hear is as it is. Having attained realization in physical experience, we are able to fathom the state of the saints. Thereafter we should learn in practice, further, action on the road through the night which transcends the common and transcends the sacred. The National Master says, “I do not hear it.” Do not suppose that even these words are easy to understand. Does he not hear because he transcends the common and transcends the sacred, or does he not hear because he rips apart the nests of the common and the sacred? With effort like this, we should realize the [master’s] expression. The National Master says, “It is convenient that I do not hear it. If I heard it I would be

on the level of the saints.” This elucidation is never one truth or two truths.13 The “convenient I” is beyond the common and the sacred; might the “convenient I” be a Buddhist patriarch? Because Buddhist patriarchs transcend the common and transcend the sacred, [what they hear] may not be exactly the same as what the saints hear. Researching the truth of the National Master’s words “Then you would not be able to hear me preaching the Dharma,” we should consider the bodhi of the buddhas and the saints. The point is this: when the non-emotional preach the Dharma the saints are able to hear, but when the National Master preaches the Dharma that concrete monk is able to hear. Day upon day and month after month we should endeavor to learn this truth. Now I would like to ask the National Master: I do not ask what living beings are like after they hear, but what are living beings like just in the moment of hearing you preach the Dharma?

[68] The founding patriarch Great Master Tōzan Gohon,14 while practicing under the ancestral patriarch Great Master Ungan, asks, “What people are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma?”

The ancestral patriarch Ungan says, “The non-emotional are able

to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma.”

The founding patriarch says, “Does the master hear it or not?”

The ancestral patriarch says, “If I hear it, then you will not be able

to hear my preaching of the Dharma.”

The founding patriarch says, “If that is so, I would [rather] not

hear the master’s preaching of the Dharma.”

The ancestral patriarch says, “You do not even hear me preaching the Dharma; how much less [do you hear] the non-emotional preaching the Dharma.”

Then the founding patriarch sets forth the following verse and

presents it to the ancestral patriarch:

How very wonderful! How very wonderful!

The non-emotional preaching the Dharma is a mystery.

If we listen with the ears, it is ultimately too difficult to     understand.

If we hear the sound through the eyes, we are able to know it.15

[69]          The truth expressed now in the founding patriarch’s words “What people are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma” should be painstakingly researched through the effort of one life and many lives. This question is also equipped with the virtue of an assertion.16 And this assertion has the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow; it is not only “the mind being transmitted by the mind.”17 Transmission of the mind by the mind is the pursuit of beginners and late learners, but there is a pivotal matter which has been authentically transmitted by means of the robe and authentically transmitted by means of the Dharma. How can people today expect to realize

it as the ultimate in only three or four months of effort? The founding patriarch has already experienced the principle expressed in the past by the National Master that “The saints are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma,” and yet he now asks further: “What people are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma?” Should we see this as affirmation of the National Master’s words, or as non-affirmation of the National Master’s words? Should we see it as a question or as an assertion? If he does not completely affirm the National Master, how could he speak words like these?18 And if he completely affirms the National Master, how could he understand words like those?19

[70]          The ancestral patriarch Ungan says, “The non-emotional are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma.” Following the authentic transmission of this lifeblood, there can be learning in practice that is free of body and mind. Saying “The non-emotional are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma” may be, in essence and in form, [the same as saying] “the buddhas are able to hear the buddhas preaching the Dharma.” An assembly that listens to the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, whether of sentient beings or insentient beings, whether of common people or sages and saints, may just be the non-emotional itself. Relying upon its essenceand-form, we can tell the true from the false among [masters of] the past and present. Even if they have come from India in the west, if they are not true ancestral masters of the authentic transmission, we should not rely on them. Even if they have been learning continually for a thousand myriad years, if they have not received the transmission as rightful successor to rightful successor, we cannot succeed them. Now that the authentic transmission has already spread throughout the Eastern Lands, it may be easy to tell the true from the false. We might be able to receive the bones and marrow of the buddhas and the patriarchs even by listening to the expression “living beings are able to hear living beings preaching the Dharma.” When we hear the words of the ancestral patriarch Ungan and listen to the words of the National Master Daishō, if we truly evaluate them, “the saints” expressed in “The saints are able listen” may be the non-emotional, and “the non-emotional” expressed in “The non-emotional are able to hear” may be the saints. What the non-emotional preaches is the non-emotional—because the non-emotional preaching the Dharma is the non-emotional itself. Thus, the non-emotional is the preaching of Dharma and the preaching of Dharma is the non-emotional. The founding patriarch says, “If that is so, I would [rather] not hear the master’s preaching of the Dharma.” The words “If that is so,” which we now 200a hear, take up the principle that “the non-emotional are able to hear the none motional preaching the Dharma.” It is in accordance with the truth of the non-emotional being able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma that “I do not hear20 the master’s preaching of the Dharma.” The founding patriarch at this time is not simply taking a back seat for the non-emotional preaching the Dharma; his own zeal to preach the Dharma to the non-emotional has shown itself and is piercing the sky. Not only does he physically realize that the non-emotional preaches the Dharma; in non-emotional preaching of the Dharma he has physically mastered [transcendence of] hearing and not hearing. Going further, in emotional preaching of the Dharma he has physically realized [transcendence of] preaching and not preaching—in preaching just past, preaching just now, and preaching just coming. And beyond that, in the preaching of the Dharma [that transcends] being heard and not being heard, he has completely clarified the truth [of knowing] that this is emotional and this is non-emotional.21

[74] In general, hearing the Dharma is not confined to the spheres of the ear as a sense organ or of auditory consciousness: we hear the Dharma with our whole energy, with the whole mind, with the whole body, and with the whole truth, from before the time our parents were born and from before the time of [King of] Majestic Voice until the limit of the future and into the limitless future. The Dharma is heard prior to the body and after the mind. There is benefit to be got in each of these cases of hearing the Dharma. Never say that there is no benefit in hearing the Dharma without the involvement of mind-consciousness. Those whose mind has ceased and whose body is spent22 are able to benefit from hearing the Dharma, and those who are without mind and without body23 are able to benefit from hearing the Dharma. The buddhas and the patriarchs, without exception, pass through series of such instants in becoming buddhas and becoming patriarchs. How can the common intellect be fully aware of the influence of the Dharma connecting with the body-mind? It is impossible for us fully to clarify the limits of the body-mind. The merit of hearing the Dharma, once sown as a seed in the fertile ground of the body-mind, has no moment of decay; sooner or later it will grow, and, with the passing of time, it is sure to bear fruit. Stupid people think: “Without progressing on the path of understanding, and unless

200b our memory is good, even if we listen to the Dharma tirelessly there will be no benefit. The most important thing, whether in the human world or in the heavens above, is to devote one’s body and mind to the pursuit of wide knowledge. If we immediately forget, and leave the seat a blank, what benefit can there be? What educational merit can it have?” They say this because they have not met a true teacher and have not seen a person of the fact. One who does not possess the traditional face-to-face transmission is said not to be a true teacher. One who has received the authentic transmission from buddha to buddha is a true teacher. [The time] that stupid people describe as [preaching the Dharma] being temporarily remembered in the mind-consciousness is the time when the merit of hearing the Dharma is subtly covering the whole mind and covering the whole consciousness. In this very moment, virtue is present which covers the body, which covers the moment before the body, which covers the mind, which covers the moment before the mind, which covers the moment after the mind, which covers causes, conditions, results, actions, forms, natures, substance, and energy, which covers buddhas, which covers patriarchs, which covers self-and-others, and which covers skin, flesh, bones, marrow, and so on. Realized throughout speaking and preaching and throughout [daily actions] such as sitting and lying down, the virtue pervades the meridians and pervades the sky. Truly, it is not easy to recognize such virtue of hearing the Dharma; nevertheless, if we come upon the great order of the Buddhist Patriarch and investigate the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, there will be no time when the good influence of preaching the Dharma does not lead us, and there will be no place

where we do not spread the Dharma influence of hearing the Dharma. In this way, allowing moments and kalpas to be fleeting or slow,24 we will see results become real. We should not deliberately throw away wide knowledge; at the same time, we do not see it, in isolation, as the pivot. Practitioners should know this. The founding patriarch has realized it in physical experience.

[78]    The ancestral patriarch says, “You do not even hear me preachingthe Dharma; how much less [do you hear] the non-emotional preaching the Dharma.” Here, [confronted] with the founding patriarch’s sudden manifestation of the state of continuing to experience, on the basis of real experience, the [Buddha’s] state of real experience, the ancestral patriarch loosens his collar, and seals and certifies the state as the bones and marrow of the fore- 200c fathers. [He is saying,] “Even while I am preaching, you are beyond hearing!” He does not speak thus because [Tōzan] is ordinary flotsam; he is certifying that the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, though multifarious, does not require the activation of the intellect. The succession that takes place at this time is truly a secret. Those in the states of the common and the sacred cannot easily arrive at it or glimpse it.

[79]    Then the founding patriarch composes and presents to the ancestral patriarch Ungan a verse which says that “the mystery25 of the non-emotional preaching the Dharma” is “How very wonderful! How very wonderful!” So the non-emotional, and the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, are each difficult “to consider intellectually.”26 How are we to see “the none motional” described here? We should learn in practice that it is beyond the common and the sacred, and beyond the sentient and the insentient. Common and sacred, sentient and insentient, are always, whether preached or not preached, within the orbit of intellectual consideration. The present “[none motional],” which may indeed be “a mystery,” and “very wonderful,” and again “very wonderful” is beyond the wisdom and the consciousness of common people and sages and saints, and is beyond the reckoning of gods and human beings.

[80]    “If we listen with the ears, it is ultimately too difficult to understand”: Even with supernatural ears, or even with universal ears that pervade the whole world and all of time, when we aim to listen with the ears, “it is ultimately too difficult to understand.” Even with an ear on a wall, or an ear on a stick, we cannot understand the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, because it is beyond sound as matter. It is not that there is no “possibility of listening with the ears,” but even if we exhaust hundreds of thousands of kalpas of effort, “it is ultimately too difficult to understand.” [The non-emotional preaching the Dharma] has the dignity of the undivided truth which is originally beyond sound and form; it does not reside in nests and dens near the common and the sacred.

[82] “Hearing its sound through the eyes, we are able to know it.” Interpreting this expression, certain individuals think: “The activity of grass, trees, flowers, and birds being seen in the present by human eyes may be described as ‘hearing sound through the eyes.’” This point of view is completely mis-

taken and is not the Buddha-Dharma at all. The Buddha-Dharma has no such theory. When we learn in practice the founding patriarch’s words “hearing sound through the eyes,” the place where the sound of the non-emotional preaching the Dharma is heard, is the eyes27 themselves; and the place where the sound of the non-emotional preaching the Dharma is realized, is the eyes themselves. We must investigate the eyes still more widely. “Hearing sound” through the eyes must mean the same as “hearing sound” through the ears; and for this reason, “hearing sound through the eyes” can never be the same as “hearing sound” through the ears. We should not learn that “there are ears in the eyes,” we should not learn that “eyes and ears are one,” and we should not learn that “sound is realized inside eyes.” An ancient28 says, “The whole universe in the ten directions is a śramaṇa’s one eye.” We should not consider, by intellectual comparison, that to hear sound through this eye may be as in the founding patriarch’s words “hearing sound through the eyes.” Although we study the words of the ancient that “the whole universe in the ten directions is one eye,” the whole of the ten directions is just one eye, and furthermore, there are thousands of eyes on the tips of the fingers, there are thousands of eyes of right Dharma, there are thousands of eyes in the ears, there are thousands of eyes on the tip of the tongue, there are thousands of eyes on the tip of the mind, there are thousands of eyes of the thoroughly realized mind, there are thousands of eyes of the thoroughly realized body, there are thousands of eyes on top of a stick, there are thousands of eyes in the moment before the body, there are thousands of eyes in the moment before the mind, there are thousands of eyes of death in death, there are thousands of eyes of liveliness in liveliness, there are thousands of eyes of the self, there are thousands

of eyes of the external world, there are thousands of eyes in the concrete place of eyes, there are thousands of eyes of learning in practice, there are thousands of eyes aligned vertically, and there are thousands of eyes aligned horizontally. Thus, we study that the totality of eyes is the whole universe, but still this is not physical mastery of “the eyes.” We should make it an urgent task to investigate, through the eyes, [the action of] just hearing the non-emotional preaching the Dharma. The point expressed now by the founding patriarch is that it is difficult for the ears to understand the none motional preaching the Dharma. It is the eyes which hear the sound. Going further, there are instances of the thoroughly realized body29 hearing the sound and instances of the whole body30 hearing the sound. Even if we fail physically to master hearing sound through the eyes, we must physically realize, and must get free from, [the truth that] “the non-emotional are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma,” for this is the truth that has been transmitted.

[85]          My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, says, “A bottle gourd

      vine entwines with a bottle gourd.”31                                                                                                                      

This is Dharma preaching of the non-emotional state,32 in which the ancestral patriarch’s right eyes have been transmitted and in which the bones and marrow have been transmitted. Relying upon the truth that all Dharma preaching is in the non-emotional state, the non-emotional preach the Dharma, which is the ancient standard, and the non-emotional preaches Dharma to the non-emotional. What do we call “the non-emotional”? Remember, those who listen to the non-emotional preaching the Dharma are just it. What do we call “preaching the Dharma”? Remember, not knowing oneself to be the non-emotional is just it.

[86]          Great Master Jisai33 of Tōsuzan in Jōshū34 (successor of Zen Master Suibi Mugaku, called Daidō Myōkaku in his lifetime, also called the eternal buddha Tōsu),35 the story goes, is asked by a monk, “What is the non-emotional preaching the Dharma?” The master says, “No abusive language.”36

What Tōsu expresses here is the very Dharma plan of eternal buddhas and the ordinance of the patriarchs. Such [preaching] as the non-emotional preaching the Dharma, and Dharma preaching of the non-emotional is, in short, not to speak abusive language. Remember, the non-emotional preaching the Dharma is the whole charter of the Buddhist patriarchs. Followers of Rinzai and Tokusan cannot know it; only Buddhist patriarchs devote themselves to its investigation.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Mujō-seppō

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippōji in the                                     Yoshida district of Esshū37 on the second day  of the tenth lunar month in the first year of  Kangen.38

Notes

1 “sentient beings” or “the sentient.”Ujō. U means “having.” means “feelings” or “emotion.” In general ujō means 2 beings,” Mujō. Mumujōmeans “not having” or “without.” Conventionally, opposed to “sentientmeans “insentient things” or “the insentient”; that is, trees, rocks, fences, walls, etc. At the same time, in this chapter it also means “the non-emotional”;that is, the state without emotion, or reality, which is beyond emotion. 3 The name of a buddha of the infinite past, mentioned at the beginning of the twentieth(chapter of the LS 3.128) Lotus Sutra, Myō-shōgun-ō-honji (“The Story of King Resplendent”).

4     Lotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.128.

5     Master Nan’yō Echū (d. 755), successor of Master Daikan Enō. National MasterDaishō is his posthumous title. 6        Seikyō, literally, “Western Capital.” There were five cities in Tang China with this in northern Hunan, east China.name, but here it refers to the city that is present-day Luoyang, in the Huang basin

7 A slightly different version of the story appears in the Keitokudentōroku, chap. 28. 8 Because the state of the sentient (insentient (Dōgen distinguishes between the two states.mujō) is always non-emotional, that is, balanced—in this part, Masterujō) is sometimes emotional, but the state of the

9 Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I), Just as a Buddhist lecture is not only sound but also has meaning, so a mountainstream not only produces sound but also expounds Buddhist teaching. See, for example,Sansuigyō. 10 In Master Dōgen’s view, nature can only teach us the truth when we ourselves are balanced (non-emotional).

11       Ritsu-chi-chō,turning the great wheel of Dharma.” Master Gensha replied: “The flame is preachingMaster Seppō said, “The buddhas of the three times are inside the flame of the fire,“standing on the ground,” suggests politeness and eagerness to hear. standing on the ground to listen.” See Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II), Dharma for the buddhas of the three times, and the buddhas of the three times areGyōbutsu-yuigi.

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12       and as an adjective means “sacred.”Shō as a noun means “saint” or “sacred being” (as in the National Master’s words), 13 and fast rules but by freely changing his behavior to suit circumstances—he kept hisIt is an expression of the whole truth of the National Master, who lived not by hard teaching at a level that could be understood by the listener.

14    Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869), successor of Master Ungan Donjō.

15    understanding, or the viewpoint of real experience. The story is recorded in the In general, ears represent intellectual understanding whereas eyes represent intuitive shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 48; Keitokudentōroku, chap. 15.  Shinji-

16    Shimo-nin, lit., “a what person,” means a person in the ineffable state.

17    Ishin-denshin describes intuitive communication among human beings. The phrase Kattō. also appears in Chapter Forty-six,

18    Because Master Tōzan completely affirms the National Master, he wants to investigate further the National Master’s words that the saints are able to hear the non-emotional preaching the Dharma.

19    Because Master Tōzan completely affirms the National Master, he absorbs the National Master’s words without trying to understand them intellectually.

20    Fumon sounds in the story like a statement of Master Tōzan’s willingness to forego interpretation here is that hearing Master Ungan’s preaching (“[I would rather] not hear”), but Master Dōgen’s Master Tōzan’s non-emotional state. fumon, “not hearing” or “being beyond hearing,” expresses

21    The final sentence of the paragraph may be interpreted as an expression of Master Tōzan’s practice of zazen (which is itself preaching of the Dharma). In the instructions for zazen in the feeling, or emotion arises, just be aware of it.”Fukanzazengi, Shinpitsubon, Master Dōgen writes: “If a thought,

22    Shinmetsu-shinmotsu no mono, “mind-ceased body-sunk beings,” suggests, for example, practitioners who feel too sleepy to concentrate on a Buddhist lecture.

23    Mushin-mushin no monowho are thus working as an integrated whole that is indivisible into “mind” andsuggests practitioners who are in the state of action, and

“body.”

24    slow,” suggests patience in the face of passing time, which is sometimes fast (e.g.,Jisetsu-kōha o tonzen nara shime te,when we are lost in play) and sometimes slow (e.g., when we are waiting for something painful or boring to end).     “allowing moments and kalpas to be fleeting or

25    Fushigi .etc. Individually, As a compound these three characters mean mystery, wonder, miracle, marvel, fu means “not” or “beyond,” shi means “think,” and gi means “discuss,” “deliberate,” or “consider intellectually.”

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26    Shigi su. See preceding note.

27    that is, the eyes as a concrete organ. Gensho, as in Master Tōzan’s words, literally means “eyes-place.” gen, “eyes,” to indicate the eyes as the seat of sight;Sho, which means

“place” or “seat,” is suffixed to

28    Master Chōsha Keishin. See Chapter Sixty, Juppō.

29    Tsūshin-jo, oughly realized body,” is explained in Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), “the thoroughly realized body as a sense organ.” The term tsūshin,Kannon. Jo“thor-is explained in note 27.

30    Henshin-jo. Ibid.

31    Also quoted in Chapter Forty-six, Kattō.

32    Seppō-mujō. The reversal of mujō and seppō makes the non-emotional the object preached as the Dharma instead of the subject that preaches the Dharma.

33    is his posthumous title. Master Tōsu Daidō (819–914), successor of Master Suibi Mugaku. Great Master Jisai 34 In present-day Anhui province in east China.

35    The explanation in parentheses, which appears in the source text in small characters, may have been added by an editor other than Master Dōgen himself.

36    Akku naThis probably reflects an error of omission by the editor of the in the Keitokudentōroku,[shi], literally, “not to bad-mouth.” In the version of this conversation recorded chat. 15, the master’s answer is given as only Keitokudentōroku.aku, “bad.”

37    Corresponds to modern-day Fukui prefecture. 38 1243.

 

[Chapter Fifty-four]

Hōsshō

The Dharma-nature

Translator’s Note: means Dharma, that is the Buddha’s teaching, or the universe itself. Shō means essence, or nature. So hosshō means the Dharma nature, or the essence of the universe. Needless to say, we are living in the universe. Therefore what the universe means is one of the most important philosophical problems in our life. Some people insist that the universe is something spiritual. Others insist that the universe is something material. But from the Buddhist standpoint, the universe is neither spiritual nor material, but something real. It is, however, very difficult to express the universe as something real using words, because reality usually transcends explanation with words. Master Dōgen undertook this difficult task, in order to express the nature of the universe, in this chapter.

[89] When we learn in practice, sometimes following the sutras and sometimes following good counselors, we realize the truth independently, without a master.1 Independent realization without a master is the working of the Dharma-nature. Even the innately intelligent2 should, without exception, visit a master and inquire into the truth. And even those without innate intelligence should, without exception, strive in pursuit of the truth. [But] what person is not innately intelligent?3 Each follows the sutras and follows good counselors until arriving at the Buddhist effect, the truth of bodhi. Remember, getting samādhi as the Dharma-nature4 from meeting the sutras and good 201c counselors is called “the innate intelligence” getting samādhi as the Dharma nature from meeting samādhi as the Dharma-nature. It is to get wisdom that has abided from the past; it is to get the three kinds of illumination;5 it is to experience [the supreme truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi; it is to learn innate intelligence from meeting innate intelligence; and it is to receive the authentic transmission of untutored wisdom, or natural wisdom, through

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meeting untutored wisdom, or natural wisdom. If we were without innate intelligence, even if we met the sutras and good counselors we could not hear the Dharma-nature and could not experience the Dharma-nature. The great truth is not a [limited] principle like a person drinking water and naturally sensing whether it is cold or warm. All buddhas, together with all bodhisattvas and all living beings, by virtue of innate intelligence, are all realizing the great truth of all the Dharma-nature. To be realizing the great truth of the Dharma-nature by following the sutras and good counselors is to be realizing the Dharma-nature by ourselves. The sutras are the Dharma nature, and they are the self. A good counselor is the Dharma-nature and is the self. The Dharma-nature is a good counselor and the Dharma-nature is the self. Because it is the self as the Dharma-nature, it is beyond the falsely conceived selves of non-Buddhists and demons. In the Dharma-nature there is no “non-Buddhist” or “demon,” but only “Come for breakfast!”, “Come for lunch!”, and “Come for tea!” Nevertheless, when people who call themselves twenty- or thirty-year veterans witness discussion of the Dharma nature, they stumble on through life in blank oblivion. They climb upon the [master’s] round wooden chair, claiming to have become satisfied with monastic life, but when they hear the sound “Dharma-nature” or catch a sight of “Dharma-nature,” their body-and-mind, object-and-subject, usually just bob in a pit of confusion. Their state is such that they deludedly imagine that after the triple world and the ten directions which we are experiencing in the present have suddenly dropped away, then the Dharma-nature will appear, and this Dharma-nature will be other than the myriad things and

phenomena of the present. The true meaning of the Dharma-nature can never be like that. This universe of things and phenomena, and the Dharma-nature, have far transcended discussion of sameness and difference and have transcended talk of disjunction or union. Because they are beyond past, present, and future; beyond separation and constancy;6 and beyond matter, perception, thought, action, and consciousness, they are the Dharma-nature.

[94] Zen Master Baso Daijaku7 of Kōzei in Kōshū says, “All living beings, for countless kalpas, have never left samādhi as the Dharma-nature; they are always in the reality of samādhi as the Dharma-nature: putting on clothes and eating meals, speaking and conversing, the working of the six sense organs, and all actions, are totally the Dharma-nature.”8

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“The Dharma-nature” expressed by Baso is the Dharma-nature expressed by the Dharma-nature. It experiences the same state as Baso, and he is in the same state as the Dharma-nature. Having heard, how could we fail to speak? The Dharma-nature is riding on Baso.9 People eat meals, and meals eat people. Since the beginning of the Dharma-nature they have never left samādhi as the Dharma-nature. After the Dharma-nature they will not leave the Dharma-nature. Before the Dharma-nature they did not leave the Dharma nature. “The Dharma-nature” and “countless kalpas” are samādhi as the Dharma-nature itself; we call the Dharma-nature “countless kalpas.” That being so, this place here and now is the Dharma-nature, and the Dharma nature is this place here and now. “Putting on clothes and eating meals” are samādhi as the Dharma-nature putting on clothes and eating meals. The Dharma-nature as clothes is realized, the Dharma-nature as meals is realized, the Dharma-nature as eating is realized, and the Dharma-nature as dressing is realized. Without putting on clothes and eating meals, without speaking and conversing, without the working of the six sense organs, and without the performing of all actions, we are not in samādhi as the Dharma-nature and we have not entered the Dharma-nature. The realization of these words of the immediate present, handed on by the buddhas, arrives at Śākyamuni Buddha; and, authentically transmitted by the patriarchs, it has arrived at Baso. Handed on in the authentic transmission from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch, it has been authentically transmitted to samādhi as the Dharma-nature. The buddhas and the patriarchs, without entering it, cause the Dharma-nature to be a state of vigorous activity. Though literary Dharma teachers have the word “Dharma-nature,” it is not the Dharma- 202b nature expressed by Baso. Effort by living beings who never leave the Dharma-nature to be utterly beyond “the Dharma-nature”—even if [the effort] is successful—is three or four fresh instances of the Dharma-nature. Speaking, conversing, working, and acting that we think might be other than the Dharma-nature, may in fact be the Dharma-nature itself. The sun and moon for countless kalpas have been the instantaneous passing of the Dharma-nature. So they are in the present and so they will be in the future. When, seeing the quantity of the body-mind as the quantity of the body mind, we think of it as far from “the Dharma-nature,” this thinking is the

Dharma-nature itself. When, not seeing the quantity of the body-mind as

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“the quantity of the body-mind,” we think of it as beyond “the Dharma nature,” this thinking is the Dharma-nature itself. The thinking and the not thinking are both the Dharma-nature. Those who understand that, having been called “the nature,” water will not flow, and trees will stop flourishing and withering, are non-Buddhists.

[98] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Form as it is, the nature as it is.”10 So opening flowers and falling leaves are just the nature as it is.11 Stupid people, however, think that in the world of the Dharma-nature there can be no opening flowers and falling leaves. Now, without directing a question to anyone else, imagine12 your own doubt to be a statement. Treat it as the assertion of another person and investigate it three times over, and you may find that you are rid of it already. The aforementioned thought is not an evil thought; it is just a thought at a time before clarification. And at the time of clarification, there is no effort to get rid of this thought. Opening flowers and falling leaves are naturally opening flowers and falling leaves. Thinking in which it is thought that in the Dharma-nature there can be no “opening flowers and falling leaves,” is the Dharma-nature itself. It is thinking which has got free of conceptualization,13 and for this reason it is thinking as the Dharma-nature. Total thinking in thinking about the Dharma-nature has such features. Baso’s expression “the whole is the Dharma-nature,”14 truly, is eighty or ninety percent of realization. At the same time, there is much that Baso has not expressed. Namely, he does not say that all dharma-natures do not depart from the Dharma-nature, he does not say that the totality of all dharma nature is the Dharma-nature, he does not say that all living beings do not depart from [being] living beings, he does not say that all living beings are in a small part of a dharma-nature, he does not say that all living beings are in a small part of all living beings, he does not say that all dharma-natures actually exist as a small part of a living being, he does not say that a concrete half of a living being is a concrete half of the Dharma-nature, he does not say that the state without “living beings” is the Dharma-nature itself, he does not say that the Dharma-nature is beyond “identity with living beings,” he does not say that the Dharma-nature has got rid of “the Dharma-nature,” and he does not say that living beings are free of “living beings.” We can hear only that living beings do not depart from samādhi as the Dharma-nature; he does not say that the Dharma-nature cannot depart from the samādhi of

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living beings. There is no assertion that samādhi as the Dharma-nature leaves and enters samādhi as the state of living beings. Still less have we been able to hear that the Dharma-nature becomes Buddha, or to hear that living beings experience the Dharma-nature, or to hear that the Dharma-nature experiences the Dharma-nature. There is no expression about the non-emotional not leaving the Dharma-nature. Now, I would like to ask Baso: What is it that you call “living beings”? If what you call “living beings” is the Dharma nature, the state is “This is something coming like this.”15 If what you call “living beings” is living beings, the state is “To describe a thing does not hit the target.”16 Speak at once! Speak at once!

                                    Shōbōgenzō Hōsshō

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     Esshū17 at the beginning of winter18 in the first   year of the Japanese era of Kangen.19

 

Notes

1 Mushi-dokugo. See also opening paragraph of Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), Shisho. 2 Shōchi. paragraph of Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II), This term, which may be Confucian in origin, is also discussed in the opening Daigo; and in Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV),

Shizen-biku.

3     point here is that every person’s mind naturally inclines toward seeking out the truth. There is the person of innate intelligence. In the Buddha’s teaching there are no people Cf. Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV), of innate intelligence.” In that chapter, Master Dōgen’s point is to emphasize that intelligence or understanding comes with experience of life, not as a birthright. The Shizen-biku, paragraph 54: “In the writings of Confucius

4     Experiencing the Self”), expressing the Hōsshō-zanmai. Zanmai represents the Sanskrit word samādhi appears in the titles of three chapters of Jishō-zanmaisamādhi,(“Samādhi which means the, State of balanced state in zazen. The word Shōbōgenzō: Chapter Seventy-five (Vol. IV),

as the mutual relation between subject and object in the moment of the present; and expressing the practice of zazen itself. Together with the present chapter one (Vol. II), Chapter Seventy-two, Kai-in-zanmaiZanmai-ō-zanmai(“Samādhisamādhi, State Like the Sea”), expressing (“The from the subjective side; Chapter Thirty-Samādhi That Is King of SamādhisamādhiHōsshō,s), chapters.which adds the objective viewpoint, these can be seen as forming one group of four

5     past lives, 2) supernatural vision, 3) the ability to end the superfluous. Sanmyō (“three kinds of illumination”), from the Sanskrit tisro vidyāh: 1) knowing

6     viewpoints, materialism and idealism. gedō the view that sees all things as isolated instances of time and space, that is, materialism. Jōken,Danjōand means materialism and idealism. lit., “view of constancy” or “view of eternity,” represents idealism. jōken-gedō are traditional expressions of the two fundamental non-Buddhist Danken, lit., “view of separation,” represents Danken-

7     Master Baso Dōitsu (704–788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejō. Zen Master Daijakuis his posthumous title.

8     Kōsonshukugoroku, chap. 1.

9     Baso literally means “Horse Patriarch.”

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10    the reality called “all Nyoze-sō, nyoze-shō, from the dharmas”: “What is called ‘all Lotus Sutra, Hōben. In the dharmaLotus Sutra,s’ is form as it is, thethe subject is nature as it is. . . .” (LS 1.68)

11    Kaike-yōraku, phenomenal forms which human thinking tends to oppose to the universal essence. “opening flowers, leaves falling,” represents the world of changing

12    after. Emo. EEmomeans depend on, follow, or be based upon. therefore suggests the forming of a model, image, representation, or con-Mo means copy, imitate, or model caption of something based upon the thing itself.

13    Emo. See preceding note.

14    Jin-ze-hōsshō. In the quotation, read as kotogotoku kore hōsshō nari, these characters mean “. . . are totally the Dharma-nature.”

15    Shinji-shōbōgenzō ,Master Daikan Enō’s words on first meeting his disciple Master Nangaku Ejō. Seept. 2, no. 1; and for example Chapter Sixty-two, Hensan.

16    Master Nangaku Ejō’s words to Master Daikan Enō eight years later. Ibid.

17    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture. 18 The tenth month of the lunar calendar. 19 1243.

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[Chapter Fifty-five]

Darani

Dhāraṇī

Translator’s Note: The Chinese characters pronounced da-ra-ni represent the Sanskrit dhāraṇī, which originally means a spell or incantation that is believed to have mystical omnipotence. But Master Dōgen’s interpretation was more concrete, and especially he esteemed the value of prostrations as dhāraṇī. In this chapter he explains the meaning of prostrations as dhāraṇī.

[103] Those whose eyes of learning in practice are clear, are clear in the eye 203a of the right Dharma. Because they are clear in the eye of the right Dharma, they are able to be clear-eyed in learning in practice. The authentic transmission of this pivot is inevitably due to the influence of paying respect to a great good counselor, which is the great purpose itself and the great dhāraṇī itself. “A great good counselor” means a Buddhist patriarch, to whom, without fail, we should sincerely serve towel and flask.1 Thus, in “bringing tea” and in “making tea” the “pivot of the mind”2 is realized, and “mystical powers” are realized. “Bringing a tub of water” and “pouring water away” are the state of “not disturbing circumstances,”3 and of “witnessing everything from the wings.”4 [To perform such service] is not only to learn the pivot of the Buddhist patriarchs’ mind; it is to meet, inside the pivot of the mind, with one Buddhist patriarch or with two Buddhist patriarchs. It is not only to receive and to use the Buddhist patriarchs’ mystical powers; it is to have got, inside the state of mystical power, seven Buddhist patriarchs or Buddhist patriarchs. Thus, all the mystical power of the Buddhist patriarchs is perfectly realized in this one bundle. Every aspect of the pivot of the mind of the Buddhist patriarchs is perfectly realized in this one stroke. For this reason, although it is not wrong to use heavenly flowers and divine incense in paying respect to Buddhist patriarchs, to pay respect and to serve offerings with an act of dhāraṇī in the state of samādhi is just to be a child or grandchild of the Buddhist patriarchs.

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[106] What I have called “the great dhāraṇī” is personal salutations.5 Because personal salutations are the great dhāraṇī, we mutually encounter the reality of personal salutations. The word for personal salutations, ninji, which represents the sound of the Chinese word, has long been current in civilized society, but [the custom of personal salutations] was neither received from the Brahma Heavens nor received from the Western Heavens; its authentic transmission has been received from the Buddhist patriarchs. It is beyond the limited world of sound and form. Do not discuss it as before or after Buddha King of Majestic Voice. The personal salutations of which I speak are the burning of incense and prostration. We have as our original master the master who made us a monk, or the master who transmitted to us the Dharma. And sometimes the master who transmitted to us the Dharma is the master who made us a monk. Unfailingly to depend upon and pay respect to these original masters is a dhāraṇī that invokes their teaching. We should, as is often said, practice under them and serve them without wasting a single moment. At the beginning and end of the retreat, at the winter solstice, and at the beginning and middle of the month, we burn incense and do prostrations without fail. The method is as follows: Either before breakfast or just after breakfast, which are the established times, we visit the master’s quarters dressed in the dignified manner. Dressed in the dignified manner means wearing the kaṣāya, carrying the prostration cloth, and wearing sandals and socks;6 dressed like this, and carrying a stick of aloes, sandalwood, or other incense, we proceed [to the master’s quarters]. When we come in front of the master, we bow with joined hands.7 Then the attendant monk prepares the incense burner and sets up a candle. If the master is already seated on the master’s chair, we may burn incense at once. And if the master is behind the curtain,8 we may burn incense at once. At times when the master is lying down, eating, or the like, we may burn incense straight away too. If the master is standing on the ground, as we bow with joined hands we should ask the master to be seated. Or we may ask the master to be comfortable: there are many formulas for asking the master to be seated. After we have got the master to sit on the master’s chair, we bow with joined hands, bowing low according to the proper method. Having completed the greeting, we walk up to the front of the incense desk and place in the incense burner the stick of incense that we have been carrying. The incense

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to be used is sometimes tucked under the back of the collar, sometimes held in an inside breast pocket, and sometimes carried in the sleeves; it is a matter of individual preference. After the bow of greeting, we take out this piece of incense. If it is wrapped in paper, we turn our shoulders to our right hand side, and remove the wrapping paper. Then we lift the incense up with both hands and stand it in the burner. We should stand it up straight. Do not let it lean to one side. After setting up the piece of incense we fold the hands9 and walk 203c around to the right. When we arrive in front of the master we bow deeply with joined hands according to the proper method, spread the prostration cloth, and do prostrations. We do nine prostrations, or sometimes twelve prostrations. Having completed the prostrations, we fold the prostration cloth and bow with joined hands. In some cases, having spread the prostration cloth once and done three prostrations, we pay the compliments of the season. But for the nine prostrations [described] now, we should just do three rounds of three prostrations with the prostration cloth spread once,10 and not say the season’s greetings. The above formality has been transmitted from the Seven Buddhas in the distant past, and we have received its authentic transmission as the fundamental teaching. Therefore we practice this formality. Whenever the time comes to do prostrations like this, we do so without fail.

[110] In addition, we do prostrations whenever we have been covered by the benevolence of Dharma.11And we do prostrations in order to request the [master’s] teaching on a story.12 When, in the past, the Second Patriarch presented his viewpoint to the First Patriarch, that was an example of doing three prostrations.13 To exhibit the presence of the right Dharma-eye treasury, we do three prostrations. Remember, prostration is the right Dharma-eye treasury, and the right Dharma-eye treasury is the great dhāraṇī. For prostrations when requesting the teaching, recently many people do one prostration in which the head bumps the ground,14 but the traditional standard is three prostrations. The prostration of thanks for the benevolence of Dharma is not necessarily nine prostrations or twelve prostrations: it may be three prostrations, or one informal prostration,15 or six prostrations. All of these are prostrations in which the head is bowed down to the ground16—in India these are called “the highest worship.”17 In doing six prostrations, for instance, we hit the ground with the head; that is, we strike the forehead upon the ground,

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even to the point of bleeding. For these prostrations also, the prostration cloth is laid out. Whether doing one prostration, three prostrations, or six prostrations, we hit the ground with the forehead. This is sometimes called “kow-

204a towing.”18 Such prostration is present in secular society too; in secular society there are nine kinds of prostration. When [requesting] the benevolence of Dharma, we also have continuous prostrations; that is to say, we do prostrations ceaselessly, continuing even for hundreds or thousands of prostrations. All of these are prostrations that have been practiced in the orders of Buddhist patriarchs. In general, we should practice these prostrations according to the proper method, observing the master’s directions. In general, while prostrations exist in the world the Buddha-Dharma exists in the world. If prostrations disappear, the Buddha-Dharma will perish.

[112] When we are prostrating ourselves to the master who transmitted to us the Dharma, we prostrate ourselves without selecting a time or worrying about the place: sometimes we do prostrations while [the master] is lying down or eating, or even while [the master] is going to the toilet; sometimes we prostrate from afar, with fences and walls between us, or with mountains and rivers between us; sometimes we prostrate with kalpas between us; sometimes we prostrate with living-and-dying and coming-and-going between us; and sometimes we prostrate with the state of bodhi, and nirvana, between us. While the disciple performs these many kinds of prostration, the master does not return the prostration, but only joins hands.19 Occasionally [the master] may do a single prostration, but as a general rule [the master] does not. At the time of such prostrations, we always prostrate ourselves facing north. The master, facing south, sits erect. The disciple stands on the ground before the master, facing north, and, aiming at the master, [the disciple] prostrates to the master. This is the original standard. It is an authentic tradition that when devoted right belief emerges in us, a prostration facing north is inevitably the first thing we do. Thus, in the day of the World-honored One, the human multitudes, celestial throngs, and dragon herds that devoted themselves to

204b the Buddha all faced north to venerate and to do prostrations to the World honored One. At the very beginning, the five companions20—Ājñāta-Kauṇ- ḍinya,21Aśvajit, Mahānāma, Bhadrika, and Bāṣpa22—after the Tathāgata had realized the truth, rose unconsciously to face the Tathāgata and to offer their prostrations to him, facing north. When non-Buddhists and bands of demons

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devoted themselves to the Buddha, having discarded the false, they inevitably prostrated themselves facing north, even though they were caused to do so neither by themselves nor by others. Since that time, all those who have come to the orders of the twenty-eight generations of ancestral masters in the Western Heavens and the many generations of ancestral masters in the Eastern Lands, wishing to devote themselves to the right Dharma, have naturally prostrated themselves facing north. This is the state of compliance with the right Dharma; it is beyond the intention of master and disciple. This is the great dhāraṇī itself. “There is a great dhāraṇī, and it is called round realization.23 There is a great dhāraṇī, and it is called personal salutations. There is a great dhāraṇī, and it is a realized prostration. There is a great dhāraṇī, and its name is the kaṣāya. There is a great dhāraṇī, and its name is the right Dharma-eye treasury.” By this incantation, we have pacified and protected the whole earth, we have pacified and established the whole universe, we have pacified and manifested the whole sphere of time, we have pacified and built the whole world of Buddha, and we have pacified and realized the inside of our huts and the outside of our huts. We should learn in practice, penetrate, and discern that great dhāraṇī is like this. All dhāraṇīs see this dhāraṇī as their mother-word. As dependents of this dhāraṇī, all dhāraṇīs are realized. All Buddhist patriarchs inevitably experience establishment of the mind, pursuit of the truth, realization of the truth, and turning of the Dharma wheel, through this gate of dhāraṇī. That being so, now that we are already the children and grandchildren of Buddhist patriarchs, we should painstakingly investigate this dhāraṇī.

[116] In sum, that which was covered by the robe of Śākyamuni Buddha is that which has been covered by the robes of all the Buddhist patriarchs of the ten directions. That which was covered by the robe of Śākyamuni Buddha 204c is that which is covered by the kaṣāya. The kaṣāya is the banner of Buddhists. This conclusion is hard to arrive at and hard to meet. Though we are stupid, having received the rare human body in a remote land, the good influence of long-accumulated dhāraṇī has been realized, and we have been born to meet the Dharma of Śākyamuni Buddha. Though we do prostrations to the selfrealized and externally realized Buddhist patriarchs in a place of one hundred weeds, it is Śākyamuni Buddha’s realization of the truth, it is Śākyamuni

Buddha’s effort in pursuit of the truth, and it is the mystical transformation

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of dhāraṇī. Though we do prostrations to past buddhas and present buddhas in countless trillions of kalpas, they are a moment covered by Śākyamuni Buddha’s robe. For the kaṣāya to cover the body once is already to have got Śākyamuni Buddha’s body and flesh, hands and feet, head and eyes, marrow and brains, state of brightness, and turning of the Dharma wheel. Such is the state in which we wear the kaṣāya. This is the realization of wearing the merit of the kaṣāya. We retain it and rely upon it, we love it and enjoy it, we preserve it and protect it as time passes, and we wear it to do prostrations and serve offerings to Śākyamuni Buddha. In so doing, we definitely realize and perfectly realize triple asaṃkhya kalpas of training. To do prostrations and serve offerings to Śākyamuni Buddha means, in some instances, to do prostrations and serve offerings to the master who transmitted to us the Dharma, or to do prostrations and serve offerings to the master who shaved our head. It is just to meet Śākyamuni Buddha, to serve Śākyamuni Buddha with an offering of Dharma, and to serve Śākyamuni Buddha with an offering of dhāraṇī. My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, said in his preaching,

“Coming over the snow to do prostrations,24 and remaining amid rice flour25 to do prostrations, are excellent examples. They are the precedents of the ancestors. They are the great dhāraṇī.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Darani

Preached to the assembly at Kippōji in Esshū,26   in the first year of Kangen.27

Notes

1     Fifty-six, Kinbyō, “towel and flask,” are two of a monk’s traditional possessions. See Chapter Senmen. Serving towel and flask means serving in daily life.

2     allude to a conversation between Master Ryūtan Sōshin and his master, Tennō Dōgo:Keisa-rai, lit., “holding up tea and coming,” and shinyō, “the pivot of the mind,”

       One day [Sōshin] asked, “Since I came here I have not received any instruction aboutthe pivot of the mind.” [Dō]go said, “Since you came I have done nothing but demon-strate the pivot of the mind to you.” Master [Sōshin] said, “Where did you demonstrate?” [Dō]go said, “You came bringing tea, I received it for you. You came servingfood, I received it for you. When you paid your respects (lit., “performed then I lowered my head. Where did I not demonstrate the pivot of the mind?” Master[Sōshin] lowered his head for a while. (Keitokudentōroku, chap. 14)                    vandana”),

3     Sha-sui-rai, “pouring water away,” and fu-dōjaku-kyō, “not disturbing circumstances,” allude to a story about Master Nansen Fugan and Master Godai Impō (also knownas Tō Impō): Nansen one day sees Tō Impō approaching. He points to a water jar and says, “The jar is circumstances. Inside the jar there is water. Without disturbing the water before Nansen and pours. Nansen leaves it at that. The story is recorded in Shinji-shōbōgenzō, , bring some water to this old monk.” Im[pō] then brings the jar ofpt. 1, no. 64; Chapter Eighty-one (Vol. IV), Ō-saku-sendaba.

4     story about Master Isan Reiyū and his disciples, Master Kyōgen Chikan and Master Tensa-rai, “making tea,” amen-ryōchi,jinzū,“witnessing everything from the wings,” all allude to a “mystical powers,” kansui-rai, “bringing a tub of water,” and

tub of water to wash his face. Kyōgen said that he had been watching from the wings, Kyōzan Ejaku: After Master Isan had woken up from a nap Kyōzan brought him a standing of the situation. Kyōgen went to make some tea. Isan praised them, saying,and had witnessed everything clearly. Master Isan asked him to express his under-

Shinji-shōbōgenzō, of Śāriputra and Maudgalyāyana.” The story is recorded in Chinese characters in the Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), “The mystical powers and the wisdom of you two disciples are far superior to tho sept. 1, no. 61, and is paraphrased by Master Dōgen in Japanese in Jinzū.

5     Ninji refers to a monk’s salutation to his master, by burning incense and doing prostrations.

6     in Japan today. Socks of thick white material are still part of the formal attire of monks and priests

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Shōbōgenzō Volume III

7     of the hands together (the Sanskrit Monjin, lit., to ask [how someone is] or to inquire after [someone’s health], represents pratisammodana.gasshō-monjin Concretely, ) or with the left hand curled round the thumb monjin means to bow either with the palm sshashu-monjin). and the right hand covering the back of the left hand (

8     The master’s room would sometimes be divided by a cloth curtain thin enough to see through.

9     Shashu. See note 7.

10    three prostrations.” Taken literally, this seems to suggest that the prostration cloth Itten-sanpai o sandō arubeki,should be spread and folded three times, but it is natural to assume that the cloth was spread once for all nine prostrations. “there should be three rounds of one spreading and

11    Hō-eki, “Dharma benevolence” means a master’s preaching of Dharma.

12    Innen, “causes and circumstances,” originally meant the concrete causes and cir-nidāna in genzō. story or episode such as the ones recorded by Master Dōgen in the Chapter Twenty-four [Vol. II],  constancies pertinent to a violation of the precepts (see explanation of Bukkyō). By extension it came to mean any Buddhist Shinji-shōbō-

13    See Chapter Forty-six, Kattō, paragraph 90.

14    Ton-ippai. TonIppai means “one prostration. “means a prostration in which one places one’s head on the ground.

15    Sokurai-ippai. Soku means to touch. Rai means bow. In this case, the prostration the prostration cloth. prostration,” which is a formal prostration done with the prostration cloth completely cloth, still folded into four, is placed on the ground, and only the forehead touches Sokurai, lit., “touching bow,” is opposed to tenpai, lit., “unfolded.

16    this prostration the forehead is lowered to the ground and the palms are turned upward represents the Sanskrit Keishu-hai. Kei means to strike, hit, or tap; vandana. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. In performing Shu means the head or the neck. Keishu and raised as if to receive the feet of the person being bowed to.

17    Sanskrit Terms. Saijō-raihai represents the meaning of the Sanskrit anuttara-pūjā. See Glossary of 18 Tonshu-hai. Ton is explained in note 14.

19    of the fingers roughly in line with the nostrils. See also note 7.Gasshō. In gasshō the palms are brought together in front of the chest, with the tips

20    It is said that when he left them to pursue the truth on his own, they felt he had given up. But when the Buddha returned after realizing the truth they were so struck by his The group of five ascetic practitioners whom Śākyamuni joined in ascetic training.

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Dasabala-Kassapa).sources give the fifth of the five companions not as Bāṣpa but as Daśabala-Kāśyapa.In Pāli, the five are Āññāta-Koṇḍañña, Assaji, Mahānāman, Bhadiya, and Vappa (or Four Noble Truths to them, and they became the first members of the sangha. Some dignity that they all prostrated themselves to him facing north. Then he preached the

21    Anyakyōjinnyo represents in Chinese characters the sound of the original Sanskrit name Kauṇḍinya. For each of the five names, the original text contains a note in small name Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya. Because he was the first to recognize the meaning of the Buddha’s first teaching, Ājñāta, which means “known,” was prefixed to his original characters giving a Chinese abbreviation of the Sanskrit. In this case the abbreviated version is Korin.

22    Bafu is a transliteration of the Sanskrit Bāṣpa. The note in small characters, however,

Daśabala-Kāśyapa.gives Riki-Kashō. This stands for Jūriki-Kashō, lit., “Ten-Powers Kāśyapa,” that is,

23    U-dai-darani, myō-i-engakuwhich says possesses the gate of “possesses,” but in Master Dōgen’s sentences, because there is no subject, mujō-hō-ō-u-darani-mon, myo-i-engaku, dhāraṇī, which is called round realization.” In the sutra, alludes to the sutra Daihōkōengakushutararyōgikyō“The supreme Dharma Kinguumeansmeans

“there is.”

24    It is said that when Master Taiso Eka first met Master Bodhidharma at Shōrin Temple the mountain was covered in thick snow. 25 Master Daikan Enō, who was a woodcutter before entering the order of Master Daiman

Kōnin, could not afford to live with the other monks, so he supported himself by pounding rice in a hut in the monastery.

26 Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 27 1243.

 

[Chapter Fifty-six]

Senmen

Washing the Face

Translator’s Note: Sen means to wash, and men means the face. Idealistic religions generally revere only the spiritual side of the world; everyday activities such as eating meals, getting dressed, washing the face, and taking a bath are not considered to be religious practices. Buddhism, however, is a religion based on the real world; these everyday activities are important religious practices without which there can be no Buddhist life. This is why, when a Chinese Buddhist master was asked by his disciple, “What is the fundamental principle of Buddhism?” the master answered “Wearing clothes and eating meals.” Master Dōgen put the greatest value on the practice of washing the face. In this chapter he explains the Buddhist meaning in the daily activities of taking a bath and washing the face. [121] The Sutra of the Flower of Dharma says:

[The bodhisattva] applies oil to the body,

Having bathed away dust and dirt,

And puts on a fresh and clean robe: Totally clean within and without.1

[122]       This is the Dharma that the Tathāgata, in the order of the Flower of Dharma, preaches to practitioners of the four peaceful and joyful practices.2 It is not on the level of preaching in other orders, and it cannot be equaled by other sutras. So to bathe the body-mind, to apply fragrant oil, and to get rid of dust and dirt, are Buddha-Dharma of the highest priority. To put on a fresh and clean robe is a method of purification. When we bathe away dust and dirt and apply fragrant oil to the body, inside-and-outside will be totally clean. When inside-and-outside is totally clean, object-and-subject is pure and clean.

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[123]       Nevertheless, stupid people who neither hear the Buddha-Dharma or enter into the Buddha’s truth say: “Bathing merely washes the body’s skin, but inside the body there are the five viscera3 and six entrails.4 Without bathing each of these, we cannot be pure and clean. So we need not necessarily bathe the body’s surface.” People who speak like this have never known or heard the Buddha-Dharma, have never met a true teacher, and have never met a child or grandchild of the Buddhist patriarchs.

[124]       Now, throwing away such words of people of wrong views, we should learn in practice the right Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs. The limits of all dharmas have never been determined, and the inside and outside

of the elements5 are impossible to grasp. Therefore, the inside and outside of the body-mind also are impossible to grasp. Even so, when a bodhisattva in the ultimate body is just about to sit upon a bodhi-seat and realize the truth, [the bodhisattva] first washes the kaṣāya and then bathes the body-mind. This is the dignified behavior of the buddhas of the ten directions in the three times. Bodhisattvas in the ultimate body are different from other beings in all matters: their virtue, wisdom, and adornment of the body-mind, are all supremely venerable and supremely high. The same may be true of their methods of bathing and washing. Moreover, people’s bodies and minds, and the limits thereof, differ according to time. It is said that during one sitting the three-thousand worlds are all sat away, and although, during that time, this is so, it is beyond the supposition of self or others: it is a virtue of the Buddha-Dharma. The dimension of the body-mind [that is bathed], again, is beyond “five feet” or “six feet,” because five feet or six feet are beyond what has been decided as “five feet” or “six feet.” The place where it exists also is beyond limited and unlimited areas such as “this world,” “the external world,” “the whole world,” and “the infinite universe,” because “This concrete place is where something ineffable exists—explain it as fine or explain it as coarse.”6 The dimension of the mind, again, cannot be known by thinking and discriminating, and cannot be fathomed by not thinking and not discriminating. Because the dimension of the body-mind is like this, the dimension of bathing is also like this. To grasp this dimension and to practice and experience it is that which the buddhas and the patriarchs guard and desire. We should not see our conception of ourselves as foremost, and we should not see our conception of ourselves as real. Thus, when we bathe and wash like this we perfectly realize

the dimension of body and the dimension of mind and we make them pure and clean. Whether [the body-mind] is the four elements,7 the five aggregates,8 or the immortal essence, in bathing it can be totally pure and clean. This is 205c not to say that we should see ourselves as pure and clean only after we have brought water and washed. How could water be originally pure or be originally impure? Even if it is originally pure or originally impure, we do not claim that it causes the place we bring it to be pure or impure. The fact is simply that, when we maintain and rely upon the practice and experience of the Buddhist patriarchs, buddha-methods such as using water to wash and bathing in water are transmitted. When we practice and experience on this basis, we transcend purity, pass through impurity, and get free of non-purity and nonimpurity. Thus, the practice of washing and bathing even though we have not become dirty, and of washing and bathing even though we are already wholly pure and clean, is maintained and relied upon only in the Buddhist patriarchs’ truth: it is beyond the knowledge of non-Buddhists. If it were as stupid people say, even if we ground the five viscera and six entrails to a dust as fine as air and used all the water of the great ocean to wash them, unless we also washed inside each particle of dust how could they be pure and clean? Without washing the inside of emptiness,9 how can we realize “cleanness within and without”? Stupid fellows can never know the method of bathing emptiness. We utilize emptiness to bathe emptiness and utilize emptiness to bathe the body-mind. Those who believe in bathing as the Dharma are maintaining and relying upon the practice and experience of the Buddhist patriarchs. That is to say, in the right Dharma authentically transmitted by rightful successors, buddha to buddha and patriarch to patriarch, when we practice bathing, the body-mind within and without, the five viscera and six entrails, the duality of object and subject, and the inside, the outside, and the middle of the Dharma world and space, are instantly pure and clean. When we use incense or flowers for purification, the past, the present, and the future, causes-and-circumstances, and practice, are instantly pure and clean. The Buddha says,

Bathing three times, spreading fragrance three times,

The body-mind is pure and clean.10

   Thus, the method of purifying the body and of purifying the mind is, inevitably, to bathe once and to spread fragrance once, and to do likewise

again and again, “bathing three times, spreading fragrance three times,” then to bow to buddhas, to read sutras, to sit in zazen, and to practice walking.11 After walking, when we are ready once more to sit erect in zazen, it is said that we must always wash the feet. Even though the feet are not dirty or defiled, the method of the Buddhist patriarchs is like this. In general, in the words “Bathing three times and spreading fragrance three times,” bathing once means taking one bath,12 that is, bathing the whole body. After so doing, and getting dressed as usual, we burn some fine incense in a small censer and spread the fragrance inside the lapels, over the kaṣāya, around our sitting place, and so on. After that, we take another bath and spread fragrance again. To do this three times is a method that accords with the Dharma. At this time, although the six sense organs and their six objects do not newly arrive, the virtue of purity is present; it manifests itself before us and is beyond doubt. The fact that, although we had not intended to dispel the three poisons13 and the four upset states,14 the virtue of purity has manifested itself before us at once, is the Buddha-Dharma. Who could fathom it with the common intellect? What person could glimpse it with common eyes? For example, when we clean and purify aloes,15 we must not break it into fragments to wash it and we must not grind it into particles to wash it; we can make it pure and clean by washing its body.

[130] In the Buddha-Dharma, without fail, washing methods have been prescribed. We wash the body, wash the mind, wash the feet, wash the face, wash the eyes, wash the mouth, wash the anus and urethra, wash the hands, wash the pātra, wash the kaṣāya, and wash the head. All these are the right

Dharma of the buddhas and the patriarchs of the three times. When we are

going to serve offerings to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, bringing assorted incense, we first wash our hands, then rinse the mouth and wash the face, put on clean clothes, get some fresh water in a clean basin, and wash the incense; after that, we serve offerings to the domain of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. We hope to be able to serve to the Three Treasures offerings of sandalwood incense from the Malaya Mountains,16 washed in water of the eight virtues17 from Lake Anavatapta.

[132] Washing the face has been transmitted from India in the west, and it has spread through China in the east. Though [the method] is clarified in various collections18 of the precepts, that which is transmitted and retained by the Buddhist patriarchs may be still more authentic and traditional. Not only has it been practiced by buddhas and by patriarchs for hundreds of years; it is spread throughout koṭis of thousand myriad kalpas of the past and future. Not only is it to get rid of grime and grease; it is the lifeblood of the Buddhist patriarchs. [Sutras] say that, without washing the face, it is wrong both to receive a prostration and to make a prostration to others.

I prostrate myself, and prostrate to him; Subject of prostration and object of prostration:

[One] nature empty and serene,19 The nature is to get free.20

Therefore, we must unfailingly wash the face. As regards a time for washing the face, in some cases the fifth night watch,21 and in some cases dawn, are the times. When my late master was master of Tendō Temple, he established the third period22 of the third watch as the time. Carry skirt23 and jacket24 with you to the washstand. The hand towel25 is a sheet of cloth with a length of one jo and two shaku.26 Its color must not be white; white is prohibited. The Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms says, “There are five points to observe in using the hand towel: 1) Use the top and bottom ends for wiping. 2) Use one end for wiping the hands and the other end for wiping the face. 3) Do not wipe the nose with it. 4) Wash [the hand towel] at once after it has been used to wipe grease or dirt. 5) Do not use it to wipe 206c the body; when taking a bath, each person should have their own towel.” When carrying the hand towel, hold it as follows: Fold the hand towel in two and hang it over the left forearm near the elbow. Half the hand towel is for wiping the face and half for wiping the hands. Not to wipe the nose means not to wipe the inside of the nose or nasal mucus. Do not use the hand towel to wipe the armpits, the back, the belly, the navel, the thighs, or the lower legs. When it becomes soiled with dirt and grease, wash it. When it becomes wet or damp, dry it by a fire or in the sun. Do not use the hand towel when taking a bath. The cloud hall washroom is the rear washstand,27 and the rear washstand is located to the west of the illuminated hall28—this is the building layout which has been transmitted to us. For huts in the temple grounds and single quarters, [a washstand] is built at a convenient place. An abbot washes the face in the abbot’s quarters. Washstands are suitably provided at the residences of aged monks and retired veteran monks. While lodging in the cloud hall, an abbot will wash at the rear washstand. When you arrive at the washstand, hang the center of the hand towel around the back of your neck, and pull the two ends forward over the left and right shoulders. Then, with left and right hands, bring the left and right ends of the hand towel under the left and right armpit and around to the back. Cross the two ends over behind your back, then bring the left end across to your right and the right end across to your left, and tie them together in front of your chest. Thus, the collar of the jacket is covered by the hand towel, and the sleeves are tucked up above the elbows by the hand towel. Below the elbows, the

207a forearms and hands are exposed. For example, it is like having the sleeves tucked up by a tasuki sash.29After that, if in the rear washstand, take a washbowl to the cauldron and get a bowlful of hot water, then come back and place it on the washstand. If somewhere else, put hot water from a hot water tub into the washbowl.30

[136] Next use the willow twig. In the mountain-temples of the great kingdom of Song today the practice of chewing the willow twig, having long since died out, is not transmitted, and so they have no places for chewing the willow twig. But today at Eiheiji on Kichijōzan31 we have a place for chewing the willow twig—it is a new arrangement. On arriving there the first thing we should do is chew the willow twig. Taking a willow twig in the right hand, make a dhāraṇī-vow. The “Pure Conduct” chapter of the Garland Sutra says:

Taking the willow twig in the hand, Pray that all living beings

Will get the right Dharma in their mind, And be naturally pure and clean.

After reciting this sentence and before proceeding to chew the willow

twig, recite as follows:

Chewing the willow twig at dawn, Pray that all living beings Get conquering teeth, To chew up troubles.

After reciting this sentence, chew the willow twig. The length of the willow twig is the width of four fingers, of eight fingers, of twelve fingers, or of sixteen fingers. The Precepts for the Great Sangha,32 article thirty-four, says, “Use a twig for the teeth of suitable size, sixteen fingers at the longest, and four fingers at the shortest.” Remember, [the twig] should not be made shorter than four fingers, and longer than sixteen fingers is not a suitable size. The thickness is “the thickness of the little finger.” At the same time, there is nothing to prevent [the twig] being thinner. The shape is “the shape of the little finger”: one end is thick, the other end is thin. The thicker end is chewed into fine fibers. The Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms says, “The chewed end must not exceed three bu.”33 Chew the twig thoroughly, and then rub and wash the front of the teeth and the back of the teeth, as if polishing them. Rub and polish, and wash and rinse, again and again. Thoroughly polish and wash the base of the teeth, above the gums. Carefully scrape clean the gaps between the teeth, and wash them clean. If the mouth is rinsed out 207b repeatedly, [the teeth] will be rinsed clean. Next, scrape the tongue. The Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms says, “There are five points in scraping the tongue: 1) Do no more than three sets. 2) Stop if blood appears on the surface of the tongue. 3) Do not dirty the saṃghāṭī robe, or the feet, by waving the hand too far. 4) Do not throw away the willow twig on a path where people walk. 5) Always be in a secluded place.” “Three sets of scraping the tongue” means that we rinse the mouth with water then scrape and scrape the tongue, and repeat this three times. It does not mean to do [only] three scrapes. Heed the warning to stop if blood appears. Concerning the need to scrape the tongue thoroughly, the Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms says, “Cleansing the mouth means chewing the willow twig, rinsing out the mouth, and scraping the tongue.” Thus, the willow twig has been guarded and retained by Buddhist patriarchs and by the children and grandchildren of Buddhist patriarchs.

[139] The Buddha was living at Veṇuvana Park34 in Rājagṛha,35 together with one thousand two hundred and fifty bhikṣus. It was the first of December, on which day King Prasenajit36 was preparing a meal. Bright and early in the morning, with his own hand he offered the Buddha a willow twig. The Buddha accepted it and when he had finished chewing it he threw what remained onto the ground. It at once started to grow. With roots and shoots springing forth in profusion, and twigs and leaves spreading like a cloud, it rose to a height of five hundred yojanas. Its circumference was of the same order. By and by it produced flowers too, [each] as big as a carriage wheel. Finally it also bore fruits, [each] the size of a five-gallon jar.37 The roots, branches, twigs, and leaves were solely of the seven treasures, whose assorted colors shone with extraordinary beauty. Brightness emanating from the colors eclipsed the sun and moon. To the taste, the fruit was more delicious than nectar.38 The fragrance filled the four quarters, and all who sensed it felt glad in their hearts. A fragrant breeze came blowing, whereupon, pushing and prodding each other, the twigs and leaves all gave out a melodious sound, which unfurled the pivot of the Dharma, and which listeners never grew tired of hearing. The reverence and belief of all people who witnessed this transformation of the tree grew more and more pure and deep. The Buddha thereupon preached the Dharma, and their minds, receptive to his intention, were all enlightened. Those pursuing the state of Buddha attained the effect and were born in heaven—their numbers were very great.39

[142] The method of serving offerings to the Buddha and to the sangha is, of necessity, to offer a willow twig at dawn. After that, various other offerings are prepared. There are many examples of willow twigs being offered to the Buddha, and many examples of the Buddha using the willow twig, but for now I shall just quote the story of King Prasenajit offering the willow twig with his own hand, and the story of the tall tree, because they deserve to be known. It was also on this day that the six non-Buddhist teachers40 were each defeated by the Buddha; they ran away in astonishment and awe, and finally each of the six teachers “threw himself into a river to drown. Nine koṭis of followers of the six teachers all came seeking to be disciples of the Buddha. The Buddha said, “Welcome bhikṣus!” and their beards and hair fell away naturally, the Dharma robe covered their bodies, and they all became śramaṇas.41 The Buddha preached to them the Dharma and demonstrated the pivot of the Dharma. They ended the superfluous, dissolved [all] bonds, and attained arhathood.”42 Thus, because the Tathāgata was already in the habit of using the willow twig, humans beings and gods offered the willow twig to him. Clearly, chewing the willow twig is a practice which buddhas, bodhisattvas, and the Buddha’s disciples unfailingly retain. If we fail to practice it, the method will be lost. Would that not be regrettable?

[144]        The Sutra of the Pure Net Bodhisattva Precepts says:

Disciples of the Buddha! Always practice dhūta43 in two periods of the year, sit in zazen in winter and summer, and observe the summer retreat.44 Always use the willow twig, [powdered] beans for washing, the three robes, a water bottle, the pātra, a prostration cloth, a staff,45 an incense burner, a bag for filtering water, a hand towel, a knife, a flint, tweezers, a rope stool,46 sutras, precepts, a buddha image, and a bodhisattva statue. When bodhisattvas go practicing dhūta, and when they travel, even if the journey is hundreds of miles or thousands of miles, these eighteen things should always go with them. The dhūta last from the fifteenth 208a of the first lunar month to the fifteenth of the third lunar month, and from the fifteenth of the eighth lunar month to the fifteenth of the tenth lunar month. During these two periods, the eighteen articles should always be with you. They should be as wings to a bird.

[145]        None of these eighteen articles should be missing. If any were missing, it would be like a bird having lost a wing. Even with one wing remaining, it could never fly. Its conditions would not be those of the way of the birds. Bodhisattvas are also like this. Unless equipped with these eighteen wings, they cannot practice the bodhisattva way. And among the eighteen, the willow twig occupies first place: it should be supplied first. People who have clarified whether or not this willow twig is necessary may be bodhisattvas who have clarified the Buddha-Dharma. People who have never clarified [this matter] may never have seen the Buddha-Dharma even in a dream. This being so, to meet the willow twig is to meet the Buddhist patriarchs. For instance, if a person were to ask “What is your intention?” [I would reply,] “You have been lucky to meet old man Eihei’s chewing of the willow twig.” The buddhas and bodhisattvas of the past, present, and future, without exception, have received and retained, in the past, present, and future, these Pure Net Bodhisattva Precepts. That being so, they have also received and retained, in the past, present, and future, the willow twig.

[147] The Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries47 says:

Read, recite, and thoroughly understand both the ten major precepts and the forty-eight minor precepts of the Pure Net Sutra of the Great Vehicle, and thus know well what is observance and what is violation, what is permissible and what is forbidden. Rely only upon the sacred words of the golden mouth.48 Do not follow ordinary people arbitrarily.

Remember this. The principles authentically transmitted by the buddhas and the patriarchs are like this. Anything that goes against this is not the Buddha’s truth, is not the Buddha-Dharma, and is not the truth of the patriarchs. Nevertheless, in the great kingdom of Song today we do not see the willow twig at all. In the fourth lunar month of the sixteenth year of Kajō,49 when I first visited the mountains and temples of great Song [China], there was no monk who knew of the willow twig, and the whole nation, government and people, high and low, did not know of it. Because monks were completely ignorant of it, if I asked about the method of using the willow twig, they would grow pale and lose composure. It is pitiful that pure methods50 have been lost. People who at least scantily rinse their mouths use [a device] in which hair from a horse’s tail has been cut into lengths of an inch or so and then planted, like a horse’s mane, into the top two inches of an ox horn; this has been cut square in cross section to a thickness of approximately three bu,51 and is six or seven sun in length.52 They only clean the teeth with it. [But this] is hardly to be used as the utensil of a monk. It may be a vessel of impurity. It is not a vessel of the Buddha-Dharma. Even pious secular people might be disgusted by it. Such devices are used by both secular people and monks as a tool for sweeping dust off shoes; and also for brushing hair— there are slight variations in size, but it is the same thing. Even this device is used by only one person in ten thousand. So monks and lay people throughout the country have terribly bad breath. When people speak from two or three feet away, the stench from their mouth is difficult to bear. Even those famed as venerable patriarchs who possess the truth, and those titled as guiding teachers of human beings and gods, do not know even of the existence of the practices of rinsing the mouth, scraping the tongue, and chewing the willow twig. Judging from this situation, we cannot guess in how many ways the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs may now visibly be degenerating.

Even if, not begrudging our present dewdrop life to the thousands of miles of blue waves, we traverse the mountains and rivers of foreign lands, intending to search for the truth, the unfortunate situation [described above] will give us cause for sadness. How many pure methods have been lost already? It is regrettable. It is very regrettable. Through the whole of Japan, by contrast, both monks and laypeople experience the willow twig. This may be to expe- 208c rience the Buddha’s brightness. At the same time, our chewing of the willow twig does not accord with the proper method, and the method of scraping the tongue has not been transmitted to us, so it may be that we are slipshod. Even so, those who know the necessity of using the willow twig—in contrast to the Chinese who do not know of the willow twig—have naturally come to know a method of the excellent ones. In the methods of the mountain hermits,53 too, they use the willow twig. Remember, it is, in all cases, an implement beyond dust,54 and a tool of purification.

[151] The Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms says:

In using the willow twig, there are five points: 1) It should be cut to the proper scale. 2) It should be split according to the proper method. 3) The chewed end must not exceed three bu. 4) For odd teeth, it should be centered and chewed three times.55 5) The sap should be used to bathe the eyes.

Our present custom of cupping in the right hand, and bathing the eyes with, the water used in chewing the willow twig and rinsing the mouth, is originally just the teaching of the Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms. Nowadays in Japan it has become a longstanding household tradition. The practice of scraping the tongue was imported by Master Eisai.56 When you have finished using the willow twig, before throwing it away split the twig into two, tearing it with both hands from the chewed end. Place the sharp edge of the split twig crossways on the tongue’s surface, and then scrape. That is to say, scoop water into the mouth with the right hand and rinse the mouth, then scrape the tongue. Repeatedly rinse the mouth and scrape the tongue, scraping and scraping with the edge of the split willow twig as if aiming to draw blood. While rinsing the mouth, secretly recite the following sentence. The Garland Sutra says:

Washing out the mouth and cleaning the teeth, Pray that all living beings Proceed to the gate of pure Dharma And realize ultimate liberation.

Repeatedly rinsing the mouth, use the flesh of the first, second, or third fingers of the right hand to cleanse inside and outside the lips, under the 209a tongue, and to the roof of the mouth, leaving them as if thoroughly licked. Shortly after eating oily food, use honey locusts.57 As soon as you have finished with the willow twig, throw it away in an unobtrusive place. Then, after disposing of the willow twig, snap the fingers three times. In the rear washstand there should be a box for discarded willow twigs. Elsewhere, discard [the twig] in some unobtrusive spot. Spit out the water used to rinse the mouth somewhere other than the washbowl.

[153] Next, wash the face itself. Scooping hot water from the washbowl with both hands, wash all over, starting with the forehead, then the eyebrows, the eyes, the nostrils, the inside of the ears, the cheekbones, and the cheeks. First douse them thoroughly with hot water, and after that scrub and wash them. Do not let tears, spit, or nasal mucus fall into the hot water in the washbowl. While washing like this, do not use up the hot water immoderately, spilling or splashing it from the washbowl so that it runs out too soon. Wash until free of dirt and rid of grease. Wash inside the ears, for they are not [usually] able to contact water. Wash inside the eyes, for they cannot [be cleaned] through contact with sand. Sometimes we wash as far as the hairline or the scalp. This is dignified behavior itself. Having washed the face and thrown away the hot water left in the washbowl, again snap the fingers three times.

[155]  Next wipe the face dry with one end of the hand towel. After that, take off the hand towel again, then fold it into two and hang it over the left forearm. In the washroom behind the cloud hall there are face towels for common use—a long bolt58 of cloth is provided and there are charcoal braziers. Monks have no worries about lack [of a towel] for wiping the face. We may wipe the head and face with that [common towel], or we may use our own

209b hand towel; each is the proper method. While washing the face, do not make a noise by clanking the dipper loudly against the washbowl. And do not get the surrounding area wet by making a mess with the hot and cold water. Secretly reflect that, although we were born after the five hundred years59

and although we live on a remote island, the good we have accumulated in the past has not decayed; we should wholeheartedly rejoice that, receiving the authentic transmission of the dignified behavior of eternal buddhas, we can enjoy untainted practice and experience. On the way back to the cloud hall the footsteps should be light and quiet. The cottages of aged monks of long-accumulated virtue should always have a washstand. Not washing the face goes against the Dharma. There are methods for the use of facial medications at was time.

[156]  In sum, chewing the willow twig and washing the face are the right Dharma of eternal buddhas and people who are devoted to practicing the truth with the will to the truth should practice and experience them. To use cold water when hot water is not available is an ancient custom, a time honored method. If it is totally impossible to obtain hot water or cold water, then early in the morning we wipe the face thoroughly and apply fragrant herbs, powdered incense, or the like, after which we may bow to the Buddha, recite sutras, burn incense, and sit in zazen. Before we have washed the face, to perform any of the various practices is impolite.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Senmen

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kannondōri kōshō-                                     hōrinji on the twenty-third day of the tenth                                     lunar month in the first year of Enō.60

[157]  In India and China, kings, princes, ministers, and officials, laypeople and monks, men and women of the government and the public, farmers and common folk, all wash the face. They possess washbowls, sometimes of silver and sometimes of tin, among their household goods. They perform the service of washing the face every morning at religious shrines and spirit houses. They also offer the service of washing the face at the stupas of Buddhist patriarchs. After they have washed their faces and straightened their clothing, laypeople and monks bow to gods, bow to spirits, bow to their ancestors, and bow to their parents. They bow to their teachers, they bow to the Three Treasures, and they bow to the myriad souls of the triple world and the good guardians61 of the ten directions. Nowadays, even farmers and 209c workers in the fields, fishermen and woodcutters, never forget to wash the face. But they do not chew the willow twig. In Japan, kings and ministers,

the old and the young, the government and the public, the high and the low among laymen and monks, all unfailingly chew the willow twig and rinse the mouth. But they do not wash the face. Where they have one, they have lost the other. To maintain now both washing the face and chewing the willow twig is replenishment where there was insufficiency and is the illuminating presence of the Buddhist patriarchs.

                                    Preached again to the assembly on the twentieth                                     day of the tenth lunar month in the first year of

                                    Kangen62 at Kippōji in the Yoshida district of

                                    Esshū.63

                                    Preached to the assembly on the eleventh day                                     of the first lunar month in the second year of                                     Kenchō64 at Eiheiji on Kichijōzan in the Yoshida                                     district of Esshū.

Notes

1     Lotus Sutra, Anrakugyō (“Peaceful and Joyful Practice”). LS 2.258.

2     bare, as the form of reality as it is; etc. (LS 2.244–48); 2) “peaceful and joyful practice station; always liking to sit in zazen and to be in a quiet place; reflecting all Shi-anraku-gyō,Sutra, Anrakugyō. e.g., not associating closely with kings and ministers; preaching Dharma without expec-through speech,” e.g., not discussing other people’s good and bad conduct or merits and demerits (LS 2.256); 3) “peaceful and joyful practice of mind,” e.g., to have great am, through mystical power and through the power of wisdom, I will lead them and understand this sutra, when I attain the truth of compassion for all living beings (LS 2.262); and 4) “peaceful and joyful practice through vowing,” namely vowing that, “Though those people neither hear, nor believe in, not cause them to be able to abide in this Dharma.” (LS 2.266)“four peaceful and joyful practices,” are described in detail in the They are: 1) “peaceful and joyful practice through bodily action,”anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi,dharma wherever I Lotuss as

3     Gozō: the liver, heart, lungs, kidney, and spleen.

4     Roppu: the throat, stomach, large intestine, small intestine, gall bladder, and bladder.

5     Shodai. are earth, water, fire, and wind. For example, are earth, water, fire, wind, and space. shidai, are earth, water, fire, wind, space, and consciousness. “four elements,” from the Sanskrit Godai, “five elements,” from the Sanskrit Rokudai, catvāri mahābhūtāni,“six elements,” from pañca the Sanskrit mahābhūtāni,ṣaḍ dhātavaḥ,

6     house for a midday meal. [Rinzai] asks, “A hair swallows the vast ocean and a mustard Alludes to an episode involving Master Rinzai Gigen and his disciple Kōke SonshōShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 96: Fuke and Rinzai go to a patron’s recorded in the

function’ or should we see this as ‘reality as it is.’” Master [Fuke] duly overturns the seed includes Mount Sumeru. Should we see this as ‘the mystical powers and wondrous Dōgen writes place is where it is—explain it as coarse or explain it as fine.” Whereas here Master dinner table. [Rin]zai says, “Very coarse person!” Master [Fuke] says, “This concrete place where something ineffable exists.”shozai.45, he writes Each of the three expressions means “the place where ‘What?’ exists,” or “thenanshimo[no[]no shozai,] shozai,and the in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Shinji-shōbōgenzō version has simply Busshō, paragraphnan [no]

7     Shidai (four elements): earth, water, fire, and wind. See note 5.

8     Go-un (“five aggregates”), from the Sanskrit pañca skandha, are 1) form or matter

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(of habits (rūpa), 2) perception or feeling saṃskāra), and 5) consciousness (vedana), 3) thinking (vijñāna). See Chapter Two (Vol. I), (saṃjñā), 4) action or formationMakahannya-haramitsu.

9     balanced state in which things are allowed to be as they are. immaterial,” expresses the mental face of reality: to be pure and clean is a matter ofKūchū means “the inside of emptiness” or “the real state of emptiness,” that is, theKū, “emptiness” or “the both mind and body.

10    Source not traced.

11    Kinhin, hanpo, “one breath per half-step.”from the Sanskrit caṅkrama. The traditional rule for kinhin in Japan is issoku-

12    Master Dōgen explained the more general single character used in the verse, mokuyoku, “to bathe” or “to have amoku, lit., “to wash,” with a more specific compound bath.”

13    Sandoku(dveṣa), and 3) delusion or ignorance (“three poisons”): 1) passion or greed (Sanskrit (moha).   rāga), 2) hatred or anger

14    Shitō (“four upset states”): 1) seeing the impermanent as eternal, 2) indulging in sufwithout self as having self.fering as if it were joyful, 3) seeing the impure as pure, and 4) seeing that which is 15 sometimes obtained from waterlogged wood.Jinkō was relatively expensive incense. Jin literally means “sunk”; the incense was

16    of Sanskrit Terms.A mountain range in southern India famous for its sandalwood incense. See Glossary

17    harmful to the throat, and not harmful to the stomach.Water that has the eight virtues is sweet, cold, soft, light, clear, not brackish, not 18 Bu,Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.lit., “part,” here represents the Sanskrit nikāya, which means a collection. See

19       10Master Dōgen’s record of his years in China, the recent student, you possess in abundance the air of the ancients. You should just live Then Dōgen rose and made a prostration under the master’s foot. The master called in a secluded valley deep in the mountains and nurture the sacred womb of the Buddhist patriarchs. You will definitely arrive at the state experienced by the ancient masters.’, says: “Master [Tendō] once summoned me and preached, ‘Although you are aHōgyōki (Hōgyō Era Record), no.

out, ‘Subject of prostration and object of prostration have a nature empty and serene. communication of the truth”; the term is discussed in Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II),Dōgen’s tears of gratitude made his collar wet.” “Empathy” is Shinjin-gakudō.The empathy between us is difficult to think about.’ Then the master widely preachedthe action of the Buddhist patriarchs of the Western Heavens and Eastern Lands.kannō-dokō, “empathic Chapter Fifty-six

20       of zazen as Shō-datsuraku. Datsuraku,shinjin-datsuraku,“get free” or “drop off,” usually appears in the description “getting free of body and mind.” “Getting free of body misconception of “body” and “mind” as separate entities. and mind” means experiencing the self as a whole and thereby getting free of the 21 The night was divided into five watches of two hours each, so the fifth watch was the last watch before dawn. 22 Each watch was further divided into five periods. So the third period of the third watch was the middle of the night.

23       Kun, the Sanskrit Terms).“skirt” or “hem”; more usually written as nivāsana, which means “a kind of raiment” (see Glossary of Sanskritkunzu, “hemmed thing,” represents

24       Hensan, a long jacket usually of black cotton. The skirt and jacket may have been separate or they may have been sewn together as one long black gown with wide sleeves (See also notes to Chapter Seven (Vol. I), jikitotsu) of the kind worn by monks and professional priests in Japan today. Senjō. 25 Shukin. The shukin was used as a hand and face towel, and also as a sash to keep up the sleeves.

26    is 11.93 feet, or 3.64 meters .Ichijō-nishaku. One jo (9.94 feet; 3.03 meters) is ten shaku, so the length of the towel

27    temple ground plan in Volume I, Appendix V, “Traditional Temple Layout. ”Koka, so called because it is located to the rear of the zazen hall, is number 48 on the

28    separates the zazen hall and the washroom. master of the temple was otherwise occupied. The illuminated hall (number 57 onShōdō.the temple ground plan, Volume I, Appendix V, “Traditional Temple Layout”) directly A senior monk would use this area for instructing other monks while the

29    behind the back. The Whereas the (longer) hand towel is knotted in front of the chest, a tasuki method would have been more familiar to Japanese oftasuki is knotted

Master Dōgen’s time, and is still used in Japan today.

30    At a wash place that had no cauldron, there would be a tub filled with hot water from, for example, the kitchen.

31    According to the records at the end of the penultimate and final paragraphs of the

Master Dōgen was living at Eiheiji. It seems probable that Master Dōgen added this chapter, this chapter was first preached in 1239, and preached for a second time in, before Master Dōgen moved to Eiheiji. The third time it was preached, in 1250, part during the third preaching of the chapter.

32    The Makasōgiritsu, also quoted in Chapter Seven (Vol. I), Senjō. 33 Sanbu, three bu, is 0.36 inches (0.91 cm.).

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34    Chiku-on, lit., “Bamboo Wood,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Veṇuvana. donated to the Buddha’s order soon after the order’s establishment. This was a park that lay to the north gate of Rājagṛha and which King Bimbisāra

35    the capital of the kingdom of Kośala. kingdom of Magadha. Its site is 70 km southwest of Patna, near the present-day smalltown of Rājgir. It was the most powerful royal city of northern India after Śrāvastī, Ōshajō, “City of Royal Palaces,” represents the Sanskrit Rājagṛha, the capital of the

36    King Prasenajit was the ruler of the kingdom of Kośala. See also Chapter Fifty-nine, Baike. 37 To, “gallon,” is a measure of capacity that has varied from age to age.

38    by ancient Indian gods. Kanrō, lit., “sweet dew,” represents the Sanskrit amṛta, the nectar supposedly relished

39    in volume two of the Quoted from the chapter about how the Buddha defeated the six non-Buddhist teachers, Kengukyō (Sutra of the Wise and the Foolish).

40    Rokushi-gedō, sualist; and 6) Nirgrantha-Jñātiputra, the founder of Jainism.2)Kāśyapa, a negator of moral virtue, a moral relativist; 5) Kakuda-Kātyāyana, a sen- Ajita-Keśakambala, a materialist; 3) Maskari-Gośalīputra, a fatalist; 4) Pūraṇa the six non-Buddhist teachers, are: 1) Sañjaya-Vairāṭīputra, a skeptic;-

41    monks. gious mendicant of brahman origin. The Buddha applied the term The Sanskrit who was not of the brahman caste—as distinct from a śramaṇa (lit., “striver”) originally described a wandering mendicant parivrājaka,śramaṇaa wanderingto Buddhist

42    Also quoted from the Kengukyō.

43    Zuda, representing the Sanskrit dhūta, has two meanings: 1) the twelve ancient Gyōji), and 2) the practice of begging dhūta for food every day and not accepting invitations, which is the first of the twelve practices (recorded in Chapter Thirty [Vol. II], s. In this case, dhūta suggests the second meaning to the rainy season”) is described in detail in Chapter Seventy-nine (Vol. IV),Ango.Ge-ango, “summer retreat,” from the Sanskrit vārṣika (which literally means “belong-

45    in the embossed top of the stick. These jangle as the monk walks along, serving to Shakujō, literally, “tin staff.” Tin refers to metal rings which dangle from three holes scare away bears.

46    A folding stool with a rope seat.

47    The on Master Hyakujō’s Zen’enshingi, completed by Master Chōro Sōsaku in 1103. The work was based Koshingi (Old Pure Criteria).

48    Kinku, “golden mouth,” means the mouth of the Buddha.

Chapter Fifty-six

49    1223.

50    Byakubō, literally, “white methods.” 51 Sanbu. See note 33.

52    irately 1.2 inches (3.03 cm.).Roku-shichi-sun is between and seven and nine inches. One sun (ten bu)

53    Sen-nin, “mountain-dwelling wizard,” expresses the ideal of the Daoist sage.

54    world. Shutsu-jin, lit., “getting out of dust,” suggests, in general, transcendence of the secular

55    upper and lower teeth, so as not to damage or loosen teeth by forcing the willow twigWhere there is a gap between the teeth, the willow twig should be centered between into a gap between them.

56    Raihai-tokuzuiarchy (was formally abandoned following the Meiji Restoration of 1868. Master Eisai (1141–Sōjō-esai. Sōjō, went to China in the generation before Master Dōgen, and introduced the teachingssōgō) which was established in 624, based on the Chinese model. The system) was the title of the highest-ranking monk in the ancient Buddhist hier “chief administrator of monks” (see notes to Chapter Eight [Vol. I],-

1215)of the Rinzai sect into Japan as the master of Kenninji and other temples.

57    Honey locusts (roughly equal in size to green beans. Here they would be used to clean oil from inside Gleditsia japonica) are small, irregularly shaped green vegetables, Senjō, Master Dōgen explains the use of honey the mouth. In Chapter Seven (Vol. I), locusts in washing the hands.

58    to make one kimono; that is, just over twenty meters of cloth. Ippiki, one hiki. A hiki is a unit of cloth length. It is roughly the length of cloth needed

59    Alludes to the belief that in the age of right Dharma—the first five hundred years following the Buddha’s death—the Dharma would flourish, after which it would decline.

60    1239.

61    Shinsai the Buddha-Dharma. Means gods and benevolent spirits who are imagined to guard and protect

62    1243.

63    Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 64 1250.

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[Chapter Fifty-seven]

                                                    Menju                                              

Face-to-Face Transmission

Translator’s Note: Men means face, and ju means transmission. Menju means the transmission of the Dharma from a master to a disciple face to face. In Buddhism, what is transmitted from a master to a disciple is not only abstract theory but also something real, including actual conduct, physical health, and intuitional wisdom. Therefore the transmission of this real something cannot be actualized solely through explanations with words, or simply by passing on some manuscript. For this reason, the Dharma that Gautama Buddha taught has been transmitted in person from master to disciple since the days of Gautama Buddha. Without this personal contact, the Buddhist Dharma cannot be transmitted. In this chapter, Master Dōgen praises the transmission of the Buddhist Dharma and explains its importance. [161] “Then Śākyamuni Buddha, in the order on Vulture Peak in the Western Country, India, among an assembly of millions, picked up an uḍumbara flower and winked. At that time the face of Venerable Mahākāśyapa broke into a smile. Śākyamuni Buddha said, ‘I possess the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana. I transmit them to Mahākāśyapa.’”1

[162] This is the truth of the buddhas’ and the patriarchs’ face-to-face transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury. Authentically transmitted by the Seven Buddhas, it reaches Venerable Mahākāśyapa. Through twenty-eight transmissions from Venerable Mahākāśyapa, it reaches Venerable Bodhi dharma. Venerable Bodhidharma personally descends into China and gives face-to-face transmission to Great Master Taiso Shōshū Fukaku, Venerable Eka.2 Through five transmissions, it reaches Great Master Daikan Enō of Sōkeizan. Through seventeen transmissions, it reaches my late master, the eternal buddha Tendō of Daibyakumyōzan in the district of Keigenfu in the great kingdom of Song. On the first day of the fifth lunar month, in the first

209

year of the great Song era of Hōgyō,3 Dōgen first burns incense and does prostrations, on the elevated stage myōkōdai, to the late master Tendō, the eternal buddha; and the late master, the eternal buddha, first looks at Dōgen. Then, indicating the face-to-face transmission and bestowing it upon Dōgen, he says, “The gate of Dharma transmitted face to face by the buddhas and the patriarchs has been realized.” This is just the picking up of a flower on Vulture Peak, it is the attainment of the marrow on Sūzan Mountain,4 it is the transmission of the robe on Ōbai Mountain,5 and the face-to-face transmission on Tōzan Mountain.6 This is the face-to-face transmission of the eye-treasury of the Buddhist patriarchs. It is present only in our house; others have never experienced it even in a dream.

[164] This truth of the face-to-face transmission, because it was actually transmitted face to face to Śākyamuni Buddha in the order of Kāśyapa Buddha,7 and because it has been maintained, is the face of the Buddhist Patriarch. Without the face-to-face transmission from the Buddha’s face, we are not buddhas. Śākyamuni Buddha’s direct meeting with Venerable [Mahā] kāśyapa is the immediate transmission. Even Ānanda and Rāhula

cannot match the intimacy8 of the transmission to Mahākāśyapa. Even the great bodhisattvas9 cannot match the intimacy of the transmission to Mahā kāśyapa; they cannot sit in the seat of Venerable Mahākāśyapa. The World honored One saw sharing his seat and sharing his robe with Mahā kāśyapa as his lifetime of buddha-behavior. The Venerable Mahākāśyapa, through face-transmission, mind-transmission, body-transmission, and eye-transmission, has intimately received the face-to-face transmission of the World honored One; he has served offerings to, venerated, made prostrations to, and served homage to Buddha Śākyamuni. In thus pulverizing his bones and shattering his body, he has been through an unknown thousand myriad changes. His own countenance is beyond face and eyes; he has received the face-to-face transmission of the countenance of the Tathāgata. Śākyamuni Buddha really looks at Venerable Mahākāśyapa. Venerable Mahākāśyapa looks directly at Venerable Ānanda. Venerable Ānanda prostrates himself directly before the Buddha’s face of Venerable Mahākāśyapa. This is the face-to-face transmission. Venerable Ānanda abides in and maintains this face-to-face transmission and, through contact with Śāṇavāsa,10 he transmits it face to face. Venerable Śāṇavāsa directly serves Venerable Ānanda, during

which time “the face alone, together with the face”11 transmits and receives the face-to-face transmission. In this way the true ancestral masters of successive generations have each passed on the face-to-face transmission through the disciple regarding the master and the master seeing the disciple. If even one ancestor, one master, or one disciple failed to give or to receive the face to-face transmission they would not be the buddhas and the patriarchs. For example, in causing a stream of faith to develop by channeling water, or in keeping a light burning which makes brightness eternal—even in koṭis of thousand myriad cases—root and branch are one. At the same time, [the transmission] is fleeting moments of cheeping and pecking.12 This being so, we have amassed an age of days and nights looking directly at Śākyamuni Buddha, and have amassed a generation of days and nights being illuminated by the presence of the Buddha’s face. We do not know how countlessly many times this has continued, back and forth. We should quietly consider it, and be glad. It is the Buddha’s eyes and the Buddha’s countenance which 214c have done prostrations to the Buddha-face of Śākyamuni Buddha, which have moved the buddha-eyes of Śākyamuni Buddha into our own eyes, and which have moved our own eyes into the Buddha’s eyes. That which has transmitted this state face to face until the present, without missing a single generation, is this face-to-face transmission. The present several tens of generations of rightful successors are individual instances of the Buddha’s face, and they receive the face-to-face transmission from the original Buddha’s face. To make a prostration to this traditional face-to-face transmission is just to make a prostration to the Seven Buddhas and to Śākyamuni Buddha. It is to make a prostration and to serve offerings to the twenty-eight Buddhist patriarchs from Venerable Mahā kāśyapa. The features and eyes of the Buddhist patriarchs are like this. To meet these Buddhist patriarchs is to meet Śākyamuni Buddha and the rest of the Seven Buddhas. It is the very moment in which Buddhist patriarchs intimately bestow the face-to face transmission of themselves; and it is buddhas of the face-to-face transmission giving the face-to-face transmission to buddhas of the face-to-face transmission. Using the complicated, they give the face-to-face transmission to the complicated, without any interruption at all. Opening their eyes, they give the eye-to-eye transmission and receive the eye-to-eye transmission through the eyes. Showing their faces, they give the face-to-face transmission

and receive the face-to-face transmission through the face—the face-to-face transmission is received and given at the place of the face. Utilizing the mind, they give the mind-to-mind transmission and receive the mind-to-mind transmission through the mind. Realizing the body, they give the body-to-body transmission of the body. Other nations in other directions also see this [transmission] as their original ancestor. [But] east of China the giving and receiving of the face-to-face transmission is present only in this house of the Buddha’s right tradition. We have clearly received the transmission of the right eye with which to see the Tathāgata. When we do prostrations to the face of Śākyamuni Buddha, the fifty-one patriarchs13 and the founding Seven Buddhas are neither aligned side by side nor aligned in succession; rather, their faceto-face transmissions are all present in the same moment. One who never in a lifetime meets a master is not a disciple, and one who never meets a disciple

215a is not a master. When [master and disciple] have definitely seen each other, have been seen by each other, have given the face-to-face transmission, and have succeeded to the Dharma, that is the realization of the truth which resides in the patriarchs’ face-to-face transmission. Thus, [master and disciple] have directly taken on the brightness of the Tathāgata’s face. In sum, even after thousands of years, or myriad years, or hundreds of kalpas, or koṭis of kalpas, this face-to-face transmission is the appearance of the face of, and the realization of the transmission from, Śākyamuni Buddha.

[170] When this state of the Buddhist Patriarch has been realized, it is the realization of the images of the World-honored One, Mahākāśyapa, the fifty-one patriarchs, and the Seven Founders; it is the realization of their brightness, the realization of their body, the realization of their mind, the appearance of the tips of their toes, and the appearance of the ends of their noses. Even before a word is comprehended and even before understanding of half a word is transcended, when the master has seen the back of the disciple’s head, and the disciple has regarded the master through the crown of the head, that is the authentic face-to-face transmission. Revere a face-to face transmission like this. Merely to appear to be manifesting a trace of the mind in the field of the mind is not always a great and valuable way of life. [But] the performance of the face-to-face transmission in the changing of the face,14 and the presence of the face-to-face transmission in the turning of the head, may be face skin three inches thick15 or face skin ten feet thin, and just this skin of the face may be “the great round mirror of the buddhas.”16 Because the great round mirror is seen as the skin of the face, “inside and outside have no flaws or blurs,” and great round mirrors have passed on the face-to-face transmission to great round mirrors. Those who have received the authentic transmission of the right Dharma that has met personally with Śākyamuni Buddha are even more familiar to us than Śākyamuni Buddha; and they cause to be visible, from the corner of the eye, Śākyamuni Buddhas who are “three and three before and behind.”17 Therefore those who revere Śākyamuni Buddha and long for Śākyamuni Buddha should revere and should honor this authentic tradition of the face-to-face transmission; we should do venerate prostrations to that which is hard to encounter and hard to meet. 215b That is just to do prostrations to the Tathāgata, and to be given the face-to face transmission by the Tathāgata. Those who directly meet the face-to-face transmission of the Tathāgata as a conspicuous state which is authentically transmitted and learned in practice, whether they are the self that we used to see as ourselves or whether they are others, should be cherished and protected. In the house [of Buddha] there is an authentic tradition that those who do prostrations before the eight stupas18 are liberated from hindrances of wrongdoing and are able to feel the effect of the truth. This [stupa prostration] concretely establishes the state of Śākyamuni Buddha’s realization of the truth at the place of his birth,19 at the place of his turning the Dharma wheel,20 at the place of his realization of the truth,21 and at the place of his nirvana;22 it realized the great earth and realized the great space that have remained by the city of Kanyākubja23 and remained in Āmrapālivana.24 Through prostration to that which is realized as a stupa by sounds, smells, tastes, sensations, substances, sights, and other objects, [the prostrater] really feels the effect of practice of the truth. Prostration to these eight stupas is a discipline practiced throughout the Western Country, India; laypeople and monks, celestial throngs and human multitudes, vie to prostrate themselves and to serve offerings [to the stupas]. This is just the scroll of a sutra; Buddhist sutras are like this. There again, to practice the thirty-seven methods25 and thereby to accomplish the Buddhist effect in each instant of living, is to propagate along the omnipresent routes of the ancients the traces of the eternal practice and discipline of Śākyamuni Buddha; because he has made [these traces] clear for eternity, we can realize the truth. Remember, those eight towers of many

stories [have seen] innumerable renewals of frosts and flowers, and wind and rain have often tried to broach them, but they have left their trace in space and left their trace in matter; the freedom with which they bestow their virtue upon people of the present has not diminished. And when we apply ourselves in the present to practicing those roots, powers, truths, and paths26— although there are disturbances27 and there is the obstacle of delusion28— when we practice and experience [the thirty-seven methods], their power is

215c still fresh. Such is the virtue of Śākyamuni Buddha. Yet the present face-to face transmission is beyond comparison with those [stupas and methods]. The thirty-seven auxiliary bodhi methods have this face of the Buddha— and the buddha-mind, the buddha-body, the Buddha’s truth, the Buddha’s brightness, the Buddha’s tongue, and so on—as their original root. The accumulated virtues of the eight stupas, likewise, have the Buddha’s face and so on as their original foundation.

[176] Now, as students of the Buddha-Dharma, if we are to walk the vigorous road of penetration and liberation, we should, in the peace and quiet of day and night, carefully consider and wholeheartedly rejoice that our country is superior to other countries and our truth alone is supreme. In other regions the people who do not equal us are many. The reason our country and our truth are supreme and honored alone is that although the multitudes assembled on Vulture Peak instructed others throughout the ten directions, the rightful successor at Shaolin Temple was truly the educator of China, and the descendants of Sōkei have passed on his face-to-face transmission to the present. This is an excellent time for the Buddha-Dharma to enter afresh into the mud and into the water. If we do not experience the effect at this time, when will we experience the effect? If we do not cut delusion at this time, when will we cut delusion? If we do not become buddha at this time, when will we become buddha? If we are not a sitting buddha at this time, when will we be an acting buddha? Consideration [of these questions] should be meticulous.

[178] When Śākyamuni Buddha graciously gives the face-to-face transmission to Venerable Mahākāśyapa, he says, “I possess the right Dharma eye treasury and I transmit it to Mahākāśyapa.” At the order on Sūzan Mountain, Venerable Bodhidharma actually addresses the Second Patriarch with the words “You have got my marrow.” Clearly, that which gives the face-to face transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury, and that which becomes the face-to-face transmission of “You have got my marrow,” is nothing other than this face-to-face transmission itself. At this very moment, when you see through and get free from your habitual bones and marrow, the face-to-face 216a transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs is there. Even the face-to-face transmission of the great state of realization, and the face-to-face transmission of the mind-seal, are a singular state at a definite place.29Although they are not the transmission of everything, we never enter into investigation of insufficiency of realization.30 In conclusion, the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs is nothing other than a face giving and a face receiving, and the reception of a face and the giving of a face, beyond which there is nothing surplus and nothing lacking. We should rejoice in, delight in, believe in, and serve whatever has had the opportunity to meet this face-to-face transmission, even if it is our own features. Dōgen, on the first day of the fifth lunar month in the first year of the great Song era of Hōgyō,31 prostrated myself to my late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, and received his face-to-face transmission for the first time; I was then allowed some access to his inner sanctum. Barely free of body and mind, yet being able to maintain and rely upon the face-to-face transmission, I came back32 to Japan.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Menju

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     the Yoshida district of Etsu district,33 on the                                     twentieth day of the tenth lunar month in the                                     first year of Kangen.34

[180] Among those people who have never experienced and never learned in practice the truth that the face-to-face transmission of the Buddha’s truth is like this, there was, during the Keiyu era35 in the reign of the great Song emperor Jinso, a certain Zen Master Shōko36 of Sempukuji.37 In formal preaching in the Dharma hall he says:

Great Master Unmown Kyōshin38 is present just now. Do you all see him or not? If you are able to see him, then you are in the same state as this mountain monk. Do you see him? Do you see him? You should realize this matter directly, then you will have attainment for the first time, and it will be impossible for you to delude yourselves. Now, [consider] the example of Ōbaku in olden times. On hearing Master Hyakujō quote the story of Great Master Ba[so]39 letting out a yell, he chanced to have a great reflection. Hyakujō asked him: “Disciple, would you not like to succeed Great Master [Baso]?” Ōbaku said, “Although I know of the great master, in short I have not met the great master. If I were to succeed the great master, I am afraid that I would forfeit my own children and grandchildren.” Members of this assembly! At that time, it was not even five years since the passing of Great Master Ba[so], but Ōbaku himself confessed to not meeting. We should know that Ōbaku’s viewpoint was not mature; in short, he only had one eye.

             This mountain monk is not like that. I am able to know Great Master Unmown, I am able to meet Great Master Unmown, and I am quite able to succeed Great Master Unmown. Yet given that it is already more than a hundred years since Unmown entered nirvana, how can I today expound the principle of our intimate meeting? Do you understand it? People of penetration and people of attainment are able to certify it, but in the minds of the squinting and the inferior doubts and condemnation arise. Those who have been able to meet this state do not discuss it. Those who have not met it yet should look just now. . . . You have been standing for a long time without questions. Thank you.”40

[183] Now [Shōko], even if we permit that you know Great Master Un mon, and that you see Great Master Unmown, does Great Master Unmown personally see you, or not? If Great Master Unmown does not see you, it might be impossible for you to succeed Great Master Unmown. Because Great Master Unmown has never sanctioned you, not even you claim that “Great Master Unmown sees me.” It is evident that you and Great Master Unmown have never met each other. Among the Seven Buddhas and all the buddhas of the past, present, and future, is there any Buddhist patriarch who has succeeded to the Dharma without meeting with another as master and disciple? You must never call Ōbaku immature in his viewpoint. How could you fathom Ōbaku’s actions? How could you fathom Ōbaku’s words? Ōbaku is an eternal buddha. He is at the limit of investigation41 of the succession of the Dharma. You have never seen, heard, or learned in practice, even in a dream, the truth of the succession of the Dharma. Ōbaku has received the Dharma from his master, and has maintained and relied upon the state of the patriarch.42 Ōbaku meets with his master and sees his master. You do not see a master, do not know a patriarch, do not know yourself, and do not see yourself, at all. And there is no master who sees you. You have never experienced the opening of a master’s eyes; in truth it is you whose viewpoint is not mature and whose succession to the Dharma is never mature. Do you know, or do you not know, that Great Master Unmown is a Dharma descendant of Ōbaku? How could you fathom the expressions of Hyakujō and Ōbaku? You cannot even fathom the expressions of Great Master Unmown. People who have the power of learn- 216c ing in practice take up the expressions of Hyakujō and Ōbaku, and people who have the directly accessible and settled state43 can fathom those expressions. You, being without learning in practice and without the settled state, cannot know them and cannot fathom them. The words that “[Ōbaku] does not receive the Dharma from Great Master Ba[so], even though ‘it is not even five years since the passing of Great Master Ba[so],’” are truly not even worth laughing at. A person who deserves to succeed to the Dharma will be able to succeed to the Dharma even after countless kalpas. A person who does not deserve to succeed to the Dharma can never succeed to the Dharma, even if [the elapsed time] is [only] half a day or a minute. You are an utterly witless and stupid man who has never seen the face of the sun and the face of the moon in the Buddha’s state of truth. You talk of succeeding to Unmown even though “it is already more than a hundred years since Great Master Unmown entered nirvana”—is it by virtue of some momentous ability that you can succeed to Unmown? You are less reliable than a three-year-old child! People hoping to receive the Dharma from Unmown in another thousand years will probably have ten times your ability. Now I shall rescue you, so let us study for a while the story [of Hyakujō and Ōbaku].44 Hyakujō’s words “Disciple, would you not like to succeed Great Master [Baso]?” never say “Go ahead and receive the Dharma from Great Master Ba[so]!”45 Studying for a while the story of a lion mustering all its strength and speed,46 and studying the story of a turtle trying to climb a tree upside down,47 you should investigate the vigorous road of stepping forward and stepping back. In succession of the Dharma, the power of learning in practice like this exists. Ōbaku’s words “I am afraid that I would forfeit my own children and grandchildren” are utterly beyond your comprehension. Do you know who is expressed in the words “my own,” and who the people described as “children

and grandchildren” are? You should painstakingly study [Ōbaku’s words] in practice. The words have been realized unconcealedly and conspicuously.

[186] Nevertheless, a certain Zen Master Bukkoku Ihaku,48 being ignorant

217a of the Buddhist patriarchs’ succession of the Dharma, has listed Shōko among Unmon’s Dharma successors. This may be a mistake. Students of later ages must not unknowingly think that learning in practice might be present in Shōko. If it is possible for the likes of you, [Shōko,] to receive the Dharma by relying on written words, then do people who are enlightened by reading written sutras all receive the Dharma from Śākyamuni Buddha himself? That is never so. Enlightenment based upon written sutras always requires the seal of approval of a true teacher. Shōko, you have not even read the record of Unmon’s words as thoroughly as you say. Only people who have penetrated Unmon’s words have received the Dharma from Unmown. You have never seen Unmown with your own eyes, you have never seen yourself with your own eyes, you have never seen Unmown with Unmon’s eyes, and you have never seen yourself with Unmon’s eyes. There are many such things that you have failed to investigate in experience. You should buy yourself new straw sandals, again and again, to search for a true teacher and receive the Dharma. You must not speak of succeeding Great Master Unmown. If you speak like that, you will just be a species of non-Buddhist. Even if Hyakujō himself were to speak as you have, it would be a great mistake.

Notes

1            The Daibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyō. See also Chapter Sixty-eight, Udonge. 2 Master Taiso Eka. Great Master Shōshū Fukaku is his posthumous title.

3     1225.

4     Indicates the transmission between Master Bodhidharma and Master Taiso Eka. 5 Indicates the transmission between Master Daiman Kōnin and Master Daikan Enō. 6 Indicates the transmission between Master Tōzan Ryōkai and Master Ungo Dōyō.

7             is the seventh. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the seven ancient buddhas, and Śākyamuni Buddha Busso. 8      one, Shin Mitsugo means “immediate,” “intimate,” or “familiar” (see also notes to Chapter Fifty-). Ānanda and Rāhula were blood relatives of the Buddha who became the second patriarch in India as the successor of Master Mahākāśyapa. Rāhulawas the Buddha’s son. Two of his ten great disciples. Ānanda was the Buddha’s half-brother; he eventually

9         Dai-bosatsu indicates, for example, Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī, who is usually depicted(Samanta Bhadra, who is usually depicted (mounted on a white elephant) as the right-mounted on a lion) as the left-hand attendant of Śākyamuni Buddha; and Bodhisattva hand attendant of Śākyamuni Buddha.

10       Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Śāṇavāsa was the successor of Ānanda and therefore the third patriarch in India. SeeBusso.

11       Yuimen-yomen alludes to the familiar phrase from the Lotus Sutra, yuibutsu-yobutsu,

“buddhas alone, together with buddhas.”

12       to get the chick out of the egg—a metaphor for the efforts of disciple and master. Sotsu-taku no jinki suggests the combined efforts of a baby chick and a mother hen

13       From Master Mahākāśyapa to Master Dōgen.

14       of an action that can only be done if there is both muscular movement and mental Mahākāśyapa did on seeing the Buddha pick up an Kanmen, “changing the facial expression”—for example, genuinely smiling as Masteruḍumbara flower—is an example sincerity (oneness of body and mind).

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Shōbōgenzō Volume III

15       Menpi-kō-sansun,crete.   “face skin three sun thick,” symbolizes something real and con-

16       “The great round mirror of the buddhas/Has no flaws or blurs, inside or outside./[We]Alludes to a poem by Master Geyāśata quoted in Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Kōkyō: two people are able to see the same./[Our] minds, and [our] eyes, are completely alike.” 17 Zengo-sansanshōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 27; Chapter Forty-two, means concrete individuals as opposed to an abstract ideal. See Tsuki, note 2. Shinji18 were therefore divided into eight parts. All recipients built a stupa to bury their shareof the relics.Shortly after the Buddha’s cremation, various tribes laid claim to his ashes, which

19    This city was destroyed in a military campaign against the Śākyas at around the time Lumbini, on the outskirts of the city of Kapilavastu (present-day Tilaurakoṭ in Nepal). vastu at another site (present-day Piprāvā in India) and it was in a stupa here that the of the Buddha’s death. When refugee Śākyas returned from exile, they rebuilt Kapila-Śākyas deposited their share of the Buddha’s relics.

20    (The deer park of Ṛṣipatana (present-day Sārnāth) near the ancient city of Vārāṇasī macakra Stupa, dating from the time of King Aśoka (third century Benares). The archaeological site at Sārnāth has the remains of two stupas. The Dhar B.C.E.), is thought to portion of the Buddha’s relics that Aśoka had brought to Sārnāth from another original burial place. When demolished in 1794, was found to contain a stone urn which apparently contained to mark the spot where the Buddha gave his first preaching. The Dharmarājika Stupa,

21    gayā). Uruvilvā was a garrison town in the ancient kingdom of Magadha (the southernA bodhi tree on the bank of the Nairañjanā River near Uruvilvā (present-day Bodh was entrusted to King Ajātaśatru of Magadha. Part of India’s present-day state of Bihar). One of the portions of the Buddha’s relics

22    vastu), Malla. The Mallas of Kuśinagara carried out the cremation of the Buddha’s body and sites of the Buddha’s career are etched into the memory of monks in Japan who begin buried all the ashes at the cremation site. When other tribes laid claim to the Buddha’s A relics, however, the Mallas agreed to divide the relics into eight portions, keeping one portion for their own stupa at Kuśinagara. The names of the above four majorśāla grove at the southern edge of Kuśinagara, capital of the ancient kingdom of“Busshō-ka-pi-ra” (The Buddha was born in Kapila“Seppō-ha-ra-na”-

each formal meal by reciting: in Kuśinagara). . . .“Jō-dō-ma-ka-da” (He realized the truth in Magadha), “Nyu-metsu-ku-chi-ra” (And entered nirvana

(He preached the Dharma in Vārāṇasī),

23    district of Farrukhabad.Kanyākubja, one of the great ancient cities of Central India, was said to be the siteof one of the eight stupas. The city was situated on a Ganges tributary in the modern Chapter Fifty-seven

24    buried their share of the relics was unearthed in Vesāli in 1958.” Āmrapālivana means relics is said to have been allocated to the Licchavis of Vesāli, but no record that they Japanese Character Dictionary A mango grove outside the city of Vesāli. One of the eight portions of the Buddha’s“Āmrapāli’s Grove.” Āmrapāli was a Vesāli courtesan whose son by King Bimbisāraof monks reached Vesāli before the rains retreat in the last year of the Buddha’s life,built a stupa at Āmrapālivana has been traced. However, Spahn and Hadamitzky’s became a monk in the Buddha’s order. It is said that when the Buddha and a following states: “The covered bowl in which the Licchavis

they camped at Āmrapālivana.

25    See Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV), Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō.

26    Kon, riki, kaku, dō refers to the following: the five roots (go riki) arising from those five rootsgo kon): belief, diligence,: mindfulness, balance, wisdom; the five powers (belief, diligence, mindfulness, balance, wisdom; the seven limbs of the balanced state of truth (ment, balance, and mindfulness; and the noble eightfold path (shichi tō kaku shi): selection of Dharma, diligence, joy, entrustment, detachhasshō dō), right view, right thinking, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right state of balance. These are the latter twenty-five of the thirty-seven methods.

Ibid.

27    of Sanskrit Terms; see also notes to Chapter Forty-three, Bonnōare greed, anger, ignorance, arrogance, doubt, and false views. See Vol. I, Glossary represents the Sanskrit kleśa (“afflictions”). Traditional examples of Kūge.     kleśas

28    Waku-shō, “layers of interference.” “hindrance, obstacle,” represents the Sanskrit Waku, “delusion,” again represents the Sanskritāvaraṇa, which means kleśa. Shō, “obstruction,” “covering,” “outer layer,” or “mental blindness.” See Glossary of San-skrit Terms, kleśāvaraṇa.

29    tea fields, on a crowded train, etc. Ichigū no to kuchi, face-to-face transmission can take place in a stuffy office, in a temple set in fragrant lit., “a one-corner special state”—not a universal abstraction. The

30    itself. Because to have realized even ten percent is to have realized ten percent of the whole

31    1225.

32    The same characters quoted poem by Master Bodhidharma: “I originally came to this land/To transmit thehonrai, “originally came,” appear in the first line of an often bearing of fruit is naturally realized.” See, for example, Chapter Forty-three, Dharma and to save deluded emotional beings./A flower is five petals opening;/TheKūge.

33    Modern-day Fukui prefecture.

34    1243.

35    1034 to 1037.

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36    and was known by local people as the “Keeper of the Old Stupa.” He was already a Sempuku Shōko (dates unknown). He lived by the stupa of Master Unmown Bun’en, had finally attained clear understanding, and therefore called himself a successor of Buddhist teacher when, on reading the record of Master Unmon’s words, he felt he

Master Unmown.

37    Located in Kiangsi province in southeast China.

38    Unmown Kyōshin is his posthumous title. Master Unmown Bun’en (864–949), successor of Master Seppō Gison. Great Master 39 Ba-daishi,was the monk’s name of Master Baso Dōitsu (709–788), successor of Master Nangaku literally, “great horse master.” Ba stands for baso, “horse patriarch,” which Ejō. Master Baso was the master of Master Hyakujō Ekai (749–814), and the grand-father-master of Master Ōbaku Kiun (d. ca. 855).

40       Chinchō, lit., “value [yourselves]” or “take good care of yourselves,” is a parting Gyōji, paragraph 241; Chapter salutation. See, for example, Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Forty-five, Records of the Torch from the audience, so Master Shōko finished his preaching and left the Dharma hall. QuotedZokutōrokuBodaisatta-shishōbō,)(, compiled during the Song era.Supplementary Record of the Torchparagraph 78. There were no questions from the), one of the Gotōroku (Five

41       learning is a process to which the whole body-mind is devoted; it is not merely intellectual study of theoretical principles or scientific study of objective data.in practice,” “to master in experience,” etc. means to go, visit, enter into, participate, or devote oneself to. Master Dōgen frequently Kyūsansanis here used as an adjective. These characters usually appear the other wayin the compound sankyū suru,sangaku, “learning in practice,” to indicate that Buddhist “to investigate,” “to master,” “to investigate Kyū means to investigate thoroughly. San round, in the verb phrase uses

42       Master Baso.

43       not esoteric but open. The phrase appears in the final sentences of the Rakusho,Jikishi no rakusho. Jikishi,lit., “a place to settle down,” suggests the balanced state of zazen.lit., “directly indicated” or “directly indicatable,” meansFukanzazengi.

44       Watō .the master of Master Rinzai, so-called Master Dōgen usually refers to such stories as Sanshō Enen’s use of the word in Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), In the Rinzai sect, which traces its lineage directly back to Master Ōbaku as kōans are called innen,watō“ causes and circumstances.”Kōkyō.—see for example Master In the Shōbōgenzō

45       Master Hyakujō simply recognized his disciple’s great admiration of Master Baso. He did not recommend Master Ōbaku to transcend face-to-face transmission.

46       the task at hand, but nonetheless devotes himself entirely to it. The words appear in Shishi-funjin suggests the effort of one (like Master Ōbaku) who is more than up to Mahāprajñaparāmitā-sūtra, which uses chap. 52 of the Chinese translation of the

Chapter Fifty-seven

modern Japanese; it means “like fury” or “with great power and speed.”to pursue the truth. The phrase the metaphor of a lion chasing small prey to explain the singlemindedness necessary shishi-funjin has remained a figure of speech used in

47       chap. 5: “[A monk] asks Zen Master Kyōzan Unryō, ‘What is the meaning of Hyakujō‘ A mosquito climbing up the backside of an iron ox.’ [The monk] says, ‘What does rolling up his seat [to leave early] during Baso’s formal preaching?’ The master says, at hand but nonetheless devotes himself entirely to it. A related story appears in chap.5Uki-tō-jōju of a Chinese anthology called the suggests the effort of one (like Master Shōko) who is not up to the task Zenrui (Zen Assortment) and in the Zokutōroku, that mean, in the end?’ The master says, ‘A black turtle climbing a tree upside down.’”

48       the thirty-chapter Master Hōun Ihaku, successor of Master Hōun Hoshu. He completed the editing of Zokutōroku in 1101. Zen Master Bukkoku is his posthumous title.

 

[Chapter Fifty-eight] Zazengi

The Standard Method of Zazen

Translator’s Note: Gi means a form, or a standard of behavior. Therefore zazengi means the standard method of zazen. Master Dōgen wrote several treatises about zazen. First he wrote Fukanzazengi (“Universal Guide to the Standard Method of Zazen”), in 1227, just after coming back from China. In the Shōbōgenzō he wrote Bendōwa (“A Talk about Pursuing the Truth,” Chapter One), Zazenshin (“A Needle for Zazen,” Chapter Twenty-seven), Zanmai-ō-zanmai (“The Samādhi That Is the King of Samādhis,” Chapter Seventy-two), and this chapter, Zazengi. The Fukanzazengi was the first text Master Dōgen wrote, and thus it was the first proclamation of his belief in zazen. The Bendōwa was an introduction to zazen written in an easy style and format to help us understand the fundamental theories of zazen. The Zazenshin contains a guiding poem on zazen, and Master Dōgen’s interpretation of it. The reason Master Dōgen used poetry to interpret the meaning of zazen is that it is difficult to interpret the philosophical meaning of zazen in prose, because the ultimate meaning of zazen is something that cannot be explained with words. Master Dōgen felt that it was appropriate to suggest the ultimate philosophical meaning of zazen in poetry. But in this chapter, Zazengi, Master Dōgen explained only the formal method of practicing zazen. The existence of this chapter indicates how highly Master Dōgen revered the formal standard of zazen.

[189] To practice Zen is to sit in zazen.1 For sitting in zazen a quiet place is good. Prepare a thick sitting mat. Do not allow wind and smoke to enter. Do not allow rain and dew to leak in. Set aside an area that can contain the body. There are traces of those in the past who sat on a diamond [seat]2 or sat on 217b a bed of rock;3 they all were seated on a thick carpet of grass. The sitting place should be bright; it should not be dark, day or night. To be warm in winter and cool in summer is the way. Cast aside all involvements and cease

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the ten thousand things. Good is not considered. Bad is not considered. It is beyond mind, will, or consciousness, and beyond mindfulness, thought, or reflection. Do not try to become a buddha. Get free from sitting and lying down.4 Take food and drink in moderation. Guard time closely. Love sitting in zazen as if putting out a fire on your head. The Fifth Patriarch on Ōbaizan5 had no other practices; he solely practiced zazen.

[191] When sitting in zazen, wear the kaṣāya and use a round cushion. The cushion does not support the whole of the crossed legs; it supports the backside. Thus the underside of the folded legs is on the mat, and the bases of the backbone6 are on the cushion. This is the method of sitting used by the buddhas and the patriarchs when they sit in zazen. Either sit in the half lotus posture or sit in the full lotus posture. To sit in the full lotus posture put the right foot on the left thigh and put the left foot on the right thigh. The toes of each foot should be symmetrically aligned with the thighs, not out of proportion. To sit in the half lotus posture just put the left foot on the right thigh. Let the robe and gown hang loosely and make them neat. Place the right hand on the left foot; then place the left hand on the right hand, with the tips of the thumbs resting against each other. Keeping the hands like this,

217c draw them toward the body. Let the tips of the thumbs meet in line with the navel. Sit erect, letting the body be right. Do not lean to the left, incline to the right, slump forward, or arch backward. It is essential that the ears are aligned with the shoulders and the nose is aligned with the navel. Let the tongue spread against the roof of the mouth. Let the breath pass through the nose. Let the lips and the teeth each come together. And let the eyes be open; the eyes should be neither wide open nor half-closed. Having regulated the body-mind like this, let there be one complete exhalation. Sitting in balance in the mountain-still state, think the concrete state of not thinking. How can the state of not thinking be thought? It is non-thinking. This is the real secret of zazen. Sitting in zazen is not learning Zen meditation. It is the great peaceful and joyful gate of Dharma. It is untainted practice and experience.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Zazengi

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     the Yoshida district of Esshū,7 in the eleventh                                     lunar month, in the winter of the first year of                                     Kangen.8

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Notes

1         concrete sitting practice itself. Sanzen wa zazen nari. Sanresents the Sanskrit dhyāna, literally means visit, enter into, or participate in. which means meditation, thought, reflection, or concen-dhyāna,” means the Zen reparation—either the state or the practice thereof. Zazen, “sitting

2         Bodhgayā. The site of the Buddha’s realization of the truth under the bodhi tree at present-day

3         upon the rock. Master Sekitō Kisen, for example, built his hut on a large flat rock and sat in zazen 4 Zaga,kinds of daily activities. Short for gyō-ō-zaga, “walking, standing, sitting, and lying down,” the four 5 Master Daiman Kōnin. See, for example, Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji.    Busshō;

6     Haikotsu no shita. two knobby protuberances at the bottom of the pelvis). These are the key weight-Anatomically speaking, this means the ischial tuberosities (the bearing points in sitting. If they are positioned optimally on the sitting cushion, thenmitted via the pelvis into the ground.it is possible for the weight of the whole head, neck, and back to be effortlessly trans-

7     Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 8 1243.

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[Chapter Fifty-nine] Baike

Plum Blossoms1

Translator’s Note: Baike means plum blossoms. Master Dōgen loved plum blossoms very much and we can find many descriptions and poems about plum blossoms in his works. Master Tendō Nyojō, Master Dōgen’s master, also loved plum blossoms and so we can also find many poems about plum blossoms in his works. Plum blossoms may have been a great pleasure to Buddhist monks living in mountain temples when there were few consolations to relieve the hardship of winter—because plum blossoms bloom at the very beginning of spring, when there are no other flowers, and plum blossoms are both pretty and fragrant. In this chapter, Master Dōgen described the real situation of nature, quoting Master Tendō Nyojō’s poems and preachings on plum blossoms.

[195] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, is the thirtieth abbot and great master of Tendō Keitokuji on Daibyakumyōzan, in the great Song district of Keigenfu.2 In formal preaching in the Dharma hall he preaches to the assembly:

The first lines from Tendō this midwinter:3 Jagged and fanged4 is the old plum tree; Suddenly it flowers—one flower, two flowers, Three, four, five flowers—countless flowers.

Its purity is not capable of pride.

Its fragrance is not capable of pride.

They spread out to create the look of spring and to fan the grass  and trees.

Patch-robed monks each with bald head.

Instantly changing are the raging wind and the hard rain,

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While, wrapping the earth in dragon-pattern robes,5 the snow is     boundless.

The old plum tree is very unconstrained.

The freezing cold rubs the nostrils, and they sting.6

[197] “The old plum tree” that has been revealed now is very uncon-

strained; it suddenly flowers, and naturally bears fruit. Sometimes it makes the spring, and sometimes it makes the winter. Sometimes it makes a raging wind, and sometimes it makes a hard rain. Sometimes it is heads of patch robed monks, and sometimes it is eyes of eternal buddhas. Sometimes it has become grass and trees, and sometimes it has become purity and fragrance.7 Its instant mystical changes and mystical wonder are unfathomable: even the great earth and the high heavens, the bright sun and the pure moon, have established their merits relying upon the tree-merits of the old plum tree, [whose state] is entanglement knotting and entwining with entanglement. When the old plum tree suddenly flowers, “The opening of flowers is the occurrence of the world.”8A moment in which flowers opening is the occurrence of the world, is spring having arrived. At this moment “one flower” is present as “the opening of five petals.”9 The time of this one flower is able to include three flowers, four flowers, and five flowers; it includes hundreds of flowers, thousands of flowers, myriads of flowers, and koṭis of flowers; and it includes countless flowers. The opening of these flowers, in all cases, is the old plum tree’s state of being unable to be proud of one twig, two twigs, or countless twigs. Uḍumbara flowers, utpala10 flowers, and so on also are one twig or two twigs of flowers of the old plum tree. In sum, all cases of flowers opening are benevolent gifts of the old plum tree. The old plum tree is present in the human world and in the heavens above. It is in the reality of the old plum tree that the merits of human societies and of heavenly palaces are established. Flowers that number hundreds of thousands we call the flowers of human beings and gods. Flowers that number myriads of koṭis are the flowers of Buddhist patriarchs.11 Such a moment we call “the buddhas’ appearance in the world,”12 and we call “the ancestral master’s ‘originally coming to this land.’”

[200] My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall preaches to the assembly:

It is the time when Gautama got rid of the Eye, In the snow, a single twig of plum blossoms

Now every place has become a thorn13 Yet [I] laugh at the swirling of the spring wind.

Now that this eternal buddha’s Dharma wheel has been turned in the farthest extremes of the universe, it is the moment in which all human beings and gods attain the truth. Nothing is left uncovered by the benefit of [this] Dharma, which reaches even clouds, rain, wind, and water, and grass, trees, and insects. Turned by this Dharma wheel, even the heavens, the earth, and national lands are the state of vigorous activity. “Hearing words never before heard” means listening to these words. “Attaining the unprecedented” means 218b getting the present Dharma. It is a wheel of Dharma which, in general, cannot be seen or heard without dreamy good fortune. In and around the one hundred and eighty states of the great kingdom of Song today there are mountain temples and village temples whose number is beyond calculation, and in which there are many monks. But most of them have never seen my late master, the eternal buddha; those who have seen him may be few. Those who have witnessed his words may be a still smaller minority. How then could the people who have met with him and saluted him be many? Those who have been allowed into his inner sanctum are not even a few. How much less could people be permitted to do prostrations to the late master’s skin, flesh, bones, marrow, eyes, and features? My late master, the eternal buddha, does not easily grant monks’ requests to stay at the temple. He usually says, “People who are accustomed to not having the will to the truth are not permitted in my place.” He sends them away at once. Having got rid of them he says, “Without being a genuine person, what do they want to do? Dogs like that disturb others. They cannot stay.” I have actually witnessed this; I have heard it with my own ears. I secretly thought to myself: “What wrongness do they have not to be permitted to remain with us even though they are people of this country? What luck do I have to be permitted not only to stay at the temple but also to come and go as I please in the [master’s] inner sanctum, to do prostrations to his venerable form, and to listen to his words of Dharma, though I am a native of a distant foreign country? This excellent connection which has formed between us, in spite of my dullness,

cannot be pure imagination.” While my late master was spreading his influence through Song China there were still people who were able to enter into

218c [the truth] along with people who were unable to enter. Now that my late master, the eternal buddha, has departed Song China, it may be darker than a moonless night. Why? I say so because at around the time of my late master, the eternal buddha, there were no other eternal buddhas like my late master, the eternal buddha. That being so, in now aspiring to see and hear the foregoing [preaching], we students of a later age should be mindful. Do not imagine that human beings and gods in other directions might be able to see and to hear, or might be able to learn in practice, a wheel of Dharma like the present one.

[204] “Plum blossoms in the snow” are the one appearance of the uḍumbara flower.14 How often does it recur in everyday life that, while looking at the right Dharma-eye treasury of our Buddha Tathāgata, we pass over the winking of an eye and do not break into a smile?15 Yet just now we have received the authentic transmission of, and have been struck by, the realization that plum blossoms in the snow are the very eye of the Tathāgata. Picking up this [realization], we make it into the eye on the forehead,16 and we make it into the eyeballs in the eyes. Further, when we get inside plum blossoms themselves, and perfectly realize plum blossoms, doubtful causes or circumstances never appear at all. Just this is the eye of “In the heavens above and under the heavens I alone am the Honored One,”17 and it is honored throughout the reality of the Dharma world. That being so, heavenly flowers in the heavens above, heavenly flowers in the human world, the mandārava flowers,18 mahāmandārava flowers, mañjūṣaka flowers,19 and mahāmañjūṣaka flowers that rain from the heavens, together with the miscellaneous flowers of limitless lands in the ten directions, are all the dependents of plum blossoms in the snow; for they have bloomed by receiving a part of the benefit of plum blossoms. The hundreds of koṭis of flowers20 are the dependents of plum blossoms; we should call them miniature plum blossoms. All other flowers, flowers in space, flowers on the ground, flowers in samādhi, and so on, are common flowers which are the large and small dependents of plum blossoms. Flowers that open in the lands which make up the hundreds of koṭis of lands inside a flower,21 are all a portion of the benefit of these plum blossoms. Beyond the benefit apportioned by plum blossoms, there is no other raindrop or dewdrop of benefit at all; life-blood totally derives from plum blossoms. Do not learn that the place where “snow is boundless” is only the Shōrin Temple in the Sūzan Mountains:22 “[snow is 219a boundless]” is the Eye of the Tathāgata, it illuminates overhead and illuminates underfoot. Do not learn it as only the snow of a snow palace on a white mountain;23 it is the eye of the right Dharma of the aged Gautama. The five eyes24 are perfectly realized at this place. The thousand eyes25 may be roundly realized in this eye. Truly, there cannot be a single atom of “the real form of all dharmas” that the body-mind and the brightness of the aged Gautama do not perfectly realize. Though there are differences in the views of human beings and gods, and though the sentiments of the common and the sacred diverge, “the boundless expanse of snow” is “the earth,” and “the earth” is “the boundless expanse of snow.”26 Without “boundless expanses of snow,” there is no “earth” in the universe.27 The getting together of the outside and the inside28 of this “boundless expanse of snow” is just the Eye of Old Gautama. Remember, flowers and the ground are totally without appearance. Flowers are without appearance.29 Because flowers are without appearance, the ground is without appearance. Because flowers and the ground are totally without appearance, the Eye is without appearance. The words “without appearance” express the supreme state of bodhi. What is seen just in the moment of this [supreme bodhi] is “a single twig of plum blossoms.” What is expressed just at this moment is “In the snow, a single twig of plum blossoms!” which is the vivid appearance30 of ground and flowers. The reason this [scene] is described further as “the boundless expanse of snow,” is that its whole outside-and-inside is “the boundless expanse of snow.”31 The whole universe is the state of the mind, and the whole universe is a scene of flowers.32 Because the whole universe is a scene of flowers, the whole universe is plum blossoms. And because the whole universe is plum blossoms, the whole universe is Gautama’s Eye. “The now, the place that has arrived”33 is mountains, rivers, and the earth. The present matter34 and the present time35 are the realization at the present place36 of:

I originally came to this land,

To transmit the Dharma and to save deluded emotional beings. A flower is five petals opening;

The bearing of fruit is naturally realized.37

Though there is coming from the west and there is movement to the east, they are the present place that is the now of plum blossoms. The state in which the realization of now is like this, is described as “realizing thorns.”38 There is the now of old branches and new branches on big limbs, and there is the present place of old twigs and new twigs on small stems. We should learn

 “places” as “having arrived” and we should learn “having arrived” as “now.” The “inside”39 of “three, four, five” and six flowers is the inside of “countless flowers.” A flower is equipped with inner virtues which are profound and universal, and it completely reveals outer virtues which are noble and great. This outside-and-inside40 is the blooming of a flower. It is “a single twig,” and so there is no extraneous twig and no extraneous variety. He41 who calls “the presence of one twig” “the now” is Old Man Gautama. Because [the transmission] is “a single twig,”42 it is transmitted from rightful successor to rightful successor, and for this reason “My existence43 is the right Dharma eye treasury and its transmission to Mahākāśyapa,” and “what you have got”44 is “my marrow.”45 Such realization of the present place is, wherever it occurs without exception, the great and valuable life, and therefore it is “five petals opening.” Five petals are a plum flower. On this basis,46 the Seven Buddhist Patriarchs exist, and the twenty-eight patriarchs of India in the west, the six patriarchs47 of the Eastern Lands, and nineteen48 further patriarchs, exist. They are all five petals opening on a single twig, and are a single twig of five petals.49 Having mastered “one twig,” and having mastered “five petals,” we meet the authentic transmission of “plum blossoms in the snow.” When we have transformed the body and transformed the mind inside the stream of the words “a single twig,” a cloud and the moon are one, and the river valley and the mountains are independent. Still, people who have never had eyes of learning in practice say: “The meaning of ‘five petals’ is that the five patriarchs of the Eastern Lands, and the First Patriarch, make a flower. When we list those five generations they are beyond past and present, former and latter, and so we describe them as five petals.” These words are not even worth taking up to examine and defeat. Such people are not skinbags who practice under buddhas and practice under patriarchs; they are pitiful. How could the truth that “five petals are a flower” be of only the five patriarchs? Are patriarchs after the Sixth Patriarch not to be mentioned? That is inferior to the talk of small children. We should not see or hear it, even in a dream.

[212] My late master, the eternal buddha, on the first morning of the

year says in formal preaching in the Dharma hall:

A New Year’s morning is the start of happiness, The myriad things are totally fresh.

With respect, monks of the assembly, [I say to you:] The plum tree reveals early spring.50

     Upon quiet reflection, even if the venerable old drills of the past, present,   219c

and future are liberated in body throughout the ten directions, if they do not have the expression “The plum tree reveals early spring,” who can call them individuals who have expressed the truth perfectly? My late master, the eternal buddha, stands alone as an eternal buddha among eternal buddhas. His purport is that, embraced by the plum tree’s blooming,51 myriad springs have arrived early. Myriad springs are one or two of the virtues contained in a plum tree. Just one spring is able to make “the myriad things totally fresh,” and to make the myriad dharmas into “a New Year’s morning.” “Starting of happiness” is rightness of the Eye. “The myriad things” expresses not only past, present, and future, but from before King of Majestic Voice to the eternal future. He is saying that [this] immeasurable and infinite past, present, and future is totally fresh, and so this [real] freshness has got free of “freshness.” On this basis, [Master Tendō speaks of] “treating the monks of the assembly with respect”—on the basis that his respectful treatment of the monks of the assembly is the state of the ineffable.

[214] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, says in formal preaching

in the Dharma hall:

If even a single word accords,52 The ten thousand ages do not move.53 Willow eyes are popping out on new twigs.

Plum blossoms are filling up old branches.54

That is to say, a hundred major kalpas of pursuing the truth55 are—from beginning to end—“a single word according with [the Buddha’s state].” And the effort56 of one instant of consciousness is—both before and after—“the ten thousand ages not moving.” That which makes new twigs flourish and [willow] eyes pop out is the new twigs themselves, and at the same time it is the [willow] eyes themselves. The principle holds that [willow] eyes are nothing other [than willow eyes]; at the same time, we investigate them as the new twigs. We should learn “the new” in practice, as “the total freshness of the myriad things.” The meaning of “Plum blossoms are filling up old branches” is that plum blossoms are the whole of [each] old branch, that they thoroughly realize [each] old branch, and that [each] old branch is just plum blossoms—or, for example, that blossoms and branches have entered into practice together, that blossoms and branches have grown together, and that blossoms and branches have become full together.57 Because blossoms and branches become full together, [the Buddha says:] “I possess the right Dharma eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, and I transmit them to Mahā kāśyapa,” [at which time] each face fills the picking up of a flower, and every flower fills the smiling face.

[217] My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall says to all the monks of the assembly:

The willows58 are wearing belts;59

The plum blossom is clad in bracers.60

Those bracers are beyond Shoku brocade61 and Benka’s gem;62 they are what the plum blossom reveals. What the plum blossom reveals is I who am the marrow having got you.63

[217] King Prasenajit64 invites Venerable Piṇḍola65 to a midday meal, upon which occasion the king asks, “I have heard that the Venerable One has intimately met Buddha. Is it true or not?” The Venerable One, lifting up an eyebrow with his hand, indicates affirmation.

My late master, the eternal buddha, praises him as follows:

By lifting an eyebrow he answers the question in part.

He has met Buddha intimately, without any mutual deceit.

To this day he deserves offerings from the four quarters.

Spring is on the plum twigs, embraced by the coldness of the snow.66

[219] This is the story of King Prasenajit asking the Venerable One if he has met Buddha or not met Buddha. “Meeting Buddha” means becoming buddha. To become buddha means to lift an eyebrow. If the Venerable One had only experienced “the [fourth] effect of arhathood”67 without being “a true arhat,”68 he could not meet Buddha. Without meeting Buddha, he could not become buddha. Without becoming buddha, he might be unable to attain the state of Buddha which is the lifting of an eyebrow. So remember, as a disciple of Śākyamuni Buddha’s face-to-face transmission, as one who, having already experienced the fourth effect, is awaiting his manifestation in the world as a later buddha, how could the Venerable One not be meeting Śākyamuni Buddha? This meeting Śākyamuni Buddha is not meeting with a buddha: we have learned in practice that the state in which we meet Śākyamuni Buddha as Śākyamuni Buddha, is meeting buddha.69 King Prasenajit, having been able to open these eyes of learning in practice, encounters a skilled hand70 lifting an eyebrow. [To grasp] the point of the words “He has met Buddha intimately,” we should quietly possess eyes that experience Buddha. This “spring” is beyond the human world and it is not confined to the buddha land; it is “on the plum twigs.” How do we know that it is so? “The coldness of the snow” is the lifting of an eyebrow.71 [221] My late master, the eternal buddha, says:

The original features are without life and death.

Spring is in the plum blossoms, and has entered a picture.

In picturing spring we should not picture willows, apricot trees, peach trees, and plum trees; we should just picture spring.72 To picture willows, apricot trees, peach trees, and plum trees is to picture willows, apricot trees, 220b peach trees, and plum trees; it is never to have pictured spring. It is not true that spring should not be pictured. Nevertheless, besides my late master, the eternal buddha, there is no one, from India in the west to China in the east, who has pictured spring. My late master, the eternal buddha, is the only sharp brush-tip to picture spring. The spring he is describing now is spring as a picture, and, because it has entered a picture, he need not summon any extra effort. He has let plum blossoms enter a picture and let them enter trees only so that they may usher in spring; it is a skillful means.73 My late master, the eternal buddha, by virtue of his clarity in the right Dharma-eye treasury, realizes the authentic transmission of this right Dharma-eye treasury through Buddhist patriarchs assembled in the ten directions in the past, present, and future. Thus he has penetrated the eye and has clarified plum blossoms.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Baike

                                    On the sixth day of the eleventh lunar month in                                     the fourth year of the Japanese era of Ninji,74 at                                     Kitsureiji75 in the Yoshida district of Esshū,                                     deep snow, three feet thick, covers the earth in                                     a boundless expanse.

[223] If by chance some demon of the self appears and the plum blossom seem not to be the eye of Gautama, then think: what other dharma—perhaps having been cited as more apt than plum blossoms to be the eye—could be seen as the eye? And if at such a time we look for the eye elsewhere, then every moment will be in the state of being face-to-face without recognizing each other—because mutual encounter76 will not yet be realized. Today is not my today; it is the today of a great master. Simply let the eye of the plum blossoms be clear. Stop searching for anything further. [224] My late master, the eternal buddha, says:

It is patently clear.

Stop searching back and forth for something behind the semblance     of the plum blossom.

In the becoming of rain and the becoming of clouds the past-and    present is naturally there.

                The past-and-present being empty, what end-point could there be?

Thus, the becoming of clouds and the becoming of rain is the speaking and doing of the plum blossom. Floating clouds and falling rain are the plum blossom’s thousands of twists and turns and myriad layers of color, its thousands of merits and myriad virtues. “The past-and-present being naturally there” is the plum blossom; the plum blossom is called “the past-and-present.”77 [225] In the past, Zen Master Hōen78 says:

The north wind mixes with snow and shakes the valley forest.

Though the myriad things have sunk under cover, regret is not deep.

The only presence is the mountain plum trees, which are full of spirit.

Before December they are already spewing the mind for all the     coldness of the year.79

Now, without penetrating the concrete situation of plum blossoms it is hard to know the mind [that is ready] for all the coldness of the year. A bit of the virtue of the plum blossoms, mixed with the north wind, has become the snow. Clearly, that which draws the wind, makes the snow, brings order to the year, and causes the myriad things of the valley forest to exist, is totally the power of the plum blossoms.

[226] The veteran monk Taigen Fu80 praised the realization of the truth

as follows:

I remember at the beginning, before realization, Each call of the painted long horn was a call of sorrow.

Now there are no idle dreams on my pillow.

I leave the plum blossoms to blow, in gusts large and small.

Veteran monk Fu was formerly a giver of lectures. Enlightened by the cook81 of Kassan Mountain,82 he realized the great state of realization, which is the plum blossoms letting the spring wind blow, in gusts large and small.

 

Notes

1         apricot (Baike. In Japan, the tree referred to as Prunus mume) in order to distinguish it from ume is accurately translated as a Japanese sumomo which means plum, translated as plum blossoms. and shrubs of the genus or Japanese plum. However, given that plum trees include numerous kinds of trees Prunus, where no distinction is necessary baike has been

2         Present-day Ningbo in northern Zhekiang province.

3         eleventh lunar month. for the first branches of plum blossoms. Tendō-chūtōChūtō,[no“midwinter,” means the middle of the three winter months, that is the] dai-ikku.Dai-ikku,Tendō is the name both of Master Tendō Nyojō and of the “first line(s) of verse,” can be interpreted as a metaphor temple.

4         angles. The branches and twigs of a plum (Japanese apricot) tree protrude at many irregular 5 which were worn by ancient Chinese emperors.Kon means the white ceremonial robes, gorgeously embroidered with dragon patterns,

6     Nyojōoshōgoroku, final volume.

7     In these sentences Master Dōgen suggests that the plum tree is so conspicuously realin the scenery of nature that everything in nature depends upon it. 8 (Ke-kai-sekai-ki, flowers) and reality (the world the words of Master Prajñātara, expressing the oneness of phenomena).

9     Alludes to the words of Master Bodhidharma (quoted in full later in this chapter): “Ibeings./A flower is five petals opening,/The bearing of fruit is naturally realized. “See also Chapter Forty-three, originally came to this land,/To transmit the Dharma and to save deluded emotional Kūge.

10    they suggest flowers with special significance in Buddhism, not common or garden Uḍumbara is the Sanskrit name for a fig tree of the mulberry family (see Chapter Udonge). Utpala is the Sanskrit name for the blue lotus flower. Lotus Sutra and other sutras, and as such Uḍumbara

Sixty-eight, and utpala flowers are mentioned in the flowers.

11    To Buddhist patriarchs, reality displays limitless phenomena.

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12    Shōbutsu-shutsugen-o-se. for example, LS 1.88–90.This expression appears frequently in the Lotus Sutra. See,

13    Keikyoku stances made Master Tendō worry about whether the plum flowers could survive.means thorns, brambles, or “nettlesome circumstances.” The harsh circum-

14    appearing in one moment,” alludes, for example, to Ichigen no donge, “one appearance of the uḍumbara Lotus Sutra, Hōben: flower” or “the uḍumbara “Wonderful uḍumbara flower Dharma like this the buddha-tathāgatas preach only occasionally, just as the flower appears only once in an age.” See LS 1.86–88.

15    Sixty-eight, eye, Master Mahākāśyapa—seeing in these actions the essence of the Buddha’s teach-ing (the right Dharma-eye treasury)—broke into a smile. See, for example, Chapter Legend says that when the Buddha picked up an Udonge.     uḍumbara flower and winked an

16    The image of the Indian god Maheśvara, or Śiva, equipped with an intuitive third eye on the forehead, was sometimes used in Buddhism as a symbol of human intuition.

17    Tenjō-tenge-yui-ga-doku-son. Legend says that when the Buddha was born, he took ground he said these words. seven steps, and with one hand pointing to the heavens and the other pointing to the

18    Flowers of the coral tree, mentioned for example in Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō: “This gods strike celestial drums,/And constantly make theater and music,/Show eringmandāravaland of mine is tranquil/. . . It is a place where living beings enjoy themselves./The flowers/On the Buddha and the great assembly.” (LS 3.32) 19 The name of a species of celestial flower, according to Monier-Williams’ Sanskrit English Dictionary.

20    All phenomena in the world.

21    interdependence of all things. Sutra,” That countless worlds exist inside a flower is the characteristic teaching of the called in Chinese and Japanese Garland SutraKegongyō,. The sutra emphasizes thelit., “Flower Adornment

Avataṃsaka-sūtra, and usually called in English the

22    snow fell as if without mercy, gradually piling up and burying him to his waist. . . .”When Master Taiso Eka first visited Master Bodhidharma at Shōrin Temple, “the nightGyōji, paragraph 216.

See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II),

23    Setsu-zan setsu-gū, by an immature viewpoint. Master Tendō’s expression, in contrast, is an expression “snow mountain, snow palace,” expresses an ideal place imagined of what he actually realized.

24    Gogen, “five eyes” or five intuitional states, are: 1) the physical eye, 2) the supernatural eye, 3) the eye of wisdom, 4) the Dharma-eye, and 5) the Buddha-eye.

25    Suggests the thousand eyes of Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara. See Chapter Thirty-three(Vol. II), Kannon.

Chapter Fifty-nine

26    yuki-man-man,wrapping the earth in dragon-pattern robes, the snow is boundless.” Although MasterMaster Tendō’s poem says Tendō thus describes “the snow” as boundlessly covering “the earth,” the two elements“boundlessness of snow,” and naishi daichi ni ko-kon shi te yuki-man-man,daichi, “the earth,” are not separate.“. . . while,

27    Without manifestation of real phenomena, there could be no planet Earth.

28    Hyō-ri, “outside and inside,” means form and content.

29    Ke-mushō, “flowers are nonerasing.” Mushō suggests 1) the instantaneousness of phein which illusion has been extinguished). See also discussion of Master Taiso Eka’s In the latter meaning, noumena, and 2) the absence of illusory concepts such as “appearance” or “arising.”ke-mata-fu-zō-shō, paragraph 33.mushō is sometimes used as a synonym for nirvana (the state “Flowers have never appeared,” in Chapter Forty expression three, Kūge,

30    Shō-shō, “appearance-appearance” or “life-life,” is contrasted with mushō.

31    Master Tendō’s expression hit the target completely.

32    Kejō. Jō means 1) feelings, emotion; 2) circumstances, conditions, scenery.

33    itaNikon no tōjo. In Master Tendō’s poem, Tō-jo, or itanikon is an adverb, “Now. . . ,” but here it is[ru] tokoro, as a compound meanstō, a noun, “the present” or “the now.” “wherever one goes,” that is, “everywhere,” “every place.” At the same time,

joEleven (Vol. I), The use of means 1) “every place,” and 2) “the place that has arrived” or “the present place.”[ru] means “to arrive “ or “to have arrived” and tō, itaUji,[ru]paragraph 44. to indicate presence is also discussed in the notes to Chapterjo, tokoro means “place”; so tō-

34    Tōji, “the matter that has arrived.” 35 Tōji, “the time that has arrived.”

36    Tōjo, “the place that has arrived.”

37    The words of Master Bodhidharma. See also Chapter Forty-three, Kūge.

38    Jō-keikyoku. Read in the poem as [jō, it means “realization.”to] na[ru], the first character means “to become,” but here, read as

39    Ri, ura,poem contains the phrase lit., “backside” or “inside,” here means the inner essence. Master Tendō’ssetsuri, “in the snow” or “inside the snow.”

40    Hyōri, oneness of outer form and inner essence. 41 Master Tendō.

42    transmitted are one. At the same time, the transmission is connected with individual The transmission is a single twig because transmitter, receiver, and that which is concrete matters.

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43    “exist.” The Buddha said, “I possess the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind Go-u means the Buddha himself. Go means “I” or “my,” and u means “possess” or the opening paragraph of Chapter Fifty-seven, of nirvana. I transmit them to Mahākāśyapa.” See, for example, paragraph 214 and Menju.

44    Nyotoku means what Master Taiso Eka got from Master Bodhidharma. See Chapter Kattō. Forty-six,

45    Gozui means Master Bodhidharma’s marrow. Ibid.

46    Whole .On the basis of the oneness of the concrete individual many and the real inclusive

47    From Master Bodhidharma to Master Daikan Enō.

48    From Master Daikan Enō to Master Dōgen.

49    Goyō, “five petals,” means “flowers.”

50    plum trees would already have been in bloom. In the lunar calendar, New Year’s Day was the first day of spring; on that day the 51 [Kai, hiraVol. I], Hokke-ten-hokke[ku] means “to bloom,” “to open,” “to disclose” (see Chapter Seventeen), or “to reveal” (as in Master Tendō’s poem).

52    Sōkai, state with the Buddha’s state. or ai-kana[u], “mutually accord,” means the accordance of a practitioner’s

53    if the manifestation is only one word of speech, then eternity stands still. In other words, when a person manifests the Buddha’s state in concrete form, even 54 on fresh green branches, whereas plum flowers grow on old brown or black branches. The third and fourth line of the poem describe real facts in nature: willow buds grow

55    Bendō.

56    practice of zazen.Kufū. The words bendō and kufū, which frequently appear together, both suggest the

57    from anything else: the whole of the plum tree is contained in every part of the plum “Together” is dō-jō, literally, “the same twig.” The point is that nothing is separate tree.

58    Yō-ryū. Yō means purple willows and ryū means weeping willows.

59    The brown trunks of the willow trees showing between the green of the spring leaves and the green undergrowth looked like big leather belts.

60    pink blossoms, they looked like bracers—i.e., the leather wrist or arm protectors worn Where the brown or black branches of the plum trees showed through the white or by archers.

61    Shoku-kin. Shoku means Sichuan province which was famous for its gorgeous brocade.

Chapter Fifty-nine

lit., “desire for Shoku,” means insatiable desire.Shoku-kin, Shoku brocade, therefore, symbolizes something very desirable. Bo-shoku,

62    a man called Benka. Also mentioned in Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), A huge gem found in ancient China during the Zhou dynasty (1122–255 Kesa-kudoku ,B.C.E. para-) by graph 127.

63    Zui-go-toku-nyo.“You have got my marrow,” in reverse order. They represent the unity These are Master Bodhidharma’s words to Master Taiso Eka, Kattō.nyoof subject-object and object-subject in the transmission. See Chapter Forty-six, toku-go-zui,

64    King Prasenajit (Pāli: Pasenadi), ruler of the kingdom of Kośala, was a lay follower of the Buddha. He is described many times in the Pāli canon as a jovial character fond of rich living but at the same time a staunch supporter of the sangha. 65 His father, Bhāradvāja, was a brahman in the court of King Udayana of Kauśāmbī. The monk Piṇḍola is remembered as one of the sixteen arhats in the Buddha’s order. had gone to hear Piṇḍola preaching the Dharma while the king was asleep, Udayana King Udayana himself was not very sympathetic toward Buddhism; after his wives reportedly threatened to have Piṇḍola thrown into a nest of red ants. 66 Kenbutsu. The story and Master Tendō’s verse of praise are also quoted in Chapter Sixty-one,

67 Arakan-kathe truth through intellectual study. See Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), (“fourth effect”) means the fourth stage of a śrāvaka, one who pursues Arakan. 68 four (Vol. II), Shin(“Belief and Understanding”) chapter (LS 1.260), is also quoted in Chapter Thirty[no] arakanArakan. means a buddha. The phrase, which appears in Lotus Sutra, Shinge-

69    Kenbutsu, “meeting buddha,” means realizing the state of Buddha as it is; it does not Kenbutsu. mean only seeing a buddha with the senses. See Chapter Sixty-one,

70    Kōshu, “good hand,” “nice hand,” or “fine hand,” means a person who has practical ability.

71    reality that the master suggested by lifting an eyebrow. The coldness of snow is reality—in the coldness of snow, we can experience the

72    We should realize spring as an inclusive reality.

73    Zengyō-hōben, from the Sanskrit upāya-kauśalya. The use of words and imagery as is explained by the Buddha in the a skillful means to lead us to the realization of reality that is beyond words and imagery, Lotus Sutra. See, for example, LS 1.120, 3.16.

74    1243.

75    Kitsureiji. Kitsurei is almost certainly another name for Kippōji, the temple in Esshū preceding this chapter. (modern-day Fukui prefecture) where Master Dōgen preached the several chapters Rei and hō, pō both mean mountain peak.

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76    and object. Sōhō, “mutual encounter,” means getting rid of the illusion of separation of subject

77    Kokon, “past-present,” means eternity.

78    Master Goso Hōen (1024?–1104), successor of Master Hakuun Shutan. 79 Quoted from chap. 30 of the Zokutōroko.

80    He traveled through many districts of China, not becoming the master of a temple.Ācārya Taigen Fu (dates unknown), a successor of Master Seppō Gison (822–907).

81    Tenzo, showed the importance he attached to this job by writing his own head cook, was one of the six main officers of a big temple. Master Dōgen). The name of the cook referred to here has not been traced. Tenzokyōkun (Instructions for the Cook

82    A temple was founded on Kassan Mountain in 870 by Master Kassan Zenne, a disciple of Master Sensu Tokujō.

[Chapter Sixty]

Juppō

The Ten Directions

Translator’s Note: Ju means “ten” and means “direction,” so juppō means “the ten directions.” The ten directions are east, west, south, north, northeast, southeast, southwest, northwest, and upward and downward. These represent all directions, the whole of space, or the whole world. In Buddhist philosophy the meaning of space is frequently discussed. In these discussions, the word juppō, “ten directions,” is often used as a concrete expression of space. In this chapter, Master Dōgen picks up the word juppō and uses it to discuss real space.

[3]  A fist is just the concrete ten directions.1 A moment of sincerity2 is the brilliant ten directions. [With these words] the marrow has been struck out of the bones.

[4]  Śākyamuni Buddha tells a great assembly, “In the buddha lands of

the ten directions, there only exists the One-Vehicle Dharma.”3

These “ten directions” have grasped “buddha lands” and made them into

the concrete. Thus, unless we bring the buddha lands here, the ten directions 221a never exist. Because they are the buddha lands, we see the Buddha as the ruler. This sahā realm, it seems, is the buddha land of Śākyamuni. Taking up this sahā world, and clearly noting that eight ounces is half a pound, we should learn in practice that the buddha lands of the ten directions are of seven feet or of eight feet. These ten directions fit into a single direction and fit into a single buddha, and for this reason they have manifested the ten directions. Because they are the ten directions, one direction, this direction, [my] own direction, and the present direction, they are the direction of the eyes, the direction of a fist, the direction of an outdoor pillar, and the direction of a stone lantern. The buddhas of the ten directions in such buddha lands of the ten directions never retain “great” and “small,” or “pure” and “impure.”

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For this reason, the “buddhas alone together with buddhas” of the ten directions praise and admire each other. They never see maligning each other and discussing each others’ relative merits or likes and dislikes as the turning of the Dharma wheel or as the preaching of Dharma. As buddhas and as the Buddha’s disciples, they promote and salute [each other].4 In receiving the Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs, we learn under them like this, not criticizing each other as right and wrong and slandering and shaming each other, as if we were non-Buddhists or demons. When we open and peruse the Buddhist sutras that have now been transmitted to China, and glimpse the totality of the [Buddha’s] lifetime of teaching, Śākyamuni Buddha never says that buddhas of other directions are inferior, never says that buddhas of other directions are superior, and never says that buddhas of other directions are not buddhas. In sum, what we can never find in [Śākyamuni Buddha’s] lifelong preaching are words of the Buddha that criticize other buddhas. Words of buddhas of other directions that criticize Śākyamuni Buddha, similarly, have never been reported.

[7] Thus. . .

Śākyamuni Buddha tells a great assembly, “I alone know concrete form,

and the buddhas of the ten directions are also like that.”5

Remember, the form of “I alone know concrete form” is the enaction of round form.6 Round form is “this bamboo being as long as this, and that

221b bamboo being as short as that.”7 The truth of the buddhas of the ten directions is the preaching that “I alone know concrete form, and Śākyamuni Buddha is also like that.” It is “I alone experience concrete form, and the buddhas of this direction8 are also like that.” It is the form of “I,” the form of “knowing,” the form of “the concrete,” the form of “all,” the form of “the ten directions,” the form of the sahā realm, and the form of Śākyamuni Buddha. This principle is the Buddhist sutras. Buddhas and their lands are beyond duality, they are beyond the sentient and beyond the insentient, they are beyond delusion and realization, they are beyond good, bad, and indifferent, they are beyond purity and beyond impurity, they are beyond creation, beyond existence, beyond destruction, and beyond emptiness,9 they are beyond constancy and beyond non-constancy, they are beyond existence and beyond nonexistence, they are beyond self and beyond others; they have left behind the four lines10 and transcended the hundred negations. They are nothing

Chapter Sixty

other than the ten directions and nothing other than the buddha lands. In sum, the ten directions are just folk who have heads and do not have tails.

[10] Zen Master Chōsha Keishin11 addresses the assembly: “The whole

universe in the ten directions is a śramaṇa’s12 eye.”13

What has been described now is one eye of the śramaṇa Gautama. The eye of the śramaṇa Gautama is “I possess the right Dharma-eye treasury.” It belongs to anyone,14 and at the same time it is the eye of the śramaṇa Gautama. The whole universe in the ten directions in its ragged and jagged state is Gautama’s eye-organ. This “whole universe in the ten directions” is one among a śramaṇa’s eyes. And going up beyond this, there are “limitlessly abundant eyes.”15

[11]“The whole universe in the ten directions is a śramaṇa’s everyday

speech.”

“Everyday”16 means “ordinary” or, in colloquial Japanese, yonotsune. So the ordinary speech of a śramaṇa’s everyday life is the whole universe in the ten directions; it is correctness in word and correctness in speech. We should clearly learn in practice the truth that because everyday speech is the whole universe in the ten directions, the whole universe in the ten directions is everyday speech. This “ten directions,” because it is without “limit,”17 is [called] “the whole18 ten directions.”19 In everyday life we use this speech. It is as in the case of seeking a horse, seeking salt, seeking water, and seeking 221c a pot, and as in the case of serving water, serving a pot, serving salt, and serving a horse.20 Does anyone know that a great person who is free of thought transforms the body and transforms the brain within the stream of this speech, and transforms [even] speech in mid-speech. The correctness in word and straightness in speech of the ocean’s mouth and the mountains’ tongue is “everyday.” Thus, even if we cover our mouth and cover our ears, the ten directions are this real existence.

[13] “The whole universe in the ten directions is a śramaṇa’s whole body.”

With one hand indicating the heavens as the heavens and with the other hand indicating the earth as the earth, [the Buddha says that,] although they are real as they are, “In the heavens and under the heavens, I alone am the Honored One”:21 this state is the whole universe in the ten directions as the śramaṇa’s whole body. Brain, eyes, and nostrils, skin, flesh, bones, and marrow: each is totally the śramaṇa’s body as clarification and liberation of the

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whole ten directions. Without our moving the whole ten directions, it exists like this. Not depending upon intellectual thinking, but by mustering the śramaṇa’s body which is the whole universe in the ten directions, we realize the śramaṇa’s body which is the whole universe in the ten directions. [14] “The whole universe in the ten directions is the brightness of the self.”22

“The self” means the nostrils that are prior to the birth of one’s parents. And the condition in which the nostrils happen to be present in the hands of the self is called “the whole universe in the ten directions.” In that condition the self is realized and it realizes reality; it opens the hall and meets Buddha. At the same time, it is “someone having replaced the eyes with black beads.”23 But there again, “when the face has split we may be able to meet with great masters.”24 Moving on further, “to call someone to us is easy but to send them away is difficult.” Conversely, “when we get called we turn the head. What is the use of turning the head by oneself? In fact, I turn my head adhering to this concrete person.”25 And “while a meal is waiting for someone to eat it and a robe is waiting for someone to wear it”—even if you seem to be groping in vain26—“I am afraid that I am already going to give you thirty strokes.”

[16]  “The whole universe in the ten directions exists inside the brightness

of the self.”

An eyelid is called “the brightness of self.” And its sudden opening is called

“existence inside.”27 That which exists in eyes as a result of looking is called

222a “the whole universe in the ten directions.” And though it is like this, “when we sleep on the same floor we know the holes in [each other’s] covers.”28

[17]  “In the whole universe in the ten directions there is no one who is

not himself.”

So among individual excellent instructors and individual concrete fists, there is no instance of a “ten directions” who is not him- or herself. Because of being itself, each individual self is totally the ten directions. The ten directions of each individual self directly restrict the ten directions. Because the lifeblood of each individual self is present in the hands of each individual, each returns to others the original cost of straw sandals.29 How can it be that Bodhidharma’s eyes and Gautama’s nostrils are now newly conceived in the wombs of outdoor pillars? Because getting out and getting in are left utterly to the ten directions and ten aspects.

Chapter Sixty

[19]          Great Master Shūitsu30 of Gensha-in Temple says, “The whole uni-

verse in the ten directions is one bright pearl.”31

Clearly, the one bright pearl is the whole universe in the ten directions. Those with heads of gods or faces of demons have seen it as their cave, descendants of the Buddhist Patriarch have seen it as the eye, men and women of human families have seen it as brains and fists, and beginners and late learners have seen it as wearing robes and eating meals. My late master made it into a mud ball with which to strike brothers senior and junior. Furthermore, although this was plain and simple placement of a piece,32 it had scooped out the eyes of the ancestors. During the scooping, ancestors each lent a hand, and the insides of their eyes radiated light.

[20]          Master Kempō,33 the story goes, is asked by a monk, “‘The bhaga vats of the ten directions are on one road to nirvana’s gate.’ I wonder where they are on the street?”

Kempō draws a circle34 with his staff and says, “They are right here.”35

“Being right here” is the ten directions. “The bhagavatas” are a staff. “A

staff” is being right here. “One road” is the ten directions. But36 do not let a staff get lost inside “Gautama’s nostrils,” and do not let a staff get lost in 222b “the nostrils of a staff”: do not batter a staff into “the nostrils of a staff.” And at the same time do not recognize that Old Man Kempō has meditated on “the bhagavatas of the ten directions being on one road to nirvana’s gate”: he only speaks of being right here. Being right here is not to be denied, and if Old Man Kempō is, from the outset, not deluded by his staff, that is good. In sum we just learn in practice, as the ten directions, nostrils that are alive.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Juppō

Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in  Esshū,37 Japan, on the thirteenth day of the  eleventh lunar month in the first year of                                Kangen.38

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Notes

1         Juppō,hō mean not only a direction but also a quarter, region, or district. From the Sanskrit dāśa-diś. Both the Sanskrit diś and the Chinese character

2         Sekishin, lit., “red mind,” means naked mind or sincere mind. 3         Lotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.106.

4     thumb and the right hand covering the back of the left hand (also Chapter Fifty-five, palms of the hands together (Monjin, lit., “to ask [how someone is],” in practice means to bow, either with the Darani.gasshō-monjin), or with the left hand curled round the shasshu-monjin). See

5     Lotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.74.

6     preaches that his body manifests Ta-ensō. In a verse quoted in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), en-getsu-sō, “the roundness of the moon.” Here, as Busshō, Master Nāgārjuna in that chapter, en, “round,” means not only circular but real.

7     Words of Master Suibi Mugaku. See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 71.

8     Jihōplace.”means “the direction of [my]self”; that is, “this direction” or “this concrete

9     lishment of one world and the establishment of the next world. are four Jō, jū, e, kū,kalpa “creation, existence, destruction, emptiness,” allude to the idea that theres (of creation, existence, destruction, emptiness) between the stab

inaction”: 1) Shiku.Alludes to the philosophical system called u, “existence,” “being,” or “having,” and 2) shiku-funbetsu,mu, “nonexistence,” “absence, ”four-line discrimen-

reality as inclusive of two sides. 4) suggests reality as beyond affirmation and negation. Or “being without,” suggest two opposing approaches to describing reality—affirmative and negative. 3) Yaku-u yaku-mu, “both existence and nonexistence,” suggests concrete HI-u hi-mu, “neither existence nor nonexistence,”

10    Master Chōsha Keishin (d. 868), successor of Master Nansen Fugan.

11    Buddhist monks. So a wandering mendicant of brahman origin. The Buddha applied the term who was not of the brahman caste—as distinct from a The Sanskrit śramaṇaśramaṇa(lit., “striver”) originally described a wandering mendicantmeans 1) a diligent practitioner, and 2) a monk.pārivrājaka (lit., “wanderer”),śramaṇa to

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12    Keitokudentōroku, This and the following quotations of Master Chōsha’s words appear together in the chap. 10. See also Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), Kōmyō.

13    means 1) “who?” or “anyone,” and 2) a person in the state that cannot be expressed the fine mind of nirvana. I transmit them to Mahākāśyapa” (see Chapter Sixty-eight,Asui ni fushoku su.). Here Master Dōgen substituted Fushoku, The Buddha said, “I possess the right Dharma-eye treasury andor  fuzoku, here means “belong,” but in the Buddha’s words asui, “anyone,” for “Mahākāśyapa.” Asui

Udonge

with words. means “transmit.”

14    Nyokyo-ta-gen. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon.

15    Kajōstate.” See Chapter Sixty-four, means, as an adjective, “everyday,” and as a noun, “everyday life,” or “the usualKajō.

16    Jin here means “limit.”

17    Jin here means “to the limit” or “whole.”

18    The full sentence is: jinjuppōkono juppō, mujin naru ga yue ni, jinjuppō nari. Mujin means “the ten directions to the limit,” i.e., “the whole means of the ten directions.” Ironically, therefore, this sentence says that because the ten directions are without “without limit,” and jin (= limit), they are jin (= whole).

19    dhava sendaba. The word saindhava, “product of the Indus River basin” is ambiguous or inclusive,sain but a wise retainer knows from the real situation whether a king who requests wants a horse, salt, water, or a pot. See Chapter Eighty-one (Vol. IV), Ō-saku-

20    four directions and, pointing to the sky with one hand and pointing to the ground Alludes to the legend that after his birth the Buddha took seven steps in each of the with the other, he said “In the heavens and under the heavens, I alone am the Honored One.” Source not traced. See also Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō.

21    Jiko no kōmyō means “the brightness of the self” or “my own brightness.”

22    original source has not been traced.is quoted in Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), Having black beads for eyeballs means not being overexcited. The same expression Butsu-kōjō-no-ji, paragraph 65, but the

23    the appearance of a new face, habitual imbalances having been transcended, and con-Heki-men-rai-taike-sōken, “the face having split, meeting with great masters,” suggests the opening of a Buddha hall. The expression is in the style of a sentence written increate entry into the real world of buddhas—which is not necessarily dependent on been traced. The same applies to the expressions in quotes in the remainder of the Chinese (and has therefore been placed in quote marks), but a Chinese source has not paragraph.

24    “I turn my head by myself.” Ko[no] kan [ni] tsui[te] ezu [suru], “I turn my head adhering to this fellow,” means

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25    Mosaku-fujaku, effort. lit., “groping without touching,” suggests innocence, or immature 27 Zairi, taken from Master Chōsha’s words, suggests concrete existence.

28 through the four philosophies of subject, object, synthesis in action, and ordinary reality. The four sentences of the paragraph exemplify the progress of Master Dōgen’s thoughts 29 one’s salt. See also Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), To repay the cost of one’s straw sandals means to have earned one’s keep, to be worth Busshō, paragraph 73.

30 Master Gensha Shibi (835–907). Great Master Shūitsu is his posthumous title. 31 (Keitokudentōroku,Vol. I), Ikka-no-myōju. chap. 18; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 15. See also Chapter Four

32    Ichijakusu means one stone placed on a go board.

33    Master Esshū Kempō (dates unknown), successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai.

34    existed inside the circle. Ikkakua circle in the ground with his staff, and said that the bhagavatas of the ten directions[o] kaku [su], lit., “draw a drawing,” in context suggests that the master etched

35    Gotōegen, chap. 13. See also Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 37.

36    The previous sentence has considered the meaning of concepts in the story. This sentence affirms the concrete existence of a staff.

37    Corresponds to present-day Fukui prefecture. 38 1243.

 

[Chapter Sixty-one] Kenbutsu

Meeting Buddha

Translator’s Note: Ken means “look at,” “meet,” or “realize the state of,” and butsu means “buddha” or “buddhas.” Therefore kenbutsu means “meeting Buddha” or “meeting buddhas.” In order to meet buddhas it is necessary first to become buddha, because buddhas can be seen only by buddhas. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explained the real situation of meeting buddhas and the true meaning of meeting buddhas.

[23] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses a great assembly: “If we see [both] the many forms and [their] non-form, we at once meet the Tathāgata.1

“To see the many forms” and “to see [their] non-form,” as described now, is a liberated bodily experience, and so it is “to meet the Tathāgata.” Realization in which this eye of meeting the Buddha is already open in experience is called “meeting buddha.”2 The vigorous Way [called] “the eye of meeting the Buddha” is eyes partaking in buddha. When we see in others our own buddha, and when we see our own buddha outside of buddhas,3 although all things are a tangle, to have learned “meeting Buddha” in practice, to be pursuing and realizing “meeting buddha,” to be getting free of “meeting buddha,” to be attaining the vivid state of meeting buddha, and to be utilizing meeting buddha, are the real manifestation of sun-faced buddhas4 and the real manifestation of moon-faced buddhas. Meeting buddha like this, in each case, is meeting buddha whose faces are limitless, whose body is limitless, whose mind is limitless, and whose hands and eyes are limitless. The effort in pursuit of the truth, and mastery of experience of the [Buddha’s] state, which we are performing to the tips of the toes in the present and which we have continued since establishing the mind and taking the first step: all are 222c vivid eyes and vivid bones and marrow running inside meeting buddha. This being so, the whole world of the self and all worlds in other directions, this

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individual and that individual, are all equally the effort of meeting buddha. When people without eyes of learning in practice take up the Tathāgata’s words “If we see the many forms [and] non-form. . .” they think, “To see the many forms as non-form is just to see the Tathāgata.” In other words, they think the words describe seeing the many forms not as forms but as the Tathāgata. Truly, a faction of small thinkers will [inevitably] study the words like that, but the reality of the words which the Buddha intended is not like that. Remember, to see the many forms, and to see [their] non-form, is to meet the

Tathāgata at once. There is the Tathāgata and there is the non-Tathāgata.5

[26] Zen Master Dai Hōgen6 of Seiryō-in Temple says, “If we see the

many forms [as] non-form, we are not then meeting the Tathāgata.”7

This expression of Dai Hōgen now is an expression in the state of meeting buddha. In it, there is the expression of Hōgen, and there is the expression of meeting buddha: conversing, they come head-to-head in competition and they extend hands in cooperation. We should listen to Hōgen’s expression with the ears, and we should listen to the expression of meeting buddha with the eyes. At the same time, [students] in the past who have learned this principle in practice have thought as follows: “The many forms are the form of the Tathāgata, and there is no instance of them having mingled with a form that is not the form of the Tathāgata. We should never see this concrete form as non-form. To see it as non-form is “leaving the father and running away.”8 They have asserted that, “Because this concrete form is just the form of the Tathāgata, we say that the many forms should be the many forms.” This is truly a supreme discourse of the Great Vehicle, and the experience of the masters of many districts. Decisively determining it to be so, we should believe it and experience it. Do not be fluff following the wind to the east

223a and to the west. “The many forms are the form of the Tathāgata, not nonfarm”: investigating this and meeting buddha, deciding this and experiencing conviction, we should receive it and retain it, and we should recite it and become thoroughly versed in it. In so doing, we should make it seen and heard ceaselessly through our own ears and eyes, we should get free of it through our own body, mind, bones, and marrow, and we should make it clear through our own mountains, rivers, and universe. Such is the action of learning the state of Buddhist patriarchs. Do not think that, because it is your own speech and conduct, it cannot make your own eyes clear. Being transformed by our

own words of transformation,9 we get free of the view of our own transformation into a Buddhist patriarch. This is the everyday state of Buddhist patriarchs. Therefore, there is only one way to comprehend the state in experience, namely: “the many forms are already beyond non-form, and non-form is just the many forms.” Because non-form is the many forms, non-form is truly non-form. We should learn in practice that the form called “non-form” and the form called “the many forms,” are both the form of the Tathāgata.10 In the house of learning in practice, there are two kinds of texts: sutras that are seen, and sutras that are not seen. This is what eyes in the vivid state learn in practice. If we have never experienced the ultimate state of putting on the eyes and looking at these texts, [our eyes] are not eyes that experience the ultimate. If [the eyes] are not eyes that experience the ultimate, [the state] is not meeting buddha. In meeting buddha there are the many forms which are seen and non-form which is seen; the state is “I do not understand the BuddhaDharma.”11 In not meeting buddha there are the many forms which are not seen and non-form which is not seen; which state “People who understand the Buddha-Dharma have attained.” Hōgen’s expression, which is “eighty or ninety percent of realization,” is like this. At the same time, in regard to this “one great cause,”12 we should say further, “If we see the many forms as real form, we at once meet the Tathāgata.” An expression like this is totally by virtue of Śākyamuni Buddha’s influence; it is the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of no figure other than his.

             [31] At that time Śākyamuni Buddha, on Vulture Peak,13 addresses the   223b

great assembly through Bodhisattva Medicine King:

If we are close to a teacher of the Dharma, We instantly attain the bodhisattva way. And if we learn following this teacher,

We are able to meet buddhas [numerous] as sands of the Ganges.14

“Being close to a teacher of the Dharma” describes the Second Patriarch’s eight years of serving his master, after which he gets the marrow with his whole arm.15 It describes Nangaku’s fifteen years of pursuing the truth.16 Getting the master’s marrow is called “being close.” “The bodhisattva way” is “me being like this, and you also being like this.”17 It is “instantly to attain” a limitlessly abundant tangle of action. “Instant attainment” is not the acquisition of that which has been manifested since ancient times, is not the first attainment of that which has never before occurred, and is not the rounding up of an amorphous state that exists in the present. Getting free of attainment of “being close” is called “instant attainment.” Therefore all attainment is “instant attainment.”18 In regard to “Learning following this teacher,” being as if an attendant is the ancient example, and we should research it. Just at the moment of this action, direct experience of “being able to meet” is present. In that state “we meet buddhas [as numerous] as sands of the Ganges.” Buddhas [as numerous] as sands of the Ganges are just individual instances of the state of vigorous activity itself. Do not run cringing to meet buddhas [as numerous] as sands of the Ganges. First apply yourself to “learning following a teacher.” “To learn following a teacher” is “to attain the buddha-view.”19

[34] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses the assembly, all of whom are expe-

riencing the truth of bodhi:

Profoundly entering the balanced state of dhyāna,

[We] meet the buddhas of the ten directions.20

The whole universe is “profound” because it is “in the buddha lands of the ten directions.”21 It is not wide, not great, not small, and not narrow. When we act, we “act following circumstances.”22 This is called “total inclusion.” This [action] is not of seven feet, eight feet, or ten feet; it is total inclusion with no outside, and is the one word “enter.” And this “profound entry” is “the balanced state of dhyāna.” “To profoundly enter the balanced state of dhyāna” is “to meet the buddhas of the ten directions.” Because he is able

223c to exist—“profoundly entering this place, with no one contacting him”23— he “meets the buddhas of the ten directions.” Because “she will not receive it even if I take it,”24 buddhas in the ten directions exist. “Profound entry” cannot manifest itself for a long, long time.25 “Meeting the buddhas of the ten directions” is just “to see a reclining Tathāgata.”26 “The balanced state of dhyāna” is impossible to get into or to get out of.27 Neither disbelieving nor fearing the real dragon, in the present moment of meeting buddha we need endeavor no further to get rid of doubt. We meet buddha relying upon meeting buddha, and thus we profoundly enter the balanced state of dhyāna relying upon the balanced state of dhyāna. This truth of the balanced state of dhyāna, meeting buddha, profound entry, and so on, has not been produced in the past

by folk who could ponder it at leisure, and then passed onto the folk of today. And it is not an innovation of the present. Rather, a truth such as this is inevitable. All transmissions of the truth and receptions of the behavior are like this. Initiation of causes and attainment of effects are like this.

[37] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses Bodhisattva Universal Virtue:28 “If there is anyone who receives and retains, reads and recites, rightly remembers, practices, and copies this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma, we should know that that person is meeting Śākyamuni Buddha, and hearing this sutra as if from the Buddha’s mouth.”29

In general, all the buddhas say that “to meet Śākyamuni Buddha” and to realize the state of Śākyamuni Buddha is to realize the truth and to become buddha. Such behavior of buddhas is originally attained through each of these seven practices. A person who performs the seven practices is “that person” whom “we should know,”30 and is “the very person here and now, as he or she is.”31 Because this is just the state in which we meet Śākyamuni Buddha, it is directly “hearing this sutra as if from the Buddha’s mouth.” Śākyamuni Buddha, since having met Śākyamuni Buddha, is Śākyamuni Buddha. Thus, the form of his tongue universally enfolds the three-thousandfold [world]: what mountain or ocean could be other than the Buddha’s sutras? For this reason, “the very person here and now” who copies is meeting alone with Śākyamuni Buddha. “The Buddha’s mouth” is constantly open through the myriad ages: what moment could be other than the sutras? For this reason, the practitioner who receives and retains the sutras is meeting 224a solely with Śākyamuni Buddha. The virtue of not only the eyes and ears but also the nose and so on, may also be like this.32 The front and the back, the left and the right, taking and leaving, an instant of the present, also, are like this. We have been born to experience “this sutra”33 of the present: how could we not rejoice to be meeting Śākyamuni Buddha? Life is an encounter with Śākyamuni Buddha. People who, spurring the body-mind, “receive and retain, read and recite, rightly remember, practice, and copy this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma” may [already] “be meeting Śākyamuni Buddha.” They are “hearing this sutra as if from the Buddha’s mouth”: who could not vie to listen to it? Those who have no urgency and who do not apply themselves are wretched living beings without happiness or wisdom. One who “practices” is “that person whom we should know is meeting Śākyamuni Buddha.”

[39] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses the great assembly: “If good sons and good daughters, hearing my preaching of the eternity of [the Tathāgata’s] lifetime, believe and understand it with a profound mind, then they will see the Buddha constantly existing on Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa, surrounded by an assembly of great bodhisattvas and many śrāvakas, and preaching the Dharma. And they will see this sahā world with its land of lapis lazuli, even, level, and right.”34

This “profound mind” means “the sahā world.” “Belief and understanding”35 means the place of no escape. Who could not believe and understand the Buddha’s words of real truth?36 That we have met this sutra is an opportune circumstance that we should believe in and understand. In order to believe in and understand with a profound mind this Flower of Dharma, and in order to believe in and understand with a profound mind the eternity of [the Tathāgata’s] lifetime,37 we have longed to be born in this sahā realm. The mystical power of the Tathāgata,38 the power of his compassion, and the power of the eternity of his lifetime, are able, by means of mind, to make us believe and understand; are able, by means of body, to make us believe and understand; are able, by means of the whole universe, to make us believe and understand; are able, by means of Buddhist patriarchs, to make us believe and understand; are able, by means of all dharmas, to make us believe and understand; are able, by means of real form, to make us believe and understand; are able, by means of skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, to make us believe and understand; and are able, by means of living-and-dying and going-and-coming, to make us believe and understand. These instances of

224b belief and understanding are the state of meeting buddha itself. Thus, clearly, when we possess the eye of the mind we meet Buddha, and when we attain the eye of belief and understanding we meet Buddha. That he speaks not only of “meeting buddha” but of seeing his “constant existence on Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa” may mean that the constant existence of Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa is totally the same as the Tathāgata’s lifetime. This being so, “seeing the Buddha constantly existing on Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa” describes the constant existence, in the past, both of the Tathāgata and of Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa, and the constant existence, in the future, both of the Tathāgata and of Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa.39 The bodhisattvas and śrāvakas, similarly, may be constant existence, and preaching the Dharma also may be constant existence. We are looking at

“the sahā world with its land of lapis lazuli, even, level, and right.” Do not be disturbed in looking at the sahā world: high places are level being high, and low places are level being low.40 This ground is land of lapis lazuli.41 Do not disdain eyes that see it as even, level, and right. Land in which the ground is of lapis lazuli is like this. If we saw this ground as other than lapis lazuli, Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa would not be Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa, and Śākyamuni Buddha would not be Śākyamuni Buddha. The belief and understanding that “the land is lapis lazuli” is just the form of profound belief and understanding, and is the state of meeting buddha itself.

[43] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses the great assembly:

And [when living beings], with undivided mind, desire to meet     buddha,

Without attaching to their own body and life,

Then I, with many monks,

Appear together on Vulture Peak.42

The “wholeheartedness”43 described here is not the wholeheartedness discussed by the common person, the two vehicles, and the like. It is the wholehearted state of meeting buddha. The wholehearted state of meeting buddha is “Vulture Peak” and is “the accompanying many monks.” When each present individual secretly arouses “the desire to meet buddha,” we are desiring to meet buddha through concentration of the Vulture Peak mind. So “the undivided mind” is indeed “Vulture Peak” itself. And how could the undivided body not appear together with the mind? How could the state not be the undivided body-mind together? Just as body and mind are like this 224c already, so too are lifetime and life like this. For this reason, we totally surrender our own “self-attachment” to the Vulture Peak state of solely attaching to the supreme truth. Thus, [the Buddha] expresses the state in which “I with many monks appear together on Vulture Peak” as the undivided mind of meeting buddha.

[44] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses the great assembly:

If they preach this sutra

Just this is to meet me,

Tathāgata Abundant Treasures,

And many transformed buddhas.44

“The preaching of this sutra” is “I am always living at this place, [but] with mystical powers I make living beings who are upset still fail to see me though I am close.”45 This Tathāgata-state of mystical powers apparent and hidden has the virtue of just this being to meet me and other [buddhas]. [45] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses the great assembly:

One who is able to keep this sutra,

Is already meeting me,

And also meeting the Buddha Abundant Treasures,

And those [buddhas] who are [my] offshoots.46

Because to keep this sutra is difficult, the Tathāgata constantly encourages it. In the rare event that there is “one who keeps this sutra,” the state is just meeting buddha. Clearly, if one is meeting buddha one is keeping the sutra, and one who is keeping the sutra is one who is meeting buddha. This being so, even to hear a single verse or a single line, and to receive and to retain them, is to be able to meet Śākyamuni Buddha, is also to meet the Buddha Abundant Treasures, is to meet the buddhas who are offshoots, is to receive the transmission of the treasury of the Buddha-Dharma, is to attain the Buddha’s right eye, is to be able to experience the Buddha’s life, is to attain the eye of the ascendant state of Buddha,47 is to attain the Buddha’s brain and eyes, and is to attain the Buddha’s nostrils.

[47] The Buddha Constellation King of Flower Wisdom with Voice of Thunder addresses King Resplendent:48 “Remember, great king! A good counselor49 is the great cause whereby we are educated and guided to be able to meet buddha and to establish the will to [the supreme truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.”50

The mats of this great order [described] now are not yet rolled up. Although we speak of “the buddhas of the past, the present, and the future,” [these past, present, and future] are not to be equated with the three times of the common person. [In the Buddha’s order] what is called “the past” is matters in the mind, “the present” is a fist, and “the future” is the projections

225a of the brain. This being so, the Buddha Constellation King of Flower Wisdom with Voice of Thunder is an instance of meeting buddha realized in the mind. Commonly understood talk of meeting buddha is like this. “Education and guidance” is meeting buddha. Meeting buddha is “establishing the will to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” And establishment of the bodhi-mind is meeting buddha being right in the beginning and right at the end. [48] Śākyamuni Buddha says:

Beings who practice all the virtues,

And who are gentle, simple, and straight,

All see my body,

Existing here and preaching the Dharma.51

What he calls “all the virtues” is dragging through the mud and staying in the water, or following ripples and chasing waves.52 Those who practice this are called “beings who are gentle, simple, and straight”—“As also I am, and as also you are.”53 They have experienced this state of meeting buddha inside mud and have experienced this state of meeting buddha in the waves of mind; [thus] they witness [the Buddha] “existing here and preaching the Dharma.” On the other hand, in the great kingdom of Song recently, cronies calling themselves “Zen masters” are numerous. They do not know the length and breadth of the Buddha-Dharma, and their experience is very scant. Barely parroting two or three sayings of Rinzai or Unmown, they have considered these to be the whole truth of the Buddha-Dharma. If the Buddha-Dharma could be perfectly expressed by two or three sayings of Rinzai or Unmown, the Buddha-Dharma could not have reached the present day. It is hard to call Rinzai and Unmown venerable in the Buddha-Dharma. How much less [venerable] are the cronies of today who are inferior to Rinzai and Unmown; they are rabble who do not deserve to be mentioned. Because they are too stupid to understand the meaning of the Buddhist sutras for themselves, they randomly insult the Buddhist sutras and neglect to practice and learn them. We should call them flotsam in the stream of non-Buddhism. They are not the children and grandchildren of Buddhist patriarchs. How much less could they arrive at the boundary of the state of meeting buddhas? They are rabble who cannot even attain the principles of Confucius and Laozi. No child in the house of the Buddhist patriarchs should meet with those cronies who call themselves “Zen masters.” Just investigate in practice and realize in physical experience the eyes which are the eye of meeting buddha.

[50] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, quotes the following:

“King Prasenajit54 asks Venerable Piṇḍola55 ‘I have heard that the Venerable    225b One has intimately met Buddha. Is it true or not?’ The Venerable One, lifting up an eyebrow with his hand, indicates affirmation.” My late master praises [Piṇḍola] as follows:

By lifting an eyebrow he answers the question in part.

He has met Buddha intimately, without any mutual deceit.

To this day he deserves offerings from the four quarters.

Spring is on the plum twigs, embraced by the coldness of the snow.56

This “meeting buddha” is neither meeting our own state of buddha nor meeting the buddha in others; it is meeting Buddha. Because one branch of plum blossoms meets one branch of plum blossoms, the blooming of flowers is perfectly clear. The point of King Prasenajit’s question is to ask whether the Venerable One has already met buddha and whether he has become buddha. The Venerable One, unequivocally, has lifted an eyebrow. It is verification of meeting buddha, by which no one can be deceived, and to this day, it has not ceased: [Piṇḍola’s] “deservedness of offerings”57 is apparent without concealment. [And yet] we cannot trace his “meeting buddha,” which is “intimate experience.”58 The meeting buddha of that master of three hundred million59 is the meeting buddha of the present: it is beyond seeing the thirtytwo signs. Who could be far from the state of seeing the thirty-two signs?60 There may be many types of human beings, gods, śrāvakas, and pratyekabuddhas who do not know this principle of meeting buddha. It is similar, for example, when we say that those who stand up a fly whisk are numerous, but those who stand up a fly whisk are not many.61 To be meeting buddha is to have been realized by the state of buddha. Even if the self wishes to conceal it, the state of meeting buddha has already leaked itself out—this is the principle of meeting buddha. We should investigate in detail the real features of this lifting an eyebrow, making effort with body-minds as numerous as the sands of the Ganges. Even if, for a hundred thousand myriad kalpas of days and nights, we have constantly lived together with Śākyamuni Buddha, if we lack the ability to lift an eyebrow, the state is not meeting buddha. Even if, more than two thousand years on, we are in a remote place more than a hundred thousand miles away, if we have intimately realized the ability to lift an eyebrow, it is realization of the state of Śākyamuni Buddha that precedes 225c King of Emptiness, it is realization of one branch of plum blossoms, and it is realization of “plum twigs” as “spring.” This being so, “intimate experience of meeting buddha” is the performance of three prostrations, joining hands and bowing, a face breaking into a smile, a fist emitting a thunderclap, and crossed legs sitting on a round cushion.

[54] Venerable Piṇḍola goes to a great gathering at the palace of King Aśoka for a midday meal. After distributing incense, the king does prostrations and asks the Venerable One, “I have heard that the Venerable One has intimately met Buddha. Is it true or not?”

The Venerable One brushes up his eyebrow with his hand and says, “Do

you understand?”

The king says, “I do not understand.”

The Venerable One says, “When Dragon King Anavatapta invited Buddha

to a midday meal, I62 was also admitted among that number.”63

The point of King Aśoka’s question is that the words “Is it true that the Venerable One has intimately met Buddha?” ask whether the Venerable One is already the Venerable One. Then the Venerable One at once brushes up his eyebrow. This causes the state of meeting buddha “to appear in the world”;64 it causes act of becoming buddha to be “intimately experienced.” He says, “When Dragon King Anavatapta invited Buddha to a midday meal, I was also admitted among that number.” Remember, in a gathering of buddhas, “buddhas alone, together with buddhas,” may be as [abundant as] “rice, hemp, bamboo and reeds,”65 [but śrāvakas of] the fourth effect and pratyekabuddhas cannot be admitted. Even if [śrāvakas of] the fourth effect and pratyekabuddhas have come, we cannot count them among the number of buddhas. The Venerable One himself has already declared, “When Buddha was invited to a midday meal, I also was among that number”—a natural self-expression that has emerged freely. The fact that he is meeting buddha is evident. “Inviting Buddha” means not only inviting Śākyamuni Buddha, but inviting all the countless and limitless buddhas of the three times and the ten directions. To be included in the number of invited buddhas is the state without hesitation, and the state beyond hesitation, of intimate experience of meeting buddha. Indication of meeting buddha, of meeting a teacher, of meeting myself, and of meeting you, in general, should be like this. Dragon King Anavatapta is the dragon king of Lake Anavatapta. Lake Anavatapta 226a is called in this country the “Lake of No Suffering from Heat.”

[61] Zen Master Honei Ninyū66 praises [Piṇḍola] as follows:

Our Buddha intimately met with Piṇḍola

Whose eyebrows were long, hair short, and eyes rough.

Even King Aśoka doubted him. Oṃ maṇi śrī sūrya.67

This eulogy is not perfect in its expression, but I quote it because it is

relevant research.68

[57] Great Master Shinsai of Jōshū,69 the story goes, is asked by a monk,

“I have heard that you intimately met Nansen. Is it true or not?” The master says, “Chinshū district produces big radishes.”70

The expression realized now is verification of “intimately meeting Nansen.” It is neither words that say something nor words that say nothing. It is neither words bestowed from above nor words of common parlance. It is neither the lifting of eyebrows nor the brushing up of eyebrows. It is intimate meeting with [Nansen’s] eyebrows. Even though [Jōshū] was an individual71 of outstanding talent, without intimately meeting [Nansen], he could not be like this. This story of the big radishes produced in Chinshū is an account of the time when Great Master Shinsai was the abbot of Shinsaiin Temple in Tōka-en Gardens in Chinshū. He was later given the title “Great Master Shinsai.” Because he was like this, he received the authentic transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs’ right Dharma-eye treasury from his first opening in experience of the eye of meeting buddha. When the authentic transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury is present, the dignified behavior is realized of a buddha manifesting an easy bearing, and the state of meeting buddha, at this place, is towering and magnificent.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kenbutsu

                                    Preached to the assembly on Mount Yamashibu                                     on the first and the nineteenth days of the                                     eleventh lunar month in the winter of the first                                     year of Kangen.72

Notes

1         means that which can be perceived by the senses. Quoted from the Diamond Sutra (KongōhannyaharamitsukyōHiso, “non-form,” means that which). Shoso, “many forms,” cannot be perceived by the senses, i.e., meaning, essence, value.

2         has been translated as “see,” “meet,” “real manifestation,” “view,” and “realization,” depending on the context. Kenbutsu, lit., “seeing Buddha,” means realization of the whole reality of the state Ken of action that is called “buddha.” It does not describe seeing the Buddha’s form.

3         from a layperson doing his or her daily job. An example might be leaving a Buddhist temple and receiving very helpful service

4         he was. The master replied “Sun-faced buddhas, moon-faced buddhas.” The story isJitsu-men-butsu-ken.quoted in the Eiheikōroku,When Master Baso Dōitsu was unwell a monk asked him howvol. 9, no. 80.

5         In other words, even the Buddha has both form and non-form.

6         Zenji (“Zen Master Great Hōgen”) is his posthumous title. Master Hōgen Bun’eki (885–958), successor of Master Rakan Keichin. Dai Hōgen

7         the characters of the first clause are exactly the same, but in the first case they areread Wanshizenjigoroku,mo[shimo][shosō shi] shosō [wa][hi-sō tochap. 3. In both the Buddha’s words and Master Hōgen’s words,] hi-sō [nari to[to o]]mimi[[re bare ba].]. . .  and in the second case they are read

8         Sha-fu tōzei. Alludes to Lotus Sutra, Shinge. See LS 1.224.

9         Hensan case (in Ichitengo,from A to B)” or “transforming one’s body” (see also note 18 in Chapter Sixty-two, tenki,ichiten). “turning point,” and 2) “move” or “change” as in Go “turning word.” means “complete transformation,” or 2) means “word(s).” IchiIchi means “one” or “the whole.” can be understood as modifying 1) go, in which case tenshin,Kōkyō,Ten means 1) “turn” as “moving oneself paragraph 155;ichigoten, in which means

“one word” or “a word.” See also Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Chapter Seventy-six (Vol. IV), Dai-shugyō.

10       The mental face of reality and the concrete face of reality are both faces of reality.

11       A monk asks Master Daikan Enō, “What people attained Ōba i’s teaching?” The master says [ironically], “People who understood the Buddha-Dharma [intellectually]

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says, “I do not understand the Buddha-Dharma.” See 59.“I did not attain it.” The monk says, “Why did the master not attain it?” The master attained it.” The monk says, “Did you yourself attain it, Master?” The master said, Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no.

12       the same time, it alludes to the passage in the Ichidaiji-innen, “one great cause,” means the quotation from the Lotus Sutra, Hōben,Diamond Sutra. which says that At pose: to cause living beings to disclose, to be shown, to realize, and to enter, the buddhas appear in the world only on account of one great cause or one great pur-Buddha’s wisdom. See LS 1.88–90.

13       Ryō-jūsen, means “Vulture Peak.” “Sacred Vulture Peak,” represents the Sanskrit Gṛdhrakūṭa, which literallyRyō, “sacred,” which was presumably added in the Chinese translation from the Sanskrit, has been omitted in the translation of this chapter. 14 The closing lines of Lotus Sutra, Hōsshi. See LS 2.166.

15       Master Taiso Eka, the Second Patriarch in China. Legend has it that he cut off hisarm at the beginning of his practice under Master Bodhidharma; he was later affirmedwith the words, “You have got my marrow.” See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Chapter Forty-six, Kattō. Gyōji;

16       Master Nangaku Ejō pursued the truth for fifteen years under Master Daikan Enō.

17       Alludes to the famous conversation between Master Daikan and Master NangakuGo-yaku-nyoze, nyo-yaku-nyoze, or “I am also like this, and you are also like this.”Senjō; Chapter Sixty-two, Hensan; etc. quoted in Chapter Seven (Vol. I),

18       In other words, real attainment (experience that is not restricted by worrisome concepts such as “being close”) can only take place in the present moment.

19       Toku-butsu-ken,order of the characters ken . . . butsu, “being able to meet buddhas. . . .” Here Master Dōgen reversed the“to attain buddha-realization.” The last line of the quotation has ken and butsu. 

20       kyō o yoman mono, Lotus Sutra, Anrakugyō.“a person who reads this sutra.” See LS 2.282. The original subject in the Lotus Sutra is kono 21 Juppō-butsudō-chū alludes to LS 1.106: “In the buddha lands of the ten Lotus Sutra chū is

directions,/There only exists the One-Vehicle Dharma.” In the used here as a preposition, “in” or “within,” but in Master Dōgen’s commentaries is frequently used as a noun, “inside of,” “content of,” or “reality of.” See, for Hokke-ten-hokke. Chū example, the opening words of Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I),

22       Zuitako su others completely” or “just following circumstances.” The latter phrase, which appears is a variation of the traditional phrase Bukkyō, zuitako, paragraph 177, and Chapter which means “following for example in Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), Thirty-seven (Vol. II), Shinjin-gakudō, paragraph 152, suggests a flexible attitude.

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23       Shin-nyū-riko-munin-setsu-kyoin his or her own action. phrase is in Chinese characters only but a source has not been traced. Kyo, Kare, suggests the independence of a person who is absorbed“ him,” is originally masculine in gender. The

24       is originally neutral in gender. Quoted from the Setsu-shi-shōrai-ta-yaku-fu-ju suggests detachment. Wanshizenjigoroku.Ta, “he,” “she,” or “the other,”

25       of having entered but as the momentary action of entering. Three (Vol. I), manifest the state of realization for a long time (as a bell continues ringing after it has This expression Genjō-kōan.chō-chō shutsu,In that chapter, Master Dōgen says that we continue to lit., “long, long manifestation,” also appears in Chapter nyū, “enter,” not as an enduring state been struck). Here, however, he is interpreting

26       Nansen Fugan. See Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. I), Refers to a story about the first meeting between Master Jōshū Jūshin and Master Hakujushi.

27       In other words, over time, cannot exist in the present moment. can exist in the present moment. But entering into or getting out of a state, as processes dhyana is just the state at the present moment. Entering, as action,

28       Fugen, from the Sanskrit Samanta Bhadra. He is often depicted, riding on a white elemi), phant, as the right-hand attendant of the Buddha. See also Chapter Seventeen (Vol.Hokke-ten-hokke. 29 Virtue”). See LS 3.330.Lotus Sutra, Fugen-bosatsu-kanpotsu (“Encouragement of Bodhisattva Universal

30    “that person,” means a concrete person, a real person. Tōchi-zenin, “should know that person,” is taken directly from the Lotus Sutra. Zenin,

31    Nyoze-tōnin. appear in the Lotus Sutra. Nyoze, This is Master Dōgen’s characteristic variation using characters that used as an adjective, means “as it is,” and used as a Hokke-ten-hokke; the actual existence of the agent himself or herself. In the masa Chapter Fifty, noun means “reality as it is.” (See also Chapter Seventeen [Vol. I], [ni], means “should.” Shohō-jissō). NinTō originally means “to hit the target.” Here it emphasizes means person or human being. Lotus Sutra, tō, read as

32    reading the sutras and hearing their recitation but also from smelling incense, tasting For example, the virtue of meeting Śākyamuni Buddha is to be had not only from tea, etc.

33    shikyō In the Shōbōgenzō,or, as here, shikyōten,the Lotus Sutra “this sutra. “and the universe itself are identified in the words

34    Lotus Sutra, Funbetsu-kudoku (“Discrimination of Merits”). See LS 3.56.

35    Shinge,Sutra. “Belief and Understanding,” is the title of the fourth chapter of the Lotus

36    Jōtai, “real truth,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit bhūta, which means “actually happened, true, real.” See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

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37    Lotus Sutra.Nyorai-juryō, “The Tathāgata’s Lifetime,” is the title of the sixteenth chapter of the

38    chapter of the Nyorai-jinriki,Lotus Sutra. “The Mystical Power of the Tathāgata,” is the title of the twenty-first 39 concrete mountain but also the Tathāgata is real. Not only the Tathāgata but also the concrete mountain is eternal; and not only the

40    Master Kyōzan says, “This place is low like this. That place is high like that.“ MasterIsan says, “Water is able to make things level. We will make it level just with water.”Master Kyōzan Ejaku, following his master Isan Reiyū, is making a new paddy field.Master Kyōzan says, “There is no need to rely on water, Master. High places are levelbeing high, and low places are level being low.” See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 23.

41    Ruri, from the Sanskrit vaiḍūrya, is a semiprecious stone that is usually rich azure blue. In ancient India it was a symbol of excellence (see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). 42 Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō. See LS 3.30.

43 Isshin, lit., “one mind,” translated in the quotation as “with undivided mind.” 44 describes countless buddhas emanating from the body of Śākyamuni Buddha and Lotus Sutra, Ken-hōtō (“Seeing the Treasure Stupa”). See LS 2.194. The chapter kebutsu, coming from all directions to hear the Dharma. These buddhas are called “transformed buddhas”; that is, transformations of Śākyamuni Buddha.

45    Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō. See LS 3.30.

46    Bunshin, vious quotation. Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-jinriki “offshoots,” means the same as (“The Mystical Power of the Tathāgata” kebutsu, “transformed buddhas,” in the pre-). See LS 3.162.

47 Butsu-kōjō-gen of zazen. Butsu-kōjō ,suggests the optimistic attitude that derives from the daily practice “ascendant state of buddha” or “going beyond buddha,” expresses

realized the truth. In Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), the continuing daily practice of a Buddhist practitioner even after he or she has already buddha again.” explains the term as follows: “What has been called ‘the matter of the ascendant attained the whole body-mind of the practitioner. Of buddha’ means, having arrived at the state of buddha, progressing on and meeting Gen, “eye,” expresses the Buddhist view or attitude, in which is con-Butsu-kōjō-no-ji, Master Dōgen

48 Myō-shōgon-ō, from the Sanskrit Śubhavyūharāja (King Resplendent).

49 Zenchishiki, from the Sanskrit kalyāṇamitra, in general means a teacher who gives

Chapter Fifty-two, practical guidance on how to apply the principles of Buddhism in daily life (seeepisode in the counselors” or “friends in virtue,” for transforming his wrong mind, and causing himto be able to abide in the Buddha-Dharma and meet the World-honored One.Bukkyō, King Resplendent has just praised his own sons as “good note 3; Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). In this specific

Lotus Sutra,

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50    Lotus Sutra, Myō-shōgon-ō-honji. See LS 3.306.

51    Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō. See LS 3.32.

52    Common efforts in daily life.

53    Go-yaku-nyoze, nyo-yaku-nyoze.Ejō. See note 17. Master Daikan Enō’s words to Master Nangaku 54 order. See also notes to Chapter Fifty-nine, King Prasenajit was the ruler of the kingdom of Kośala, and a supporter of the Buddha’s  Baike.

55 One of the sixteen original arhats in the Buddha’s order. Ibid. 56 Nyojōoshōgoroku. Also quoted in Chapter Fifty-nine, Baike.

57       At the same time, Ōgu. Read in the poem as ōgu represents the Sanskrit term of reverence “arhat,” which meansku [ni] ō[zu], these characters mean “to deserve offerings.”

“one who deserves.” Many temples in Japan have images of the sixteen arhats, towhich offerings continue to be served.

58       paragraph 121 (“direct experience”); and Chapter Fifty-seven, suggests experience. The phrase familiar, intimate, or immediate; it describes absence of separation into subject and between subject and object, and so we cannot witness it as a third party. Shinzō no kenbutsu,Sō, zō], its function is to indicate the past tense, but in the compound means formerly, having taken place in the past; in the poem, read as “meeting buddha as intimate experience,” is the mutual relation Shinzo also appears in Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II),ShinshinzōKōmyō, meansit

object. katsu[te

Daigo, paragraph 225 (“familiar experience”); Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II),

(“familiar to us”).   Menju, paragraph 170 59 According to legend, Śrāvasti, the capital of the kingdom of Kośala, had a population of nine hundred million, one third of whom were Buddhists under Venerable Piṇḍola. 60 only that but also realization of the state of buddha. Anyone could see the Buddha’s physical form. Piṇḍola’s meeting Buddha was not 61 Many set themselves up as Buddhist teachers but few really teach Buddhism. 62 are used by Master Prajñātara in Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Hindō, lit., “poor way,” a humble form used by a Buddhist monk. The same words Kankin, paragraph 191.

63    Aikuōkyō (King Aśoka Sutra), chap. 3.

64    Shutsugen-o-se. These words appear frequently in the Lotus Sutra. See, for example, LS 1.88–90.

65    Both expressions in quotemarks originate in the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.68, 1.72.

66    Master Honei Ninyū (dates unknown), successor of Master Yōgi Hōe. The poem isquoted from the one-volume record of his words, Honeininyūzenjigoroku.

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67    Śrī Buddhist incantations called The Sanskrit means to diffuse light; and oṃ is a word of affirmation often placed at the beginning of six-syllabled shadaksharī; maṇisūrya means the sun. In the context of this poem, means jewel, gem, or pearl; Oṃ affirmation of Master Piṇḍola. maṇi śrī sūrya, or “Truly, a pearl shines like the sun!” suggests the author’s respectful

68    Shukō no sangaku. Shu, omomuki direct toward; so shukō means a plan, idea, design, scheme, or device. At the same time, as shukō no here means “being relevant to.” In modern Japanese the means purport or gist, and pratipādana (see Glossary of Sanskritkō, mu[kau] means to compound a traditional term representing the Sanskrit Terms), Nari, is retained for example in the “actions are balanced and constant” or “undertakings are balanced and con-shukō sometimes means action itself, or conduct in the world. This meaning Fukanzazengi: shukō sarani kore hyōjō naru mono stant.”

69    Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. Shinsai-in was the name of his temple, and Great Master Shinsai is his posthumous title. 70 Kōsonshukugoroku, chap. 13.

71    Doppo. Doku means alone, solitary, or independent, and Butsudō, paragraph 186, Master Dōgen describes the singular shō-jinsoku no doppo,ho means step or walk. In literally, Chapter Forty-nine, excellence of Master Seigen Gyōshi by praising him as “a solitary step of a true mystical foot.

72    1243.

[Chapter Sixty-two]

Hensan

Thorough Exploration

Translator’s Note: Hen means “everywhere” or “widely,” and san means “to visit” or “to study through experience.” Originally hensan described the custom Buddhist monks used to have of traveling around in order to meet excellent masters with whom they could be satisfied. But according to Master Dōgen, hensan, or “thorough exploration,” is accomplished not by traveling around but by a Buddhist monk’s thorough exploration of the Buddhist state under one true master. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the true meaning of hensan.

[61]   The great truth of Buddhist patriarchs is exploration of the ultimate state through and through, is “there being no strings under the feet”1 and is “the appearance of clouds under the feet.”2 Still, although it is like this, “the 226b opening of flowers is the occurrence of the world,”3 and “At this concrete place, I am always keen.”4 For this reason, “A sweet melon, right through to the stem, is sweet. A bitter gourd, right through to the root, is bitter.”5 The sweetness of sweetness, right through to the stem, is sweet. We have been exploring in practice6 the state like this.

[62]   Great Master Shūitsu7 of Genshazan, the story goes, is summoned by Seppō, who says to the master, “Bi of the dhūta!8 Why do you not go widely exploring?” The master says, “Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands; the Second Patriarch did not go to India in the west.”9 Seppō profoundly affirms this.10

The principle of the state of thorough exploration described here is exploration of a somersault; it is the sacred truth, at the same time, not being practiced. “How could it have grades or ranks?”11

When Zen Master Nangaku Daie12 first visits13 the eternal buddha of Sōkei

Mountain,14 the eternal buddha says, “This is something coming like this.”15

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[Nangaku’s] thorough exploration of this mud ball continues altogether for eight years. At last he expresses the conclusion16 of his thorough exploration to the eternal buddha, saying “Ejō has understood [why], when I first came here, the master received Ejō with [the teaching] ‘This is something coming like this.’”

The eternal buddha Sōkei says, “How do you understand it?”

Then Daie says, “To describe a thing does not hit the target.” This is the

realization of thorough exploration, and the realization of eight years.

The eternal buddha Sōkei asks, “Do you rely upon practice and experience or not?”

Daie says, “It is not that there is no practice and experience, but to taint

it is impossible.”

Thereupon Sōkei says, “I am like that, you are also like that, and the

buddhas and patriarchs of India were also like that.”17

After this, [Nangaku] thoroughly explores the state for another eight years. Counting from beginning to end, it is fifteen years of thorough exploration. [His] “coming like this” is thorough exploration. [His] opening the [Buddha] hall and meeting the buddhas and patriarchs, in [the realization that] “describing a thing does not hit the target” is still exploration of “also being like that.” Since entering the picture and looking, he has thoroughly explored the state in sixty five-hundreds of thousand myriad koṭis of transformations of the body.18 We do not esteem idly entering one monastery and leaving another monastery as thorough exploration. We esteem discovery with the whole of the eyes as thorough exploration. We esteem attainment of the ultimate through action as thorough exploration. To see, through to 226c the end, how thick is the skin of the face: this is thorough exploration.

[66] The point of Seppō’s expression about thorough exploration is originally neither to encourage [Gensha] to leave the mountain nor to encourage him to travel north and south; it is to promote the thorough exploration that Gensha expresses as “Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands; the Second Patriarch did not go to India in the west.” It is like saying, for example, “How could [this] not be thorough exploration?” Gensha’s saying that Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands is not a random expression about coming and yet not coming; it is the truth that the earth is without an inch of land. What we call ”Bodhidharma” is an acute case of the lifeblood.19

Chapter Sixty-two

Even if the whole of the Eastern Lands suddenly sprang up in the extreme and waited upon him, that would not impinge upon his movement of his own body20—nor indeed upon his turning around in the stream of [others’] words.21 Because he does not come to the Eastern Lands, he looks the Eastern Lands in the face. Although the Eastern Lands meet with a buddha’s face and a patriarch’s face, it is not that he has come to the Eastern Lands; it is that he has grasped the state of a Buddhist patriarch and lost [his own] nostrils. In sum, land is beyond east and west, and east and west are not connected with land. “The Second Patriarch did not go to India in the west”: in thoroughly exploring India, he does not go to India. If the Second Patriarch goes to India, [his state] is [only] having lost an arm.22 Now, why does the Second Patriarch not go to India? He does not go to India because he has sprung inside [Bodhidharma’s] blue eyes. If he had not sprung inside those blue eyes, he would go to India without fail. We esteem gouging out Bodhidharma’s eyes as thorough exploration. Going to India in the west and coming to the Eastern Lands are not thorough exploration. We do not esteem going to Tendai23 or to Nangaku,24 or traveling to Godai25 or to the heavens above, as thorough exploration. If we fail to see through and get free from the four oceans and five lakes,26 the state is not thorough exploration. Visiting the four oceans and five lakes does not cause the four oceans and five lakes to experience thorough exploration but only makes it slippery on the road and slippery underfoot, thus causing us to forget thorough exploration. In general, because we see it as thorough exploration to explore to the end that “The whole universe in the ten directions is the real human body,”27 we can investigate the real state in which “Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Lands and the Second Patriarch did not go to India in the west.” Thorough exploration is a big stone being big and a small stone being small. It is, without disturbing stones, to let the big experience themselves and the small experience themselves. To experience hundred thousand myriads of things at hundred thousand myriads of places is not yet thorough exploration. Performance of hundred thousand myriads of bodily transformations within the stream of half a word: this is thorough exploration. For example, to work the earth and only to work the earth is thorough exploration. To pass from once working the earth, to once working the sky, to once working the four quarters and eight aspects, is not thorough exploration. Gutei’s28 exploration of Tenryū,29 and attainment of

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the one-finger state, is thorough exploration. “Gutei’s only raising one finger”30 is thorough exploration.

[70] Gensha preaches to the assembly, “I and Old Master Śākyamuni

have experienced the same state.”31

Then a monk steps forward and asks, “I wonder what person you met.” The master says, “The third son of the Sha family, on a fishing boat.”32

The head-to-tail rightness experienced by “Old Master Śākyamuni” is naturally the same as the experience of Old Master Śākyamuni himself. And because the head-to-tail rightness experienced by Old Man Gensha is naturally the same as the experience of Old Man Gensha himself, Old Master Śākyamuni and Old Man Gensha are experiencing the same state. Old Master Śākyamuni and Old Man Gensha are investigating to the limit the experience of satisfaction and the experience of dissatisfaction: this is the principle of thorough exploration. Because Old Master Śākyamuni experiences the same state as Old Man Gensha, he is the eternal buddha. Because Old Man Gensha is in the same state as Old Master Śākyamuni, he is a descendant. We should thoroughly explore this truth, in detail. [Gensha meets] “The third son of the

Sha family, on a fishing boat”: we should clarify this point and learn it in experience. That is, in other words, to strive to thoroughly explore the moment in which Old Master Śākyamuni and Old Man Gensha simultaneously experience the same state. Old Man Gensha, who has met the third son of Sha on a fishing boat, is present, and is experiencing the common state. The third son of Sha, who has met a shaven-headed man on Genshazan, is present, and is experiencing the common state. We should allow ourselves to consider, and should allow others to consider, experience of sameness and experience of difference. Old Man Gensha and Old Master Śākyamuni are experiencing the same state and thoroughly exploring it. We should thoroughly explore, and should commonly experience, the truth that “the third son of Sha” and “I” have met a “What person.”33 Unless the truth of thorough exploration is actually manifest in the present, experience of the self is impossible and experience of the self is unsatisfactory; experience of others is impossible and experience of others is unsatisfactory; experience of “a person” is impossible, experience of “I” is impossible, experience of a fist is impossible, and experience of the eye is impossible—lifting the self by fishing the self34 is impossible, and rising up even before being fished is impossible.35 When

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thorough exploration is perfectly realized already, it is free of “thorough exploration”: “When the sea is dry its bottom is not seen; when human beings die no trace of their mind is retained.”36 “The sea is dry” describes the whole sea having totally dried up. At the same time, if the sea has dried up, a “sea bed” is not seen. “Retaining no trace,” and “total retention,” are both in the human mind. When human beings die our mind does not remain: it is because we have grasped death that “mind” does not remain.37 Thus, we can conclude that the whole human being is mind, and the whole of mind is a human being. We investigate in experience the front and back of each such partial thought.

[74] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, on an occasion when veterans of the truth from many districts have assembled to request his formal preaching in the Dharma hall, gives the following formal preaching:

The great truth is gateless.

It springs out beyond your brains.

As space, it transcends any path.

[Yet] it has already got inside the nostrils of Seiryō.38

Meeting with it like this would be inimical to imitators of Gautama, And a womb of trouble for those of Rinzai.

Aye. . .

A great master tumbles, dancing in the spring breeze.

Falling in amazement, apricot blossoms scatter a riot of crimson.39

For the present formal preaching in the Dharma hall, the veterans of many districts have gathered at the time when my late master, the eternal buddha, is the abbot of Seiryōji in Kenkōfu City.40 That they are “veterans of the truth” means that they have been either the master’s disciples or his companions on the zazen platform. While [themselves] the masters of many 227c districts, they are, in this way, his old friends. How could their number not be great? It is an occasion on which they have assembled to petition [the master] for formal preaching in the Dharma hall. Veterans who totally lack something concrete to say are not among his friends, and not in that number of petitioning friends who, despite being great and valuable themselves, wait upon him and request [his preaching]. In general, my late master’s state of thorough exploration is beyond the masters of other districts. In the last two or three hundred years in great Song China, there has been no eternal buddha to equal my late master. “The great truth is gateless” describes four or five thousand willow quarters41 and twenty or thirty thousand music halls. In “springing out” of such places with the whole body, we employ no methods other than “springing out beyond the brain” and “getting inside the nostrils.” Both are learning in practice. Those who have never experienced springing free beyond the brain and never experienced transformation of the body inside the nostrils, are not people of learning in practice and are not men of thorough exploration. We should learn the meaning of “thorough exploration” only under Gensha. When the Fourth Patriarch learned in practice for nine years under the Third Patriarch,42 that was just thorough exploration. Zen Master Nansen [Fu]gan’s43 living only in Chiyō district,44 and not leaving the mountains for a small matter of thirty years, was thorough exploration. The efforts to learn in practice of Ungan, Dōgo,45 and the others, during forty years on Yakusan Mountain, were thorough exploration itself. The Second Patriarch learned in practice for eight years on Sūzan Mountain, and explored the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow to the limit. Thorough exploration is just sitting and getting free of body and mind. The state at the present moment in which going is going there and coming is coming here, there being no gap between them, is thorough exploration with the whole body, and it is the whole body of “the great truth.” Walking on, over Vairocana’s head46 is the state without emotion.47 And decisive attainment of the state like this is the conduct of a Vairocana. When we have mastered thorough exploration of “springing out,” the state is that a gourd springs out of a gourd, and we have, for a long time, seen the top of a gourd as a practice place for singling out the state of buddha. Life is like a thread,48 and a gourd performs thorough exploration of a gourd. We have only seen that erecting a stalk of grass49 is thorough exploration.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Hensan

                                    Preached to the assembly in a hut at the foot of                                     Mount Yamashibu on the twenty-seventh day                                     of the eleventh lunar month in the first year of                                     Kangen.50

Notes

1     “Straightway there should be no strings under the feet.” In China captured birds hadKeitokudentōroku, chap. 15: Master Tōzan is asked the meaning of action. He replies, feet means being free of hindrances that pull one down. See also Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), string tied around their feet to stop them flying away, so having no strings under theZazenshin, paragraph 44.

2     Keitokudentōroku,appeared under his feet.” Clouds appearing under the feet suggests the realization ofinstruction, said, ‘Pray lend me your mystical power.’ After he had spoken, cloudsconcrete mystical power.chap. 3, says, “Haradai, having reverentially received the master’s

3     The words of the twenty-seventh patriarch, Master Prajñātara, quoted in the dentōroku, chap. 2, describe the oneness in reality of phenomena (flowers) and sub-Keitokustance (the world).

4     Master Tōzan’s words quoted from the pt. 1, no. 55; Chapter Forty (Vol. II), Keitokudentōroku,Gabyō, paragraph 211.chap. 15. See also Shinjishōbōgenzō,

5     The words of Master Engo Kokugon, recorded in the Engozenjigoroku, vol. 2.

6     “Exploring in practice” is sangaku, usually translated as “learn in practice.” San, sightseeing sense; it includes the meaning of participation in, experience of, or devotiontranslated in the chapter title as “exploration,” literally means “visit” but not in asan appears very frequently in the sankyū,Shōbōgenzō“investigate,”in the gestive of the real Buddhist process (i.e., not only learning knowledge but learning“master in practice,” etc. Master Dōgen used it as a prefix to make a verb more sug-compounds to something. The character sangaku, “learn in practice” or “learn by experience,” Menju, para-

graph 183.of a condition of body and mind). See also notes to Chapter Fifty-seven,

7     Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison. Great Masterships is his posthumous title.

8     Bizuda. Bi is from the name Shibi. Zuda is a nickname derived from the Sanskrit word Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), dhūta, which means hard or ascetic practice. The twelve Gyōji. See also LS 2.310.  dhūtas are listed in

9     follow personal preferences.It was inevitable for Master Bodhidharma to come to China, and it was inevitable for the Second Patriarch in China, Master Taiso Eka, to stay in China. They did not

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10    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 18. See also Chapter Four (Vol. I), Ikka-no-myōju.

11    Nan no kaikyū ka kore aranvisions to exist?” The phrase suggests the holistic viewpoint. Chinese source not traced. means, in other words, “How is it possible for any subdi12 is his posthumous title. Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744), successor of Master Daikan Enō. Zen Master Daie 13 SanzuruSee note 6.in this case includes the meaning of entering the master’s order as a disciple. 14 Master Daikan Enō (638–713), successor of Master Daiman Kōnin.

15 Or “What is that comes like this?” See notes to Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), paragraph 108. Inmo, 16 Ichi-jakusu, “conclusion,” literally expresses placing a stone in a game of go.

17    Shinji-shōbōgenzō,says, “Just this untaintedness is that which buddhas guard and desire. You are likept. 2, no. 1. In the Shinji-shōbōgenzō version, Master Daikan Enō that, I am also like that, and the patriarchs of India were also like that.”

18    point. going for a walk, or listening to words of transformation such as “Profoundly believein cause and effect!”; 2) moving one’s body (from A to B) or changing one’s stand-Tenshin means 1) transforming one’s physical state, e.g., by putting on the kaṣāya,

19    Master Bodhidharma is not only an abstract concept.

20    action. Tenshin, as in note 18. The point here is the independence of Master Bodhidharma’s

21    Gomyaku no honshin, saulting in mid-speech,” suggests a very flexible or accommodating attitude. Lit., “turning over his body in the stream of words” or “somer -

22    The fact that he cut off his arm would not have any meaning.

23    Tendai Mountain in Zhekiang province in east China, where Master Tendai Chigie stablished the training place which became the headquarters of the Tendai sect.

24    Nangaku Mountain is in Hunan province in southeast central China. 25 Godai Mountain is in Shanxi province in northern China.

26 of the five lakes has changed from age to age.The four oceans means the oceans of the north, south, east, and west. The definition 27 In Chapter Fifty, Chōsha Keishin. Shohō-jissō, Master Dōgen attributes this expression to Master

28    Thereafter, in answer to all question, Master Gutei just showed one finger. Master Gutei of Mount Kinka (dates unknown), successor of Master Kōshū Tenryū. He is said to have realized the truth when Master Tenryū showed him one finger.

Chapter Sixty-two

29    famous for transmitting “one-finger Zen” to Master Gutei. Master Kōshū Tenryū (dates unknown), successor of Master Daibai Hōjō. He is 30 Gutei-yui-ju-isshi. These characters appear in the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 46. 31 Dōsan. Dō means “the same.” San is as in the chapter title. See note 6.

32 That is, Master Gensha himself. The story is recorded in the Rentōeyō, chap. 23. 33 Shimo-nin, a person whose state cannot be expressed with words.

34       Ji-chō-ji-jō. Ji as a noun or pronoun means “self,” “myself,” “oneself,” etc.; and as an adverb means “by oneself” or “by itself”; that is 1) “independently” or 2) “naturally, ”spontaneously.” boat.” means to go up. Chō means to fish, as in Master Gensha’s words chōgyo-sen, “fishing

35       Mi-chō-sen-jō.

36       These are common expressions of a complete change. In the following sentences ,Master Dōgen considers the Buddhist meaning of each expression. 37 When we realize the state without illusion, the concept “mind” does not remain.

38    Seiryō means Master Tendō himself.

39    Nyojōoshōgoroku, vol. 1.

40    To the south of present-day Nanking.

41    Karyūkō,light district. Lit., “blossom and willow quarter,” means an area of pleasure houses, a red-

42    The Fourth Patriarch in China is Master Daii Dōshin. His master, the Third Patriarch,is Master Kanchi Sōsan.

43    Master Nansen Fugan (748–834), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. 44 In present-day Anhui province in east China.

45    members of the order of Master Yakusan Igen. Master Ungan Donjō (782–841) and Master Dōgo Enchi (769–835) were two of the

46    Biru-chōjō-gyōShukusō asks Master Nan’yō Echū, “What is the state without conflict?” The master alludes to the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 26: The Tang emperor light and everything is contained in everything else. Avataṃsaka-sūtra says, “Walk on, treading on Vairocana’s head!” Vairocana is described in theas ruling a realm of abundant time and space, where all things emit

47    as the state without conflict.” “The state without emotion” is as the state without emotion.” The expression in the story, “the state without conflict,” is mujō-zanmai,mujō-zanmai, ““samādhisamādhi

48    Master Daiman Kōnin said, “The life of a person to whom the robe has been given

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49    In Chapter Sixty-nine, Hotsu-mujōshin, Master Dōgen describes picking up a stalk

“erecting a stalk of grass” represents one concrete action. of grass and creating with it the sixteen-foot golden body (image of Buddha). Here

50    1243.

[Chapter Sixty-three]

                                                    Ganzei                                        229c3

Eyes

Translator’s Note: Ganzei, which means “eyeballs” or “eyes,” symbolizes the viewpoint of Gautama Buddha, that is, the Buddhist viewpoint. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the meaning of the word ganzei, which appears frequently in the Shōbōgenzō, quoting Master Tendō Nyojō, Master Ungan Donjō, Master Tōzan Ryōkai, and other Buddhist masters.

[79]   If koṭis of thousand myriad kalpas of learning in practice are gathered together into a happy circle, it will be eighty-four thousand Eyes.1

[80]   My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, while the master ofZuiganji,2 in formal preaching in the Dharma hall addresses the assembly as follows:

Pure the autumn wind, bright the autumn moon. Earth, mountains, and rivers are clear in the Eye; Zuigan blinks and we meet afresh.

Sending staffs and shouts by turns, they test the patch-robed monk.3

“Testing the patch-robed monk” means verifying whether he is an eternal buddha. The hub of the matter is that [earth, mountains, and rivers] send staffs and shouts charging forth by turns; and he calls this “blinking.”4 The vigorous state realized like this is the Eye. “Mountains, rivers, and the earth” are a creative occurrence, such as clear manifestation of the Eye, not happening. This is the autumn wind being pure, which is perfect maturity. It is the autumn moon being bright, which is perfect immaturity. The autumn wind’s state of purity is beyond comparison even with the four great oceans. The autumn moon’s state of brightness is clearer than a thousand suns and moons. “Purity” and “brightness” are mountains, rivers, and the earth which are the Eye. “The patch-robed monk” is a Buddhist patriarch. One who—

without preferring great realization, without preferring nonrealization, and without preferring before or after the sprouting of creation—is the Eye itself: this is a Buddhist patriarch. “Verification” is the clear manifestation of the Eye, is the realization of blindness,5 and is the vivid Eye itself. “Meeting” is mutual encounter.6 Meeting, or mutual encounter, is the Eye being sharp, and the Eye being a thunderbolt. In sum, do not think that the whole body is big but the whole Eye might be small. Even those considered in past ages to be venerable and great have understood that the whole body is big but the whole Eye is small. This is because they were never equipped with the Eye.

[83] Great Master Tōzan Gohon,7 while in the order of Ungan,8 comes upon Ungan making sandals, whereupon the master says to Ungan, “I beg you, Master, for the Eye.”

Ungan says, “To whom did you give your own?” 230a The master says, “I do not have it.”

Ungan says, “You have. Where are you directing it?” The master is without words.

Ungan says, “The state of begging the Eye is itself the Eye, is it not?”

The master says, “It is not the Eye.”

Ungan criticizes this.9

Thus, learning in practice, when it is thoroughly conspicuous, “begs the Eye.” To pursue the truth in the cloud hall, to attend formal preaching in the Dharma hall, and to enter the room [for questions] in the abbot’s reception hall, are to beg the Eye. In general, to follow other monks in leaving a practice, and to follow other monks in coming to a practice, are naturally the Eye itself. The truth that the Eye is beyond subject and beyond object is evident. [The story] says that Tōzan, already, has requested instruction10 by “begging the master for the Eye.” Clearly, one who is subjective will not be begged by others to instruct them, and one who is objective will not beg others for instruction. [Ungan] teaches, “To whom did you give your own?” There are times when the state is “your own,” and there are means of “giving it, to whomever.” [Tōzan says] “I do not have it.” These are words naturally expressed by the Eye itself. We should quietly investigate the principle of, and learn in practice, the realization of words like this. Ungan says, “You have. Where are you directing it?” The Eye of this expression is that the “not having”11 in “I do not have it,” is to have it and to be directing it somewhere.

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And to be directing it somewhere is to have it. We should realize that the expression is like this. Tōzan is without words. This is not bewilderment. It is a standard that his karmic consciousness has independently established. Ungan instructs, “The state of begging the Eye is itself the Eye, is it not?” This is a sentence which blinks the Eye. It is the vivid shattering of the Eye. The point expressed here by Ungan is that the Eye begs the Eye, water draws water, mountains line up with mountains; we go among alien beings,12 and we live among our own kind.13 Tōzan says, “It is not the Eye.” This is the Eye singing out by itself. Where body, mind, intellectual recognition, forms, and grades which are “not the Eye” are present, we should meet that state as the vivid Eye manifesting itself. The buddhas of the three times, standing on the ground, have listened to the Eye turning the great wheel of Dharma and 230b preaching the great wheel of Dharma.14 In conclusion, in the inner sanctum of investigation in practice, we establish the mind, undergo training, and experience the great truth of bodhi, by springing inside the Eye. This Eye is, from the beginning, neither subjective nor objective. Because there are no hindrances of any kind, a great matter like this also is without hindrances. For this reason, an ancestor15 says, “How wondrous are the buddhas in the ten directions! They are originally just the flowers in our eyes.”16 What is expressed here is that the buddhas in the ten directions are the eye, and flowers in the eye are the buddhas in the ten directions. Our present backward steps and forward steps, sitting and sleeping, because they have received the power of the eye itself, are all like this.17 They are holding on and letting go inside the Eye.

[88]          My late master, the eternal buddha, says, “Gouging out Bodhi dharma’s Eye, I make it into a mud ball and work it into a person.” Loudly, he says, “Yes! The sea has dried right to the bottom. Waves surge so high that they hit the heavens.”

He presents this teaching to a sea of monks18 in the abbot’s quarters of Seiryōji. So he speaks of “working a person,”19 and this is as if to say “fashioning a person.” Because of the work, each person possesses his or her own real features. He means, for example, that with Bodhidharma’s Eye he has forged individual people. And he has forged people. The meaning of “working a person” is like this. Because each person is a person who has sat20 with the eye, a fist now striking people in the cloud hall, a staff striking people in the 287

Dharma hall, and a bamboo stick and a fly whisk striking people in the abbot’s quarters, are Bodhidharma’s Eye itself. Having gouged out Bodhi dharma’s Eye, [Master Tendō] makes it into mud balls to work into people, but people today call this by such names as “having an interview and requesting the benefit [of instruction],” or “formal preaching in the morning and informal preaching in the morning,” or “sitting and making effort.” What sort of person does he fashion? “Seas dry right to the bottom, and high waves hit the heavens.”21

[89]          My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, praises the Tathāgata’s realization of the truth, saying:

Six years he stumbled in the undergrowth, the ghost of a wild fox.

The whole body that sprang free was just the state of entanglement.

He lost the Eye and had no object of pursuit.

Now he deceives people saying that he was enlightened by the

                         bright star.

“He has been enlightened by the bright star” is the comment of an onlooker just at the moment when [the Tathāgata] loses the Eye. This is the entangled state22 of “the whole body,” and so it is easily sprung. Pursuing the object we should pursue eliminates realization as an object of pursuit, and there is also nothing to pursue in nonrealization.

[90]          My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, says:

It is the time when Gautama lost the Eye, In the snow, a single twig of plum blossoms!

Now every place has become a thorn.

Yet [I] laugh at the swirling of the spring wind.23

To comment in brief, Gautama’s Eyes are not only one, two, or three. The “losing” [described] now refers to which Eye? It may be that there is an Eye that is called “losing the Eye.” In the state like this, moreover, there is an Eye that is “a single twig of plum blossoms in the snow.” Stealing ahead of spring, it leaks the spirit of spring.

[92] My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, says:

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Days and weeks of pouring rain!

Completely clear skies! Croaking of bullfrogs.

Singing of earthworms.

Eternal buddhas have never passed away.

They are manifesting the diamond Eye.

Aah!

The complicated! The complicated!24

“The diamond Eye” is days and weeks of pouring rain, is completely clear skies, is frogs croaking and worms singing. Because [eternal buddhas] have never passed away, they are eternal buddhas. And even when eternal buddhas pass away, [their passing] is never the same as the passing of people who are not eternal buddhas.

[93]          My late master, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, says:

The sun in the south grows distant.

Inside the Eye shines light.

Inside the nostrils passes breath.

The endless continuation of the present, the winter solstice and New Year’s Day, the growing distant of the sun and moon: [all] are free of connectedness. Such is the shining of light inside the eye, and the viewing of mountains in the sun. The dignified manner of being in such circumstances is like this.

[94]          My late master, the eternal buddha, while at Jōjiji in Rinan City,25

gives the following formal preaching in the Dharma hall:

This morning is the first of the second moon.

The eyes of the fly whisk are bulging out;

As bright as a mirror, as black as Japanese lacquer.

               Instantly they spring out,                                                                         231a

And swallow the cosmos in one gulp.

Yet the students of this monk

Are still battering into fences and battering into walls.

In conclusion, what?

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Having given all, I am laughing heartily,

And leave everything to the vagaries of the spring wind.

The “battering into fences and battering into walls” described now is the totality of fences themselves battering and the totality of walls themselves battering. There is this Eye. “This morning”; “the second moon”; “the first”: these are each concrete instances of the Eye, and they are called “eyes of the fly whisk.” Because they spring out instantly, it is this morning. Because they swallow the cosmos hundreds of thousands of times, it is the second moon. A moment of giving all is the first. The realized vivid state of eyes is like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Ganzei

                                    Preached to the assembly under Yamashibu                                     Peak in Esshū26 on the seventeenth day of the                                     twelfth moon in the first year of Kangen.27

Notes

1     In general viewpoint is stronger than that of concrete eyeballs. ganzei is capitalized in this translation (“Eye”) when the sense of Buddhist

2     In Zhekiang province in east China.

      3 oshōgoroku,This and the following quotations of Master Tendō’s words are from the vol. 1. Nyojō-

4         Tenkatsu. Teneye. Tenkatsu,means to let a drop fall, or to make a dot. “blinking,” therefore suggests the momentary freshness of what is Katsu means blindness in an seen.

5         Katsu. See note 4.

6         each other,” describes not only sense perception but reciprocity of subject and Sōken wa sōhō nari. In other words, Master Tendō’s expression sōken, lit., “to see object.

7         Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869), successor of Master Ungan Donjō and the Eleventh title. Chinese Patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage. Great Master Gohon is his posthumous

8         Master Ungan Donjō (782–841), successor of Master Yakusan Igen. 9     Keitokudentōroku, chap. 14.

10    Shin-eki literally means “to request the benefit [of a master’s instruction].” See Chapter Kankin, paragraph 219. Twenty-one (Vol. I),

11    Mu, “not having” or “being without,” suggests the balanced condition in which there Busshō. is nothing superfluous and nothing lacking. See Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II),

12    no-myōju,Irui-chū-gyō,that appears often in the paragraph 101.“going among alien beings,” is an expression of independent action Shōbōgenzō. See, for example, Chapter Four (Vol. I), Ikka-

13    Dōrui-chū-shō, “living among one’s own kind,” expresses the Buddhist attitude from the other side—not only independence but also identification.

14    the great wheel of Dharma.” Gensha says: “The flame is preaching Dharma for the Seppō says: “The buddhas of the three times are inside the flame of the fire, turning

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buddhas of the three times, and the buddhas of the three times are standing on the story in detail in Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II), ground to listen.” (Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 88). Master Dōgen considers theGyōbutsu-yuigi.

15    Master Rōya Ekaku (dates unknown), successor of Master Fun’yō Zenshō.

16    See Chapter Forty-three, Kūge, paragraph 49.

17    They are all in the state without separation into subject and object.

18    Kaishū, there are no class distinctions among the members of a sangha.lit., “sea assembly” or “sea sangha.” The expression suggests the fact that

19    or people. Ta-nin. Ta means to strike, hit, or hammer out. Nin means a human being, a person, 20 taTaza is a verb prefix that suggests concrete action.means to sit in zazen, as in the phrase shikantaza, “just sitting.” In this compound, 21 Master Tendō fashioned people who were not worried by the impermanence of reality.

22    Kattō, also translated as “the complicated.” See Chapter Forty-six, Kattō.

23    The same verse appears in Chapter Fifty-nine, Baike, paragraph 200.

24    Kattō. See note 22.

25    In Zhekiang province in east China. 26 Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 27 1243.

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[Chapter Sixty-four] Kajō

Everyday Life

Translator’s Note: Ka means “house” or “home,” and means “usual” or “everyday.” So kajō means “everyday” or “everyday life.” People are often prone to think that religious matters should be different from daily life, being more sacred than and superior to daily life. But according to Buddhist theory, Buddhist life is nothing other than our daily life. Without daily life there can never be Buddhism. In China it was said that wearing clothes and eating meals are just Buddhism. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the meaning of kajō, everyday life, on the basis of Buddhism.

[97]   In general, in the house of the Buddhist patriarchs, [drinking] tea and[eating] meals are everyday life itself. This behavior of [drinking] tea and [eating] meals has long been transmitted and is realized in the present. Thus, the Buddhist patriarchs’ vivid activity of [drinking] tea and [eating] meals has come to us.

[98]   Master [Dō]kai1 of Taiyōzan asks Tōsu,2 “The ideas and words of a Buddhist patriarch are as everyday tea and meals. Beyond this, are there any other words with which to teach people or not?”

Tōsu says, “Say! The capital3 is under the emperor’s direct rule. Is there also any dependence upon [the ancient rulers] U, Tō, Gyō, and Shun,4 or not?”

Taiyō is about to open his mouth. Tōsu covers the master’s mouth with his fly whisk and says, “By the time you first established the will, you already deserved thirty strokes.”

At this, Taiyō attains realization and does prostrations, then goes at once. Tōsu says, “Come back a while, Ācārya!” Taiyō, in the end, does not turn his head.

Tōsu says, “Has the disciple arrived at the state without doubt?”

             Holding his hands over his ears, Taiyō leaves.5                                                                    231b

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[100]  So we should clearly maintain and rely upon [the teaching that] a Buddhist patriarch’s ideas and words are a Buddhist patriarch’s everyday tea and meals. Coarse tea and plain food in everyday life are the ideas and words of a Buddhist patriarch. Buddhist patriarchs make tea and meals, and tea and meals maintain Buddhist patriarchs. That being so, we rely on no tea and meal energy outside of these [tea and meals], and we never waste the Buddhist patriarch energy in these [tea and meals]. “Is there also dependence upon U, Tō, Gyō, and Shun, or not?” We should strive to learn in practice this manifestation of the view. “Beyond this, are there any other words with which to teach people or not?” We should spring out in experience from the brains of this question. We should experiment and observe in experience whether we are able to spring out or unable to spring out.

[101]  Great Master Musai6 of Sekitō-an Hut on Nangakuzan says,

I thatched a hut and have no wealth.

Having finished a meal, I calmly look forward to a nap.7

“[I] have finished a meal”—[an experience] that he repeats, repeats again, and repeats over again—is the idea and words of a Buddhist patriarch who experiences meals. One who has not yet finished a meal is not yet satisfied with experience. At the same time, this truth of “calmness, having finished a meal,” is realized before a meal, is realized during a meal, and is realized after a meal. To misunderstand that, in the house of “having finished a meal,” there is [always] the eating of meals, is learning in practice of [only] four or five pints out of ten.

[102] My late master, the eternal buddha, preaches to the assembly: “I remember the following: A monk asks Hyakujō, ‘What is a miracle?’ Hyakujō says, ‘Sitting alone on Great and Mighty Peak.’8 Monks, do not be disturbed. Let the fellow kill himself by sitting for a while. If someone today were suddenly to ask, ‘Ācārya [Nyo]jō, what is a miracle?’, I would only say to them, ‘How could anything be a miracle?’ Finally, what? The pātra of Jōji9 having passed to Tendō, I eat meals.’”10

In the everyday life of a Buddhist patriarch there is always a miracle; it has been called, “sitting alone on Great and Mighty Peak.” Even though we now hear “Let the fellow kill himself by sitting,” [his sitting] is still a miracle. And there is something even more miraculous than that; it has been called,

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“the pātra of Jōji passing to Tendō, and eating meals.” A miracle, in every instance and for every person, is always “eating meals.”11 This being so, “sit- 231c ting alone on Great and Mighty Peak” is just “eating meals.” The pātra is used for eating meals and what is used for eating meals is the pātra. For this reason [the master speaks of] “Jōji pātra” and “Tendō eating meals.”12After satisfaction, there is recognition of meals. After completely eating a meal, there is satisfaction. After recognition, there is satisfaction with meals. And after satisfaction there is still eating meals. Now then, what is the pātra? In my opinion, it is beyond [the description] “It is only a piece of wood” and it is not “as black as Japanese lacquer.”13 How could it be unyielding stone? How could it be an iron man? It is bottomless,14 and it is without nostrils. It swallows space in one gulp, and space receives it with joined hands.

[105]  My late master, the eternal buddha, on one occasion while addressing an assembly in the abbot’s quarters of Zuigan Jōdo Zen-in Temple in Daishū,15 says, “When hunger comes I eat a meal, when tiredness comes I sleep. Forges span the universe.”

“Hunger coming” is the vivid state of a person who has eaten meals already. For a person who has not experienced eating meals, hunger is impossible. So remember, we for whom hunger may be an everyday state are, decidedly, people who “have finished a meal.” “Tiredness coming” may be further tiredness experienced in tiredness. It has totally sprung free from the top of the brains of tiredness. Therefore, it is a moment of the present when, in vivid activity through the whole body, the whole body is totally turned around. “Sleeping” is sleeping that borrows the eyes of Buddha, the eyes of Dharma, the eyes of wisdom, the eyes of patriarchs, and the eyes of outdoor pillars and stone lanterns.

[106]  My late master, the eternal buddha, upon proceeding from Zuiganjiin Daishū to his assignment at Jōjiji in Rinanfu City,16 says in formal preaching in the Dharma hall:

Half a year I ate meals and sat on Banpō Peak, Shut off by thousand myriads of mists and clouds.

Suddenly, a thunderclap17 resounded.

The color of spring in the capital is apricot-blossom crimson.18

The teaching of the Buddhist patriarchs who administered the teaching during the age of the Buddha was, in every case, “sitting on Banpō Peak and

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eating meals.” Mastery of the transmission of the Buddha’s wisdom and life is just realization of the vivid state of “eating meals.” “Half a year of sitting on

Banpō Peak” is called “eating meals.” “The enclosing mists and clouds” are incalculable. Though the “thunderclap” is “sudden,” the “spring color” of “the apricot blossoms” is nothing other than crimson. “The capital” means each present instance of naked sincerity.19 The ineffable state of these situations is “eating meals.” Banpō is the name of the peak [on which stands] Zuiganji.

[108] My late master, the eternal buddha, addressing the assembly on one occasion in the Buddha hall of Zuiganji in Keigenfu City20 in Minshū, says:

The golden and fine form21

Is to get dressed and to eat meals.

That is why I bow to you.22 I sleep early and get up late.

Aye. . .

Talk of the profound and preaching of the fine are enormously free. Sternly be on guard lest a twirling flower inflames you.

This instant, we should already have seen through the heavy burden. “The golden and fine form” describes getting dressed and eating meals. Getting dressed and eating meals are the golden and fine form. Never grope around asking what person gets dressed and eats meals. Do not say that someone else is the golden and fine form. Then your state will be this expression of the truth. [One to whom the master says] “That is why I bow to you” is like that. When I have already started eating the meal, you bow with joined hands and eat the meal. Because we sternly guard against twirling flowers,23 we are like that.

[110] Zen Master Enchi Daian24 of Chōkei-in Temple in Fukushū, says

in formal preaching to the assembly in the Dharma hall:

Daian lived on Isan Mountain for thirty years,

Eating Isan meals, Shitting Isan shit,

Not learning Isan Zen,

Just watching over a castrated water buffalo.

When it strayed into the grass, I dragged it out.

When it invaded another’s seed patch, I whipped it.

Though disciplined for a long time already,

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As a pitiful creature, it suffered people’s remarks. Now it has turned into a white ox on open ground.25 It is always before me.

All day long it is in a state of conspicuous brightness.

Even if driven away, it does not leave.26

We should clearly receive and retain this preaching. Thirty years of effort in an order of Buddhist patriarchs are eating meals, with no miscellaneous worries at all. When the vivid state of eating meals is realized, supervision of a castrated water buffalo is naturally the standard.

           [112] Great Master Shinsai of Jōshū27 asks a newly arrived monk, “Have 232b

you ever been here before?”

The monk says, “Yes, I have.”

The master says, “Have some tea.”

Later he asks another monk, “Have you ever been here before?”

The monk says, “No, never before.” The master says, “Have some tea.”

A chief of the temple office28 asks the master, “Why [did you say] ‘Have some tea,’ to the monk who has been here before and also [say] ‘Have some

tea’ to the monk who has never been here before?” The master calls to the chief.

The chief answers.

The master says, “Have some tea.”29

“Here” is beyond the brain, is beyond the nostrils, and is beyond Jōshū district. Because it springs free from “here,” it “has already arrived here”30 and it “has never been here before.”31 “This place is the place where the ineffable exists,”32 but they discuss it only as “having already arrived” and “never having been before.” For this reason my late master says, “What person in a painted tower33 or a tavern could come to meet Jōshū and enjoy Jōshū’s tea?” In sum, the everyday life of Buddhist patriarchs is nothing other than drinking tea and eating meals.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kajō

                                    Preached to the assembly under Yamashibu Peak                                     in Etsu district on the seventeenth day of the                                     twelfth lunar month in the first year of Kangen.34

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Notes

1     Chinese Patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage. Master Fuyō Dōkai (1043–1118), successor of Master Tōsu Gisei, and the Eighteenth

2     Master Tōsu Gisei (1032–1083), successor of Master Taiyō Kyōgen.

3     KanSo Master Tōsu’s words are a truism. Literally means “the region around the capital that is ruled directly by the emperor.”

4     dynasty. Emperor Tō (r. 1766–1753 Emperors Gyō and Shun ruled at the end of the legendary age of the Five Rulers(2852–2205 B.C.E.). Emperor U (r. 2205–2197 B.C.E.) was the founder of the Shang dynasty.B.C.E.) was the founder of the Xia

5     Rentōeyō, chap. 28.

6     Master Sekitō Kisen (700–790), successor of Master Seigen Gyōshi and the Eighth Chinese Patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage.

7     Keitokudentōroku, chap. 30.

8     Daiyūhō, “Great and Mighty Peak” is another name for Hyakujōzan where Master Hyakujō had his order.

9     Temple, and he gave this preaching on the day he took up residence at Tendō Temple. Master Tendō Nyojō left Jōji Temple in 1225 in order to become the master of Tendōpātra, Buddhist alms bowl, is the subject of Chapter Seventy-eight (Vol. IV),

The Hatsu-u.

10    Nyojōoshōgoroku, vol. 2. Also quoted in Chapter Seventy-eight (Vol. IV), Hatsu-u.

11    Kippan, “eating meals,” is here used as a representative example of a basic activity of everyday life.

Master Tendō Nyojō himself. Jōji-

12    abstraction but as something actually used and realized in the life of the master. Tendō-kippan,Jōji and Tendō are the names of the two temples and at the same time the names ofof meals [realized by] Tendō,” that is, real eating of meals.read in the quote as “. . . to Tendō, and [I] eat meals,” here means “the eatinghatsu-u, “Jōji pātra,” suggests the bowl not as an

13    that it defies any such description. Ganzei ,himself to describe the Koku-nyo-shitsu, paragraph 94). Master Dōgen is suggesting here that the “as black as Japanese lacquer,” are words used by Master Tendōhossu, or ceremonial fly whisk (see Chapter Sixty-three, pātra is so profound

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14    therefore has no supporting rim or base; at the same time, the word that the state of a Mutei means bottomless or without a base. The pātra is bottomless or unfathomable. pātra is rounded at the bottom andmutei suggests

15    A coastal district of Zhekiang province, bordering the East China Sea.

16    Also in Zhekiang province.

17    The thunderclap symbolizes the invitation to become master of Jōji Temple. 18 Nyojōoshōgoroku, vol. 1.

19       Sekiseki-jōjō,sekishin-henpen,II), See also Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Shinjin-gakudō,lit., “red-red instance-instance,” is a variation of the common expression lit., “red mind fragment-fragment,” i.e., sincerity at every moment. paragraph 156.Kōkyō, paragraph 162; Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol.

20       Present-day Ningbo in northern Zhekiang.

21       Alludes to the golden hue of the Buddha, one of his thirty-two distinguishing signs.

22       story involving Master Gensha Shibi, although a definitive source has not been traced. master and disciple are each furnished equally with Buddhist virtue.Yo The point is that, in performing simple acts like getting dressed and eating meals,[tte] ware nanji o rai[su], “Therefore I bow to you,” is thought to derive from a 23 the Buddha and Master Mahākāśyapa on Vulture Peak (see Chapter Sixty-eight, Nenge,Udongepractitioner feel spiritual.“the picking up of a flower,” alludes to the story of the transmission between). Here it is an example of a stimulus that might tend to make a Buddhist

24       title. Master Enchi Daian (793–883), successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. He became amonk under Master Ōbaku, then joined Master Hyakujō’s order along with Master Isan Reiyū. After Master Isan’s death in 853, Master Enchi became the master of Isan Mountain. Later he retired to Chōkei-in Temple. Zen Master Enchi is his posthumous

25       Alludes to the Lotus Sutra. See LS 1.166. 26 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 9.

27    Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. Jōshū district isin modern-day Hubei province.

28    Inju, also called kansu, “prior,” is one of the main temple officers charged with general administration of the monastery.

29    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 33; Rentōeyō, chap. 6.

30    suggests the state at the moment of the present.Sō-tō-shikan in the story means “been here before,” but the literal meaning of sō-tō-shikan, lit., “arrived here before” or “arrived here already,”is to arrive. Therefore

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31    the moment of the present.Fu-sō-tō-shikan, “never been here before” or “never arrived here before,” also describes

32    96says, “Very coarse person!” Fuke says, “This place is the place where something inef-In response to a question from Rinzai, Fuke overturns a dinner table. Master RinzaiShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no.

fable exists. Explain it as coarse or explain it as fine.” . See also notes to Chapter Fifty-six, Senmen, paragraph 124. 33 Garō, “painted tower” suggests a grand and luxurious building.

34 1243.

 

 [Chapter Sixty-five]

Ryūgin

The Moaning of Dragons

Translator’s Note: Ryū means “dragons,” and gin means “sing,” “chant,” or “moan.” Dragons, of course, are not living animals but are mythical creatures. So it would be very strange for dragons to sing or moan; in short, it is impossible for dragons to sing or moan. But in ancient China people used the word ryūgin, “moaning of dragons” or “whispers of dragons,” as a symbol of something mystical in nature or in the universe—for example, in the expression koboku ryūgin. Koboku means “withered trees”; the words conjure an image of a lonely, desolate landscape of withered trees, where we feel we can hear something that is not a sound. This concept later entered into Buddhist explanations. The moaning of dragons is not a sound but something that cannot be heard with the ears alone; that is, quietness, nature, the universe, or reality. Buddhism is not simple mysticism, and so we should not readily believe in the existence of something mystical. At the same time, we should not limit reality to the area of sensory perception. On this basis, Master Dōgen explains the meaning of ryūgin, “the moaning of dragons,” in this chapter. [116] Great Master Jisai of Tōsuzan in Jōshū,1 the story goes, is asked by a monk, “Among withered trees does the moaning of dragons exist or not?” The master says, “I say that inside of skulls exists the lion’s roar.”2

Talk of withered trees and dead ash is the original teaching of non Buddhists. But the withered trees of which non-Buddhists speak and the withered trees3 of which Buddhist patriarchs speak may be very different. Even though non-Buddhists talk of withered trees, they do not know withered trees; how much less could they hear the moaning of dragons? Non-Buddhists have thought that withered trees might be trees in decay; they have understood that [withered trees] cannot meet spring. The withered trees of which the 232c

Buddhist patriarchs speak are in the learning in practice of “the sea having

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dried.”4 The sea having dried is a tree having withered, and a tree having withered is [the vivid state of] “meeting spring.” A tree not being disturbed is the withered state. The mountain trees, ocean trees, sky trees, and other trees of the present, are just withered trees. Even a sprouting bud is the moaning of dragons among withered trees. Even [a tree] of a hundred thousand myriad fathoms is the descendant of withered trees. The form, nature, substance, and energy of the withered state are the withered stumps which Buddhist patriarchs have described, and are other than withered stumps— there are trees in mountains and valleys and there are trees in fields and villages. Trees in mountains and valleys are usually called “pines and oaks.” Trees in fields and villages are usually called “human beings and gods.” “Leaves spread out from roots”:5 we call this state “a Buddhist patriarch.” “Root and branch should return to the fundamental”:6 this is just learning of the state. What exists in the state like this is the long Dharma body of a withered tree, or the short Dharma body of a withered tree. Those who are not withered trees never moan the moaning of dragons, and those other than withered trees do not get rid of “the moaning of dragons.” “However many times [this withered tree] meets spring, it does not change its mind”:7 this is the moaning of dragons that has become totally dry. It does not belong on the scale do, re, mi, fa, and so. At the same time, do, re, mi, fa, and so are two or three former and latter instances of the moaning of dragons. That being so, this monk’s expression “Among withered trees does the moaning of dragons exist or not?”, which has been realized as a concrete question for the first time in countless kalpas, is the realization of a comment in itself.8 Tōsu’s words “I say that inside of skulls exists the lion’s roar”9 mean “Is there anything that is covered?” [They mean] “The effort to curb ourselves and to promote others is ceaseless.” [And they mean] “Skulls are littering the whole countryside.”

[119] Great Master Shūtō10 of Kyōgenji, the story goes, is asked by a

monk, “What is the truth?”

The master says, “The moaning of dragons among withered trees.”

The monk says, “I do not understand.”11 The master says, “Eyes in skulls.”

Thereafter, a monk asks Sekisō,12 “What is the moaning of dragons

among withered trees?”

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[Seki]sō says, “A trace of joy still being retained.” The monk says, “What are eyes in skulls?”

[Seki]sō says, “A trace of consciousness still being retained.”

On another occasion, a monk asks Sōzan,13 “What is the moaning of

dragons among withered trees?”

[Sō]zan says, “The bloodline being unbroken.” The monk says, “What are eyes in skulls?”

[Sō]zan says, “Dryness being without limit.”

The monk says, “I wonder if there are any who are able to hear.”

      [Sō]zan says, “Over the whole earth there is no one who does not hear.”     233a

The monk says, “I wonder what words the dragons moan.”

[Sō]zan says, “Even without knowing the words, those who hear all

share the loss.”14

[121] The listeners and moaners we are discussing now are beyond the level of moaners who moan about dragons. This melody is the moaning of dragons itself. “Among withered trees” and “in skulls” are beyond inside and outside and beyond self and others; they are the moment of the present and the moment of eternity. “A trace of joy still being retained” is horns growing further on a head. “A trace of consciousness still being retained” is skin having been shed completely. Sōzan’s words “The bloodline being unbroken” describe the truth being no inimical, and the body being turned around in mid-speech.15 “Dryness being without limit” is the sea having dried and the bottom not being reached.16 Because not reaching the limit is dryness itself,17 in the state of dryness we continue to dry.18 Saying “Are there any who hear?” is as if to say “Are there any who cannot?” “Over the whole earth there is no one who does not hear.” I would like to ask further: Setting aside for a while “there is no one who does not hear,” tell me, before “the whole earth” exists, where then is the moaning of dragons? Speak at once! Speak at once! “I wonder what words the dragons moan.” We should ask this question. Moaning dragons are naturally a sound being voiced, or a matter being taken up, in the mud. They are the passing of air inside the nostrils. “We do not know what words these are”19 describes the existence, in words, of dragons. “Those who hear all share the loss”:20 how sorrowful it is! The moaning of dragons that has now been realized by Kyōgen, Sekisō, Sōzan, and the others becomes clouds and becomes water.21 Without speaking of the truth,

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without speaking of eyes or skulls, just this is the moaning of dragons in a thousand melodies and in ten thousand melodies. “A trace of joy still being retained” is the croaking of bullfrogs. “A trace of consciousness still being retained” is the singing of earthworms. Relying on this state, “the bloodline is unbroken,” and a gourd succeeds a gourd. Because “dryness is without limit,” outdoor pillars gestate and give birth and a stone lantern stands out against a stone lantern.22

                                    Shōbōgenzō Ryūgin

                                    Preached to the assembly under Yamashibu Peak                                     in Etsu district23 on the twenty-fifth day of the                                     twelfth lunar month in the first year of Kangen.24

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Notes

1     is his posthumous title. The simplicity of Master Tōsu’s life on Tōsuzan in his home Thirty (Vol. II), district of Jōshū (in present-day Anhui province in east China) is mentioned in ChapterMaster Tōsu Daidō (819–914), successor of Master Suibi Mugaku. Great Master JisaiGyōji, paragraph 241. See also Chapter Forty-two, Tsuki.

2     Keitokudentōroku, chap. 15.

3     Koboku,non-emotion, or people in the vivid state of non-emotion. The zazen hall of a Buddhist “withered trees” or “dead trees,” in Buddhism symbolizes the vivid state of koboku-dō, “withered tree hall.” See, for example, Chapter temple is sometimes called Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 241.

4     Kaiko,(and for “dried” are the same: see also Chapter Sixty-three, “the sea has dried,” represents a real situation that has changed completely ko.Ganzei, paragraph 88). The character for “withered” 5 Ne ni yotte ha bunpu su. Quoted from the poem Sandōkai (On Experiencing the State) by Master Sekitō Kisen.

6     means and ends, substance and detail, or the important and the trivial.Honmatsu subekaraku shū ni kisu beshi. Ibid. Honmatsu means root and branch,

7     not even look back./Why should popular entertainers be keen to search it out?” Seeby Master Daibai Hōjō: “A withered tree, broken and abandoned, in a cold forest,/How-Ikutabi ka haru ni au te kokoro o henze zuever many times it meets spring, it does not change its mind./Passing woodsmen doGyōji, paragraph 141.is the second line of the following verse

Chapter Thirty (Vol. II),

8     Watō means a kōan; that is, a comment or story in which the truth is expressed. SeeKōkyō, paragraph 162; and Chapter Thirty-six

(also notes to Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), Vol. II), Kōmyō, paragraph 126.

9     Shishi-ku, “lion’s roar,” symbolizes the Buddha’s preaching.

10    Master Kyōgen Chikan (d. 818), successor of Master Isan Reiyū.

11    monk’s second line is “What is a person in the state of truth?”This line follows the version in the Keitokudentōroku. In the Shinji-shōbōgenzō the

12    Master Sekisō Keisho (807–888), successor of Master Dōgo Enchi.

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13    Master Sōzan Honjaku (840–901), successor of Master Tōzan Ryōkai.

14    shōbōgenzō,This group of stories can be found in the pt. 1, no. 28. Keitokudentōroku, chap. 17. See also Shinji-

15    flexibility—maintenance of the purity of the Buddhist tradition does not call for a fighting attitude or a rigid outlook. Gomyaku-ri-tenshin, “transforming the body inside the stream of words,” expresses

16    expression Kai-ko-fu-jin-tei,kai-ko-fu-ken-tei,“the sea has dried and no sea bed is reached,” is a variation of the Hensan,“the sea has dried and no sea bed is seen” (see note 3;paragraph 70). Instead of fuken, “not seeing,” Master

Dōgen said also Chapter Sixty-two, fujin, “not reaching the limit.”

17    attachment to an end result. Fujin-ze-kan. Fujin, “not reaching the limit,” suggests the Buddhist process as non -Kan, “dryness,” also suggests nonattachment.

18    Kanjō-yū-kan, literally, “on dryness, further drying.”

19    Mata-fuchi-ze-ka-shōku,is literally “Even without knowing that these are what chapter and verse.” translated in the story as “Even without knowing the words. . .”Ka-shōku, is, “words of the ineffable. ”what chapter and verse” or “what words,” can be interpreted as “What words,” that

20    Monsha-kai-sō, time, in the compound “those who hear all mourn.” translated in the story as “those who hear all share the loss,” is literally sōshitsuSōit means “to lose.” The phrase means to mourn or to lose someone. At the samesōshin-shitsumyō, “to for example, Chapter Sixty-seven, lose body and life,” is an ironic expression of attaining the state of realization. See, Soshi-sairai-no-i, paragraph 149.

21    Kumo o nashi, mizu o nasu, “becoming clouds and becoming water,” represents theBaike, paragraph of clouds” to express nature itself.224unhindered working of nature. In a poem in Chapter Fifty-nine, , Master Tendō Nyojō uses the phrase “the becoming of rain and the becoming

22    genzō, that are commonly seen in Japanese-style gardens but also to hanging lanterns, lanterns exists conspicuously as it is. The term Tōrō-tai-tōrō, lit., “a stone lantern opposes a stone lantern,” means a stone lantern tōrō is applied not only to the stone lanterns Toro in the Shōbōtemple.floated on water, etc. However, when Master Dōgen uses the term it is assumed that he has in mind a stone lantern in the garden of a Buddhist

23    Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 24 1243.

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                                                   Shunjū                                        233b3

Spring and Autumn

Translator’s Note: Shun means “spring” and jū, which is a corruption of shū, means “autumn.” Shunjū, spring and autumn, expresses the seasons. In this chapter Master Dōgen describes the Buddhist attitude toward cold and heat. First Master Dōgen quotes a famous conversation on this subject between Master Tōzan Ryōkai and a monk. Then he discusses the comments of some ancient masters in order to explain the true meaning of the story.

[127] Great Master Tōzan Gohon,1 the story goes, is asked by a monk, “When cold or heat come, how are we to avoid them?”

The master says, “Why do you not go to the place without cold and

heat?”

The monk says, “What is the place without cold and heat?”

The master says “When it is cold, kill the ācārya with cold.2 When it is

hot, kill the ācārya with heat.”3

Many have discussed this story in the past, and many should consider it in the present. Buddhist patriarchs inevitably have experienced it, and those who have experienced it are Buddhist patriarchs. Many Buddhist patriarchs of the past and present, in the Western Heavens and in the Eastern Lands, have seen this story as their real features. The realization of the features of this story is the reality of Buddhist patriarchs. That being so, we should clarify in detail the monk’s question, “When cold or heat come, how are we to avoid them?” That means detailed examination in experience of the very moment in which cold has come and of the very moment in which heat has come. Both the totality of cold and the totality of heat, in this “cold and heat,” are cold and heat themselves. Because they are cold and heat themselves, when they have come, they have come from the very brains4 of cold and heat themselves, and they are manifest from the very eyes of cold and heat themselves. On these very brains

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is the place without cold and heat. In these very eyes is the place without cold and heat. The founding patriarch’s words, “When it is cold, kill the ācārya with cold. When it is hot, kill the ācārya with heat” are about the situation just at the moment of having arrived. “When it is cold,” the expression is “killing with cold,” but “when it is hot,” “killing with heat” need not always be the expression. Cold is utterly cold, and heat is utterly hot. Even if we have been able to discover myriad koṭis of methods of avoidance, they are all like replacing a tail with a head.5 Cold is just the vivid eyes of the ancestral patriarchs. Heat is just the warm skin and flesh of my late master.

[130] Zen Master Jōin Kōboku6 (who succeeded Master Fuyō and who was

known as Master Hōjō) says:

233c Some among the sangha interpret as follows: “This monk’s question has fallen into the relative already. Tōzan’s answer returns to the absolute. In [Tōzan’s] speech, the monk recognizes sound, and comes into the absolute. Tōzan then exits via the relative.” Interpretations like this not only blaspheme the ancient saints but also daunt the perpetrators themselves. Have you not read the words that “When we listen to the understanding of ordinary people, though the reds and blues [it excites] in the mind may be beautiful before the eyes, if it is stored for long it makes for disease.” In general, noble wayfarers, if you want to master this matter, first you must know the founding patriarch’s right Dharma-eye treasury. The comments and teaching of other Buddhist patriarchs are something like the murmurs of hot [water] in a [lacquered] bowl. Even so, I dare to ask you, “What, in conclusion, is the place without cold or heat? Do you understand or not?” A jeweled tower is a nest for a kingfisher, but a golden palace offers no shelter to a mandarin duck.7

[132]     This master is a descendant of Tōzan, a hero in the Patriarch’s order. That being so, he clearly admonishes the many individuals who mistakenly prostrate themselves to Great Master Tōzan, the founding patriarch, inside the cave of the relative and the absolute. If the Buddha-Dharma were transmitted and received on the basis of limited consideration of the relative and the absolute, how could it have reached the present day? Wild kittens, barnyard bumpkins, who have never explored Tōzan’s inner sanctum, people

Chapter Sixty-six

who have not walked the threshold of the truth of the Buddha-Dharma, mistakenly assert that Tōzan teaches people with his five positions of the relative and the absolute,8 and so on. This is an outlandish insistence and a random insistence. We should not see or hear it. We should just investigate the fact that the founding patriarch possesses the right Dharma-eye treasury.

[133]     Zen Master Wanshi9 of Tendōzan in Keigenfu City10 (who succeeded Master Tanka and who was known as Master Shōgaku) says:

This episode, if we discuss it, is like a game of go between two players. If you do not respond to my move, I will fool you completely. If we experience it like this, we will begin to understand Tōzan’s intention. And Tendō cannot help adding a footnote:

When we research it, this concrete place is without hot and cold.

Already the blue depths have dried to the last drop.

I tell you we can catch a giant turtle just by bending down.

You are a laugh, dallying in the sand with a fishing rod.11

Not denying the “game of go,” for the present, how are the “two players”? If we call it “a game of go between two players,” there might be a handicap of eight stones. With an eight-stone handicap, it is not a game of go, is it? If 234a we are to discuss it, we should discuss it like this: the game of go is one player and an opponent meeting each other. Even so, we should mindfully consider, and should physically master, the state now expressed by Wanshi as “you do not respond to my move.” “You do not respond to my move” says “you can never be me.” Do not pass over “I will fool you completely.”12 In mud there is mud: those who tread in it wash their feet—and also wash their crown strings. In a pearl there is a pearl: when it shines it illuminates others and it illuminates itself.

[135] Zen Master Engo13 of Kassan Mountain14 (who succeeded Zen Master Goso Hōen and who was known as Master Kokugon) says:

A bowl rolls around a pearl, and the pearl rolls around the bowl.

The absolute in the relative, the relative in the absolute.15 Of the antelope,16 carrying its horns, there is no trace.

Hunting hounds circle the forest and emptily skulk.17

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The present expression “a bowl rolls around a pearl” is unprecedented and inimitable, it has rarely been heard in eternity. Hitherto, [people] have spoken only as if the pearl rolling in the bowl were ceaseless. The antelope is now holding up its horns in the emptiness. And the forest is now circling the hunting hounds.

[137] Zen Master Myōkaku18 of Shishōji on Setchōzan in Keigenfu City (who succeeded Master Hokutō [Kō]so,19 and who was known as Master Jūken) says:

A guiding hand20 is as a cliff of ten thousand feet.

Why should the relative and the absolute always be neatly arranged?

A stately old mansion of lapis lazuli lights up a bright moon.

A black guard dog,21 hardy and keen, is vacantly padding up the     steps.22

Setchō is a third-generation Dharma descendant of Unmown, and he may

be called a bag of skin that has experienced satisfaction. Now, saying that “A guiding hand is as a cliff of ten thousand feet,” he indicates a singularly uncompromising standard, but [a guiding hand] may not always be like that. The present story of the monk’s question and [Tō]zan’s teaching is not necessarily about “bestowing a guiding hand or not bestowing a guiding hand,”23 and not necessarily about “leaving the world or not leaving the world”; how much less

does it rely on expression of the relative and the absolute. [People] seem unable to lay a hand upon this story without relying on the eyes of the relative and the absolute. That is because, lacking the nose ring which is [got by] visiting [a master] and requesting [instruction], they do not arrive at the periphery of the founding patriarch, and do not glimpse the great masters of the Buddha Dharma. Picking up some new straw sandals, they should visit [a master] and request [instruction]. Stop recklessly saying that the Buddha-Dharma of the founding patriarch is the five positions of the absolute and the relative.

[139]    Master Shutaku24 of Tennei Temple in Tōkei district,25 [titled] Zen Master Chōrei, says:

Amid the relative exists the absolute; amid the absolute, the relative.

Thousands of centuries floating downstream in the human world.

How many times I have hoped to return, but to return has been     impossible.

Before my gate, as ever, weeds are growing in abundance.26

Chapter Sixty-six

He also cannot help mentioning the absolute and the relative, and yet he has picked up something. Not denying that he has picked up something, what is it that, “in the middle of the relative, exists”?27

[140]    Master Busshō28 of Daii [Mountain] in Tanshū29 (who succeeded Engo and whose monk’s name was Hōtai) says:

Thanks to you,30 I have penetrated the place without cold or heat.

A withered tree has bloomed again.

Laughable people who mark their boat in looking for a sword,31 Still today are in cold ashes.32

This expression has just enough power to tread upon the Board of Law33

and to receive it upon the crown of the head.

[141] Zen Master Tandō Bunjun34 of Rokutan Pond35 says:

In the moment of heat [I] kill [myself] with heat and in the moment     of cold with cold.

Where heat and cold come from I do not care at all.

Realizing the ends of space in action and remembering worldly     matters at will.

The old master is crowned with a bearskin cap.36

Now let us ask: What is the truth of the state of “not caring”?37 Speak

at once! Speak at once!

[141]  Zen Master Kazan Buttō38 of Kōshū39 (who succeeded Zen Master Bukkan Egon of Taihei Mountain and who was known as Master Shujun) says:

Tōzan spoke of the place without cold and heat.

Numerous Zen people have lost their way there.

When it is cold I get in front of a fire, and when it is hot I employ     means of keeping cool.

All my life I am able to avoid and escape cold and heat.40

[142]  This Master [Shu]jun is a Dharma grandchild of Zen Master GosoHōen,41 but his words are like those of a small child. Even so, in “All my life I am able to avoid and escape cold and heat,” there may be a hint of future mature realization. In that case, “all my life” means “with my whole life,” and “escaping cold and heat” means getting free of body and mind. In

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conclusion, although masters from many districts and in many ages have

devoted themselves to flapping their lips like this, offering their eulogies to the ancients, they have never glimpsed the periphery of the founding patriarch Tōzan. The reason, if asked, is that they do not know what cold and heat are in the everyday life of a Buddhist patriarch, and so they randomly speak, for example, of “employing means of keeping cool and getting in front of a fire.” It is especially pitiful that you [Shujun], though in the vicinity of venerable patriarchs, have not heard what “cold and heat” means. We should regret that the ancestral master’s truth has died out. Knowing the form and stages of this “cold and heat,” having passed instantaneously through periods of cold and heat and having utilized cold and heat, we should praise over again, with eulogies of the ancients and discussions of the ancients, the truth that the founding patriarch taught. Until we are at that level, the best thing for us is to know our own faults. Even the secular42 are aware of the sun and the moon and they maintain and rely upon the myriad things, but there are differences among them between the sacred and the clever, between gentlefolk and stupid fellows. Do not misunderstand that cold and heat in the Buddha’s truth are the same as the cold and heat of stupid fellows. Just be diligent in practice at once.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shunjū

                                    Preached to the assembly, a second time, deep                                     in the mountains of Etsu district in the second                                     year of Kangen.43 At a Buddhist event,44 I have                                     preached a Buddhist Kirin Sutra.45 An ancestral                                     master said, “Though there are many horns in

                                    the herd, one kirin is enough.”46

Notes

1 Chinese Patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage. Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869), successor of Master Ungan Donjō and the Eleventh 2 Jari represents the Sanskrit term of respect ācārya. In this case, it means “you.” 3 Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 25.

4 means that which is fundamental or real as opposed to a concept. Chōnei, “brains,” sometimes symbolizes the intellectual sphere, but in this case it 5 I-tō-kan-bi,same expression suggests changing from an intellectual attitude to a practical attitude. “replacing a tail with a head,” here suggests impracticality. Sometimes the

6     Master Jōin Kōboku is his posthumous title.Master Kōboku Hōjō (dates unknown), a successor of Master Fuyō Dōkai (1043– who was the Eighteenth Chinese Patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage. Zen

1118)

7     Kataifutōroku, chap. 26.

8     Henshōtō no go-i. See also Chapter Forty-nine, Butsudō, paragraph 166.

9     Master Wanshi Shōgaku (1091–1157), successor of Master Tanka Shijun. He became disciple of Master Tanka Shijun at the recommendation of Master Kōboku Hōjō.When he was thirty-nine he became the master of Keitokuji on Mount Tendō, wherehe remained until his death.

10    on Mount Tendō under Master Tendō Nyojō.Present-day Ningbo in northern Zhekiang. Master Dōgen was later to practice here

11    Wanshizenjigoroku, chap. 4.

12    Master Wanshi’s words describe the serious state of action in daily life.

13    in Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), the Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Master Goso Hōen, and editor ofHekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record)Tenbōrin.. Both Master Engo and Master Goso are quoted

14    In Hunan province in southeast central China.

15    other three are Hen-chū-shō and shō-chū-rai,shō-chū-hen“ the absolute coming to the middle,” are the first two of Master Tōzan’s five positions. Theken-chū-tō, “both having arrived at the middle.”hen-chū-shi, “the relative arriving at the middle,” and

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16    Reiyō, kamoshika, of eastern Asia that are usually rather dark and heavily built, and some of which have “a serow,” is any of several goat-like antelopes (genus Capricornis) distinct manes (Webster’s).

17    Engozenjigoroku, chap. 9, “Eulogies of the Ancients.” 18 Master Setchō Jūken (980–1052).

19    Master Chimon Kōso (dates unknown).

20    a master to a disciple. Suishu, lit., “the hanging down of a hand,” means practical guidance bestowed from 21 Kanro. Kan was an area in China associated with this breed of dog. Ro means black. 22 Hekiganroku, no. 43.

23    there is leaving the world and not leaving the world, and there is bestowing a guiding distinction between a master’s instruction of others and his or her own practice. The Suishu-fusuishu, lit., “hanging down a hand, not hanging down a hand,” expresses a Hekiganroku, no. 43: “In the Sōtō lineage phrase appears in the commentary in the hand and not bestowing a guiding hand.”

24    Master Chōrei Shutaku (d. 1123), successor of Master Ōryū Isei.

25    province in east-central China. Tokei is literally “Eastern Capital.” It corresponds to a district in present-day Hunan

26    Chōreishutakuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Chōrei Shutaku).

27    Master Chōrei Shutaku’s verse says acters ative,” originally means “one-sidedness.” or “in the middle of.” Middle way is hen-chū-u to suggest real existence in the middle way between extremes. hen-chū-u,chūdō.ChūMaster Dōgen picked up the three char-as a preposition means “in,” “inside,” “In the relative, exists. . . .” Hen, “rel-

28    Master Busshō Hōtai (dates unknown), successor of Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135).

29    In present-day Hunan province in southeast central China. 30 Kimi, a polite form for “you,” here means Master Tōzan.

31    The Chinese book notch in his boat. He stubbornly searched under the notch, even though the boat had dropped his sword from a boat on a river, and tried to mark the place by putting aShunjū (Spring and Autumn) by Roshi tells the story of a man who moved downstream.

32    Zenshūjukorenjutsūshū Masters of the Zen Sect)(, chap. Complete String-of-Pearls Collection of Eulogies to Past24.

33    Kōan represents kōan, which stands for kōfu āntoku, literally, “official government law-text.” This name was given to a board on which a new law was displayed. It is

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thus a symbol of universal law, or Dharma; the universe itself. See Chapter Three(Vol. I), Genjō-kōan.

34    Master Tandō Bunjun (1060?–1115), successor of Master Shinjō Kokubun.

35    province in southeast China.Rokutan is the name of a pond within the grounds of Tōzan Temple in Kiangsi

36    Zenshūjukorenjutsūshū, chap. 24.

37    Fukan-tei, “state beyond cares.” Master Tandō Bunjun said fukan, kan [setei,] zu,“state,”“I do not care” or “I am not concerned.” Master Dōgen added the character suggesting detachment as a concrete condition of the body-mind.

38    and at the same time he received the direct instruction of Master Engo Kokugon. Master Kazan Shujun (1078?–1134). He was the successor of Master Taihei Egon,

39    In present-day Zhekiang province in east China. 40 Zenshūjukorenjutsūshū, chap. 24.

41 Master Goso Hōen (d. 1104), successor of Master Hakuun Shutan. Master Goso was the master of Engo Kokugon. 42 Confucianism. In this case, Master Dōgen may have been thinking of the Daoist text Zoku, “secular,” often in the Shōbōgenzō represents the teachings of Daoism and

Shunjū. 43 1244.

44 anniversary of a person’s death. Preaching by Master Tendō Nyojō at such an event Butsu-ji,is described in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), a Buddhist event, suggests, for example, a memorial gathering on theGyōji, paragraph 264. 45 The Daoist text Shunjū was also known as the Rinkyō, “[Ki]rin Sutra.” The kirin is a magical horned animal associated in Chinese legends with wise rule.

46 Master Seigen Gyōshi (d. 740), successor of Master Daikan Enō. The quotation means “To have just one outstanding student is enough.” It appears in the in the section about Master Seigen.                                                                                         Keitokudentōroku,

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[Chapter Sixty-seven] Soshi-sairai-no-i

The Ancestral Master’s Intention in Coming from the West

Translator’s Note: So means “ancestor” or “patriarch” and shi means “master”; thus soshi means “ancestral masters” or “the ancestral master.” The word sometimes, as in this case, indicates Master Bodhidharma. Sai means “west” and rai means “come.” I means “intention” or “aim.” So soshi-sairai-no-i means Master Bodhidharma’s intention in coming from the west. It is said that in the sixth century Master Bodhidharma went from India (the west) to China (the east) to spread Buddhism, and that this event marked the transmission of true Buddhism to China. Master Bodhidharma was then called the First Patriarch in China and so Chinese Buddhists thought it very important to discuss Master Bodhidharma’s intention in coming from the west. In this chapter, Master Dōgen picks up a famous discussion between Master Kyōgen Chikan and his disciple to explain the real meaning of Master Bodhidharma’s intention in coming from the west.

[147]       Great Master Shūtō1 of Kyōgenji (who succeeded Daii2 and whose monk’s name was Chikan) addresses the assembly: “A person3 has gone up a tree on a thousand foot precipice. In her mouth she is biting a branch of the tree. Her feet will not step onto the tree and her hands will not pull her onto the branch. Under the tree suddenly there appears [another] person who asks, ‘What was the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?’ Just at that moment, if she opens her mouth to answer the other she loses body and life, and if she does not answer she goes against what the other is 235a asking. Now say, just at such a moment, what are you able to do?”

Then Ācārya Shō of Koto Mountain steps out from the assembly and says, “I do not ask about when she has gone up the tree. Before she goes up a tree, please, Master, say what is the situation then?”

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The master bursts into loud laughter.4

[148]       The present story has appeared in many commentaries and discussions of the ancients, but the individuals who have expressed its truth are few; for the most part, it seems that [people] have been completely dumbfounded. Nevertheless, if we consider [the story] by utilizing “not thinking,” and by utilizing “non-thinking,”5 effort on one round cushion with Old [Master] Kyōgen will naturally be present. Once we are already sitting, in the mountain-still state, upon the same round cushion as Old Kyōgen, we will be able to understand this story in detail even before Kyōgen opens his mouth. Not only will we steal Old Kyōgen’s eyes and glimpse [the story]; drawing out Śākyamuni Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury, we will be able instantly to see through it.

[149]       “A person has gone up a tree on a thousand-foot precipice.” We should quietly investigate these words. What is “a person”? We should not say that what is not an outdoor pillar is “a piece of timber.”6 We should not lose sight of the fact that even a buddha’s face and a patriarch’s face breaking into a smile are the meeting of a self and another. The present place where “a person goes up a tree,” is beyond “the whole earth” and beyond “the top of a hundred foot pole”; it is just “a thousand-foot precipice.” If there is dropping off,7 it happens in the concrete reality of “a thousand-foot precipice.”8 We experience times of dropping and times of going up.9 [The story] says that the person in the concrete reality of a thousand foot precipice “goes up a tree.” Remember that she has experienced a time of “going up.” That being so, it is “a thousand feet” up and it is “a thousand feet” down. It is “a thousand feet” left and it is “a thousand feet” right. This place is “a thousand feet.” That place is “a thousand feet.” A real person10 is “a thousand feet.” Going up a tree is “a thousand feet.” The foregoing “thousand feet” may be like this. Now let us ask: How long is “a thousand feet”? We can say that it is as long as the eternal mirror,11 as long as a brazier,12 and as long as a tombstone.13 “The mouth is biting a branch of the tree.” What is “the mouth”? Even though we do not know the total extent of the mouth or the whole of the mouth itself, we may, for the present, know the location of the mouth by gradually moving along the branch of the tree, searching the branch and picking away leaves. It may be, for the present, that by gripping the branch of a tree, the mouth has been formed. Thus, the whole mouth is the branch, the whole branch is the mouth, the thoroughly realized body is the mouth, and the thoroughly realized mouth is the body. The tree

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steps upon the tree itself, and so [the story] says “the feet will not step onto the tree.” It is like the feet stepping on the feet themselves. The branch pulls itself onto the branch, and so [the story] says “the hands will not pull her onto the branch.” It is like the hands pulling themselves onto the hands. At the same time, the heels can still take forward steps and backward steps, and the hands can still make a fist and open a fist.14 Now people—I and others—are prone to think, “She is hanging in space.” But how could “hanging in space” be better than “biting the branch”?15 “Under the tree suddenly there appears a person who asks, ‘What was the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?’” This “under the tree suddenly there appears a person” seems to suggest that there are human beings inside the tree—as if it might be a man-tree. A human being suddenly appearing under a human being and asking is just such [a state of unity].16 In that state the tree is asking the tree, the human being is asking the human being, the whole tree is asking a question, and the whole of [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west is asking [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west. The questioner, in asking, is also biting the branch of the tree. Unless “the mouth is biting the branch,” there can be no asking, no voice that fills the mouth, and no mouth full of speech. When we ask about the [ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west, we ask by biting onto [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west. “If she opens her mouth to answer the other, she loses body and life.” We should familiarize ourselves with the present words “if she opens her mouth to answer the other. . . .” They suggest the possibility of answering the other without opening the mouth. In such an instance, she might not lose body and life. Even if there is [a choice between] opening the mouth and not opening the mouth, it cannot hinder the working of “a mouth biting the branch of a tree.” Opening and closing are not necessarily the whole of a mouth, but in a mouth there are both opening and closing. Thus, “biting the branch” is the everyday condition of a whole mouth, and it is impossible for opening and closing to hinder the working of a mouth. Does “opening the mouth to answer the other” mean disclosing the branch of the tree and answering the other, or does it mean disclosing [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the 235c west and answering the other? Unless we disclose [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west in answering others, we do not answer [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west. Not to have answered

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others is to be holding onto life with the whole body; it cannot be called “losing body and life.”17 [At the same time] if we have lost body and life already, to answer others is impossible.18 Nevertheless, Kyōgen’s mind does not shrink from answering others: it may be that his state is just “having lost body and life.” Remember, when we have not yet answered others, we are preserving body and life. When suddenly we answer others, we turn around the body and invigorate life. In conclusion, the mouth of each person being full is the state of truth, [in which state] we should answer each other, should answer ourselves, should ask each other, and should ask ourselves. This is the mouth biting the truth. The mouth biting the truth is called “the mouth biting the branch.” When [this state] answers others, over the mouth it further opens a mouth. When it does not answer others, even if it “goes against what others are asking,” it does not go against its own asking. So remember, the Buddhist patriarchs who have answered [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west are all experiencing the moment of “being up a tree and biting in the mouth the branch of the tree,” and they are continuing to answer. The Buddhist patriarchs who have asked [the ancestral master’s] intention in coming from the west are all experiencing the moment of “being up a tree and biting in the mouth the branch of the tree,” and they are continuing to ask.

[156] Master Jūken of Setchō,19 Zen Master Myōkaku, says, “To say something up a tree is easy. To say something under a tree is difficult.20 This old monk will climb up the tree. Bring a question!”21

[In response to] the present “Bring a question!” even if you bring one with all your effort, the question will come too late: I am afraid that you will be asking after the answer. I ask venerable old drills everywhere, past and present: Is Kyōgen’s loud laughter saying something up a tree or saying something under a tree? Is it answering [the ancestral Master’s] intention in coming from the west, or is it not answering [the ancestral Master’s] intention in coming from the west? See if you can say something!22

                                    Shōbōgenzō Soshi-sairai-no-i

                                    Preached while deep in the mountains of Etsu                                     district on the fourth day of the second lunar                                     month in the second year of Kangen.23

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Notes

1             is his posthumous title. Master Kyōgen Chikan (d. 898), successor of Master Isan Reiyū. Great Master Shūtō 2  Master Isan Reiyū (771–853), successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. He lived on Mount Daii. 3        person who has gone up the tree is a woman. Nin, hito means a person or a human being. In this case, it has been assumed that the

4     Wanshizenjigoroku, chap. 3. See also Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 44.

5     about?” The master says, “It is different from thinking.” The story is quoted in the mountain-still state?” The master says, “Thinking about the concrete state of not thinking.” The monk says, “How can the state of not thinking be thought While Master Yakusan Igen is sitting, a monk asks him, “What are you thinking 2, no. 24 and Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), (Vol. I, Appendix II); Chapter Fifty-eight, Zazenshin.Zazengi; See

Shinji-shōbōgenzō,also Chapter Seventy-two, Fukanzazengi, RufubonZanmai-ō-zanmai.

6     are real entities, and so we should not always group them under a concept such asMoku-ketsu, “wooden stake,” here represents a general category. All wooden things

“wooden thing” or “piece of timber.”

7     ping off of body and mind” or “getting free of body and mind.” See, for example, Datsuraku, “dropping off,” commonly appears in the phrase Zanmai-ō-zanmai.       shinjin-datsuraku, “drop-

Chapter Seventy-two,

8     Senjaku-kengai-ri.“thousand-foot precipice,” with Master Dōgen suffixed the characters of the story ri, which literally means “in the back of” or “insidesenjaku-kengai, of,” and hence, “in the concrete reality of.”

9     Raku-ji ari, jō-ji ari, “there is a time of dropping, and there is a time of going up.”

10    Nyo-nin. In the story, read as hito . . . [nyoga] goto means “real.”[ki], these characters mean “In the case that . . . a person.” Here, however,

11    I), Kōkyōthe eternal mirror in Kōkyō,symbolizes the mind. Masters Seppō and Gensha discuss the dimensions of paragraph 165.Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 9. See also Chapter Twenty (Vol.

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12    pt. 1, no. 38, Master Seppō and Master Gensha discuss the fact that the buddhas of Karo is an object with a conspicuous physical presence. In the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, the three times are in a brazier, turning the great wheel of Dharma.

13    Muhōtō,“seamless”) and placed on square steps, as a monument to a deceased monk. It is alit., “seamless stupa,” is an oval tombstone carved in solid rock (hence

Thirty-two (Vol. II), dimensions of a tombstone in concrete object with eternal meaning. Master Seppō and Master Gensha discuss the Juki, paragraph 38.Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 60. See also Chapter

14    selves,” and so on, does not imply any loss of freedom of movement. The self-containment implied by “a tree stepping on itself,” “feet stepping on them15 tree branch,” over As an expression of the state of action, Master Dōgen preferred ka-kokū, “hanging in space.”    kan-jushi, “biting a 16 no separation between human beings and trees—because, for example, human ashes Kore, lit., “this,” refers to nin-ju, “man-tree,” that is, the condition in which there is nourish trees and oxygen from trees nourishes human beings.

17    of attaining realization (i.e., getting into the activity of the moment and forgetting Sōshin-shitsumyō, “losing body and losing life,” is used here as an ironic expression oneself).

18    literally, or understood as suggesting loss of composure. In this sentence sōshin-shitsumyō, “losing body and losing life,” may be understood 19 paragraph 137.Master Setchō Jūken (980–1052), successor of Master Chimon Kōso. Zen Master Myōkaku is his posthumous title. He is also quoted in Chapter Sixty-six, Shunjū,

20 It is easy to express peculiar ideas, but difficult to manifest the everyday state. 21 Bukkagekisetsuroku (Record of Bukka’s Attacks on Knotty Problems), pt. 7.

22 to express oneself, and means to have a try, to make an attempt, Tendō Nyojō, to elicit the expression of a student’s understanding. Kokoromi[ni] i[e] mi[nkan, mi] was a phrase used by Chinese masters, including Master[ru] means to see, to watch, or to examine. Traditionallydō, i[u] means to speak, to say something,Shi, kokoro[miru] in Japan these words have been interpreted as “Try to say something, and I will means “Try to say something!” or “See if you can express yourself!” Cf. Chapterexamine you,” but according to recent scholarly investigation the phrase as a whole

Fifty-one, Forty-seven, two (Vol. II), Thirty (Vol. II), Sangai-yuishin,Juki,Gyōji, paragraph 58: “Try to say something, and I will test you”; Chapter paragraph 9: “Let them try to say something!” paragraph 264: “Try to express it yourself”; Chapter Thirty-paragraph 121: “See if you can answer this”; and Chapter

Mitsugo, 23 1244.

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[Chapter Sixty-eight]

                                                         Udonge                                           

The Uḍumbara Flower

Translator’s Note: Udonge means the flower of a type of fig tree called uḍumbara in Sanskrit. The uḍumbara tree (Ficus glomerata) is a large tropical tree of the mulberry family (Moraceae). Its flowers grow around the fruit, so they look like peel rather than flowers. Because of this, people in ancient India considered the uḍumbara to be flowerless. Consequently, they used the uḍumbara flower as a symbol of something that rarely happens;1 for example, the realization of the Buddhist truth. In a Buddhist sutra called the Dai bon tenō monbutsu ketsugikyō (Sutra of Questions and Answers between Mahābrahman and the Buddha) there is a story that one day Gautama Buddha showed an uḍumbara flower to an audience. No one could understand the meaning of Gautama Buddha’s suggestion other than Master Mahākāśyapa, who smiled. In Chinese Buddhism this story symbolized the transmission of the truth. So Master Dōgen used uḍumbara flowers to explain the meaning of the transmission. Because the Dai bon tenōmonbutsu ketsugikyō was said to have been written in China, it was criticized by some Buddhists as not expressing Gautama Buddha’s true intention. Master Dōgen, however, insisted in Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), Tenbōrin, that even if a Buddhist sutra was produced in China, after its words have been discussed by Buddhist masters it becomes a Buddhist sutra that expresses the true intention of Gautama Buddha; we need not worry whether or not it was written in India.

[160] Before an assembly of millions on Vulture Peak, the World-honored One picks up2 an uḍumbara flower and winks. Thereupon the face of Mahā kāśyapa breaks into a smile. The World-honored One says, “I possess the right Dharma eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana; I transmit them to Mahā kāśyapa.”3

The Seven Buddhas and the many buddhas are all in the same process of twirling flowers,4 which they have practiced and experienced, and realized as

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twirling of flowers the ascendant state,5 and which they have torn open and exposed as twirling of flowers down in the here and now.6 Thus, inside the concrete reality of twirling flowers, every instance of ascending and descending, or toward the self and toward others, or outside and inwards, and so on, is the totality of flowers displaying itself.7 It is the dimension of flowers, the dimension of buddha, the dimension of the mind, and the dimension of the body. All instances, however many, of the twirling of flowers, are individual instances of [the transmission from] rightful successor to rightful successor; they are the actual “existence” of the “transmission.”8 Indeed, forget the World-honored One’s twirling of a flower! When, just now, a flower-twirling World-honored One appears, that is the succession of the World-honored One. Because the time of twirling of flowers is the whole of time itself, it is experience of the same state as the World-honored One, and it is the same twirling of flowers. The meaning of “twirling flowers” is flowers displaying flowers:9 it is plum flowers, spring flowers, snow flowers, and lotus flowers. What has been called “the five petals of a plum flower”10 is the more than three hundred and sixty orders,11 is the five thousand and forty-eight scrolls,12 is the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching, and is the three clever and ten sacred stages. Therefore it is beyond the three clever and the ten sacred stages. The great treasury13 exists and miracles exist: they are described by “The opening of flowers is the occurrence of the world.”14 “A flower is five petals opening and the bearing of fruit is naturally realized”15 describes the whole body already being hung upon the whole body.16 Losing the eyes on seeing peach blossoms,17 and having the ears disappear on hearing the green bamboo,18 are present moments of twirling flowers. Being waist deep in snow and cutting off the arm, doing prostrations and attaining the marrow,19 are flowers naturally opening. Pounding rice in a stone mortar and receiving the transmission of the robe in the middle of the night20 are flowers having already twirled. These are instances of the life-source contained in the hand of the World-honored One. In general, the twirling of flowers existed before the World-honored One’s realization of the truth, it was simultaneous with the World-honored One’s realization of the truth, and it has existed since

the World-honored One’s realization of the truth. Thus, flowers are realizing the truth. The twirling of flowers has transcended by far such separate periods of time. Every buddha’s and every patriarch’s establishment of the will to,

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first steps in, practice and experience of, and maintenance of [the truth], are twirling flowers dancing like butterflies in the spring wind. This being so, because the World-honored Gautama is now putting his body into flowers and has shrouded his body in space, we call being able to grasp nostrils, and call having grasped space,21 “the twirling of flowers.” Twirling flowers are twirled by eyes, twirled by mind-consciousness, twirled by nostrils, and twirled by flowers twirling. In general, the mountains, rivers, and the earth; the sun and moon, the wind and rain; people, animals, grass, and trees—the miscellaneous things of the present displaying themselves here and there— are just the twirling of the uḍumbara flower. Living-and-dying and going and-coming are also a miscellany of flowers and the brightness of flowers. Our learning in practice like this in the present is the continuing process of twirling flowers. The Buddha says, “It is like the uḍumbara flower, which all love and enjoy.”22 This “all” is Buddhist patriarchs of bodies apparent and hidden, and is the natural presence of brightness in grass, trees, and insects. “All love and enjoy” describes the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of each individual just now being in the state of vigorous activity. Thus, all is totally the uḍumbara flower. And so we call just this “rare.”

[165] “A wink” describes the moment in which, while [the Buddha] sat under the [bodhi] tree, the bright star took the place of his eyes. In this moment “the face of Mahākāśyapa breaks into a smile.” The face has broken already, and its place has been taken by the face of twirling flowers. In the moment of the Tathāgata’s wink, we have already lost our eyes. This Tathāgata’s wink is just the twirling of flowers. It is uḍumbara flowers opening at will. Even to the present it has not ceased to be that, just in the moment of the twirling of flowers, all Gautamas, all Mahākāśyapas, all living beings, and all of us, are each holding out a hand and twirling flowers as one. Moreover, because 236c we have samādhi as containment of the body inside the hand,23 we call it “the four elements and the five aggregates.”24

[167] “My possessing it” is the “transmission,” and the transmission is my possessing it. The transmission is inevitably restricted by my possessing it. “I possess” is cerebral. In order to understand it, we must understand it by getting a grip25 on cerebral thinking. When we take26 what I possess and change it into the transmission, that is maintenance of “the right Dharma-eye treasury.”

The ancestral master’s coming from the west was the coming of twirling

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flowers.27 Twirling flowers is called “playing with the soul.”28 “Playing with the soul” means just sitting and dropping off body and mind. Becoming a buddha and becoming a patriarch is called “playing with the soul.” Putting on clothes and eating meals is called “playing with the soul.” In sum, the matter which is the ultimate criteria of a Buddhist patriarch is, in every case, playing with the soul. While we are being met by the Buddha hall, or while we are meeting with the monks’ hall, variety in their flowers becomes more and more abundant, and light in their colors deepens layer upon layer. On top of that, in the monks’ hall now the plate is taken and it cracks into the clouds. In the Buddha hall now a bamboo mouth organ is blown and it resounds to the water’s bottom. At such times, [my late master] would accidentally begin to play29 a plum blossom tune. That is, my late master, the eternal buddha, would say:

It is the time when Gautama lost the Eye,

In the snow, a single twig of plum blossoms! Now every place has become a thorn,

Yet [I] laugh at the swirling30 of the spring wind.31

Now the Tathāgata’s Eye has accidentally become plum blossoms, while the plum blossoms now have turned into all-pervading thorns. The Tathāgata is hiding his body in the Eye, and the Eye is hiding its body in the plum blossoms. The plum blossoms, having hidden their bodies in thorns, are now

237a blowing back at the spring wind. And though it may be so, we can [simply] enjoy the music of the plum blossoms.

[169] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, says:

What Reiun has seen is peach blossoms blooming, What Tendō has seen is peach blossoms falling.32

Remember, peach blossoms blooming are what Reiun has seen: “he has arrived directly at the present and has no further doubts.”33 Peach blossoms falling are what Tendō has seen. Peach blossoms open at the prompting of the spring wind, and peach blossoms fall being hated by the spring wind. The spring wind deeply hates the peach blossoms, but as the peach blossoms fall we will drop off body and mind.

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Chapter Sixty-eight

                                    Shōbōgenzō Udonge

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     Etsu district on the twelfth day of the second                                     lunar month34 in the second year of Kangen.35

 

Notes

1     See, for example, Dharma like this the buddha-tathāgatas preach only occasionally, just as the Lotus Sutra, Hōben: “The Buddha addressed Śāriputra: ‘Wonderful uḍumbara flower appears only once in an age.’” (LS 1.88)

2     in the Nen, nenShōbōgenzō. Nen[jiru]. This character is rarely seen in modern Japanese but it appears frequently tsumamuliterally means to pinch, to pick up something between one’s in modern Japanese), or to twirl, twist, or twiddle (Shōbōgenzō it is also used with various wider meanings, hineruSan in modern Japanese). In the finger and thumb (including the following: 1) to take or to take up (e.g., Chapter Fourteen [Vol. I], suigyō, paragraph 195: “the Buddhist patriarchs, when taking up water”; Chapter Shin-fukatoku, paragraph 82: “she should take three rice cakes and Gyōji, paragraph 241: “to take

Eighteen [Vol. I], hand them over to Tokusan”; Chapter Thirty [Vol. II],

Patriarch’s words”); 2) to hold something up to view, to display, to manifest (e.g.,two [Vol. II], up the clapper”), especially as a symbol of positive behavior (e.g., Chapter Twenty Busshō, Shohō-jissō  ,paragraph 35: “we should quietly take up and let go of the Sixth paragraph 234: “golden-faced Gautama is manifesting Chapter Fifty, real form”); 3) to take something up as an issue, to bring attention to, to discuss (e.g., as ten feet”; Chapter Seventy-five [Vol. IV], Chapter Twenty [Vol. I], Kōkyō, paragraph 166: “In taking up this world, we see it Jishō-zanmai, paragraph 93: “discussions in the compound “To grasp snow mountains”); and 5) to summon up, muster, utilize (e.g., Chapter of the ancients”); 4) to take into the mind, to gather, grasp, comprehend (especially Sixty-nine, minds.”) See also note 26.Hotsu-mujōshin,nenrai, e.g., Chapter Sixty-nine, paragraph 181: “through the mustering of individual Hotsu-mujōshin, paragraph 171:

3     Shinji-shōbōgenzō,seven, Flower”) chapter of the Menju. The quotation paraphrases a section of the pt. 3, no. 54. See also Chapter Forty-nine, Daibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyō. NengeButsudō;(“Picking Up of aChapter Fifty-

4     real phenomena themselves in the world of action. See also note 9.Nenge, “twirling flowers,” means 1) action that manifests real phenomena, and 2)

5     kōjō-no-ji,Kōjō no nenge. KōjōMaster Dōgen describes this as a process which continues after realization Kōjō no nenge, means “ascending.” In Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), “twirling of flowers in the ascendant state,” suggests real-Butsuof the truth of phenomena in the continuing process of Buddhist practice and experience.

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6     five [Vol. II], Jikige no nenge. JikigeJinzū, paragraph 186: “Zen Master Daii is the thirty-seventh patriarch means 1) “direct descent” (see, for example, Chapter Twenty-

kōan,tional expression of the here and now (see for example Chapter Three [Vol. I], this”). now, in which illusory concepts such as “a continuing process of realizing phenomena” are seen through.in the line of direct descent from Śākyamuni”), and 2) “the straight down”—a paragraph 90: “the immediate present, and a single drop of water, are also like Jikige no nenge suggests actual realization of concrete phenomena here andGenjō-

7     entered into one vivid picture in the balanced state of action. Kon-ge-nen, or “the totality of flowers, twirling,” suggests all phenomena having

8     tence.”Fuzoku-u-zai. In the quotation, u, a[ru] means “I possess,” but here it means “exis9 they are. Ge-nen-ge, “flowers twirling flowers,” means phenomena manifesting themselves as

10    all the Buddhist patriarchs of India and China exist on the basis of this oneness of Baike no goyō,and its parts. In Chapter Fifty-nine, “a plum flower as five petals,” represents the oneness of the whole Baike, paragraph 204, Master Dōgen writes that five petals and a plum flower. See also notes 15 and 16.

11    all-embracing, there are more than three hundred and sixty orders, which are the Kengōkyō (Sutra of the Kalpa of Wisdom) says, “Among the many lineages of the causes and conditions of thousands of buddhas’ establishment of the will.”

12    Roku The Chinese chronicle (Kaigen Era Records of Śākyamuni’s TeachingTōki says, “The śramaṇa Chishō edited the ), which is altogether five thousand Kaigenshakkyō and forty-eight scrolls.”

13    See Master Tōsu Daidō, “In the teachings of the great treasury are there miracles or not?” The master says, “To preach the teaching of the great treasury [is itself a miracle].”Daizō,of the sutras” (see, for example, Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Keitokudentōroku,“great treasury,” stands for chap. 15. daizōkyō, “great treasury of sutras” or “the whole Kankin). A monk asks

14    Ke-kai-sekai-ki. These are the words of Master Prajñātara, Master Bodhidharma’s Kūge; Chapter Fifty-nine, Baike. master. See also Chapter Forty-three,

15    Ikke-kai-goyō, kekka-jinen-jō.by Master Bodhidharma, quoted in Chapter Fifty-nine, These are the third and fourth lines of a four-line verse Baike, paragraph 204.

16    Konshin-ze-i-kakonshin, suggests the state of wholeness that can be realized when sitting in the lotus posture. “the whole body already being hung upon the whole body,” 17 sanshiki. Refers to the experience of Master Reiun Shigon. See Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Keisei18 Refers to the experience of Master Kyōgen Chikan. Ibid.

Chapter Sixty-eight

19 Thirty (Vol. II), Refers to the transmission from Master Bodhidharma to Master Taiso Eka. See Chapter Gyōji; Chapter Forty-six, Kattō. 20 Refers to the transmission from Master Daiman Kōnin to Master Daikan Enō. See Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Inmo.

21    space?” Seidō says, “I understand how to grasp it.” Shakkyō says, “How do you grasp Master Shakkyō Ezō asks Master Seidō Chizō, “Do you understand how to grasp

it?” Seidō clutches at space with his hand. Shakkyō says, “You do not understand how to grasp space.” Seidō says, “How do you grasp it, brother?” Shakkyō grabs quoted in full in Chapter Seventy-seven (Vol. IV), Seidō’s nostrils and pulls them. See Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Kokū. pt. 3, no. 49. The story is

22    The quotation appears to be from a sutra, but the source has not been traced.

23    gration of the body-mind such that each part of the body contains the whole. Teri-zōshin-zanmai,samādhi as containment of the body inside the hand,” suggests a state of total inte-“samādhi in which the body is contained inside the hand” or

24    consciousness (of form (Shidai, the four elements of earth, water, fire, and wind; and rūpa), feeling vijñāna(vedana), represent total reality, which has not only phenomenal), thinking (saṃjñā), habit formation go-un, the five aggregates(saṃskāra), and appearance but also real substance.

25    restraining it within proper limits, as a water buffalo is restrained when its nose ring Habi shite, lit., “grasping by the nose,” means keeping something in its place or Kobusshin, paragraph 58. is grasped. See also Chapter Forty-four,

26    functions as a prepositional phrase (e.g., Nenjite through the means of a finger, a pole, a needle, or a wooden clapper”).here means “taking” in the sense of using as a means. Fukanzazengi: “the changing of the moment, Nenjite thus sometimes

27    Nenge-rai, translated in the opening paragraph as “the process of twirling flowers.”

28    Thus, Character Dictionary Japanese Character Dictionary Rōzeikon. Rō, moteasoenjoyment. to animate, to breathe life into. For the compound ghost, but the phrase seikonSeimeans the soul as “the animating principle, or actuating cause of anmeans spirit, energy, vitality. tamashii o ireru,gives the phrase [bu] means to play or toy with: it suggests easy control andgives “energy, vitality.” Nelson’s lit., “to put soul into,” means to give life to,seikon tsuKon, tamashii[seikon,kiru], “to lose all one’s energy.” Spahn and Hadamitzky’s means soul, spirit, or Japanese-English

Twenty-eight (Vol. II), individual life; a person’s total self” (Webster’s)—that is, something vital, energetic, and whole rather than something ethereal. See also Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I),paragraph 199; Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II), Butsu-kōjō-no-ji, paragraph 59.Daigo, paragraph 127; Chapter

Kankin,

29    of a wind instrument. Sui, fu[ku] is literally “to blow.” Here it likens Master Tendō’s poem to the playing

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30    as in the preceding note. Ryōran [to shi te] fu[ku koto], literally, “blowing in a whirl.” Fu[ku], “blowing,” is 31 three, This verse also appears in Chapter Fifty-nine, Ganzei, paragraph 90. Baike, paragraph 200; Chapter Sixty-

32    Nyojōoshōgoroku, vol. 2.

33    at the present and have no further doubts. See Chapter Nine (Vol. I), paragraph 218.Shigon: For thirty years, a traveler in search of a sword./How many times have leaves fallen and buds sprouted?/After one look at the peach blossoms,/I have arrived directlyJikishi-nyokon-kō-fugi. This is the last line of the following verse by Master ReiunKeisei-sanshiki,

34    already fallen, but peach blossoms might have been in bloom.The second lunar month would have been around spring: plum blossoms would have

35    1244.

[Chapter Sixty-nine] Hotsu-mujōshin

Establishment of the Willto the Supreme

Translator’s Note: Hotsu means “to establish,” mujō means “supreme,” and shin means “mind” or “will.” Hotsu-mujōshin means the establishment of the will to the supreme truth. In the original sentences of this chapter we do not find the words hotsu-mujōshin; but the words hotsu-bodaishin, which mean “the establishment of the bodhi-mind,” appear many times. Therefore, the title Hotsu-mujōshin may have been selected to distinguish this chapter from the next chapter, Hotsu-bodaishin. Furthermore, the two chapters end with exactly the same words: “Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in the Yoshida district of Esshū on the fourteenth day of the second lunar month in the second year of Kangen [1244].” We need to consider how the two chapters are related. Dr. Fumio Masutani has suggested that Hotsu-mujōshin was preached for laypeople who were working on the construction of Dai butsu ji (later called Eiheiji), and that Hotsu-bodaishin was preached on the same day for monks. Unfortunately, there is no evidence to prove this theory conclusively, but the content of the two chapters does lend it some support. Both hotsu-mujōshin and hotsu-bodaishin mean the will to pursue the Buddhist truth, which can never be pursued for any purpose other than the truth itself. Master Dōgen highly esteemed this attitude in studying Buddhism, and he explains the importance of establishing the will to the truth in these two chapters.

[171]  The Founding Patriarch in the western kingdom1 says, “Snow Mountains2 are like great nirvana.”3

Remember, he likens what should be likened. [Snow Mountains and nirvana] should be likened because they are experienced directly and are straightforward. To grasp what are called “Snow Mountains” is to liken them to Snow Mountains. To grasp great nirvana is to liken it to great nirvana.

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[172]  The First Patriarch in China says, “The mind in every instance is

like trees and stones.”4

What is described here as “the mind” is the mind as it is.5 It is the mind as the whole earth. Therefore it is the mind as self-and-others. “The mind in every instance”—the mind of a person of the whole earth, of a Buddhist patriarch of the whole universe in the ten directions, and of gods, dragons, and so on—is trees and stones, beyond which there is no mind at all. These trees and stones are naturally unrestricted by limitations such as “existence,” “nonexistence,” “emptiness,” and “matter.” With this mind of trees and stones we establish the [bodhi-]mind and realize practice and experience—for the mind is trees and the mind is stones. By virtue of this trees as mind and stones

237b as mind, thinking here and now about the concrete state of not thinking6 is realized. After seeing and hearing the traditional teaching7 of this trees as mind and stones as mind, we rise above the flotsam of non-Buddhism for the first time. Before that, we are not of the Buddha’s truth.

[174]    National Master Daishō8 says, “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles

are the mind of eternal buddhas.”9

We should examine exactly where the present fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles are, and we should ask “What is it that is being realized like this?”10 The mind of eternal buddhas is not the other side of the King of Emptiness;11 it is being satisfied with gruel and being satisfied with rice,12 or being satisfied with grass and being satisfied with water.13 To take in such truths and then to sit as buddha and become buddha is called establishment of the mind.

[175]    In general, in regard to causes of and conditions for establishing the bodhi-mind, we do not bring the bodhi-mind from elsewhere; we establish the mind by taking up the bodhi-mind itself. “To take up the bodhi-mind” means to take a stalk of grass and to make a buddha, or to take a tree without roots14 and to make a sutra. It is to serve sand to the Buddha,15 or to serve rice-water to the Buddha.16 It is to offer a ball of food to living beings,17 or to offer five flowers to the Tathāgata.18 To practice a bit of good at the prompting of another, or to be cajoled by a demon into doing prostrations to Buddha, are also the establishment of the bodhi-mind. It is not only that: it is “to know that a home is not one’s home, to forsake one’s home and to leave home, to go into the mountains and practice the truth, and to do devotional practice and Dharma practice”; it is to build buddhas and to build stupas; it is to read sutras and to be mindful of the Buddha;19 it is to preach the Dharma to an assembly; it is to search for masters and research the truth; it is to sit in the full lotus posture; it is to make a prostration to the Three Treasures; and it is once to call namas buddha!20 The causes and conditions of eighty-thousand such Dharma aggregates21 are, in every case, the establishment of the mind. Some [people] have established the mind in a dream and attained the truth;22 some have established the mind in drunkenness23 and attained the truth; some establish the mind and attain the truth amid flying flowers and falling 237c leaves;24 some establish the mind and attain the truth amid peach blossoms and green bamboo;25 some establish the mind and attain the truth in the heavens above;26 and some establish the mind and attain the truth in the sea.27 In all these cases, in the state of having established the bodhi-mind, the bodhi-mind is being established further. In the [oneness of] body-and mind, the bodhi-mind is being established. In the body-mind of the buddhas, the bodhi-mind is being established.28 In the very skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the Buddhist Patriarch, the bodhi-mind is being established. Thus, our present building of stupas, building of buddhas, and so on, are just the establishment of the bodhi-mind itself. They are the establishment of the mind which leads directly to realization of buddha, and we must never abandon them midway. They are called merit achieved without doing,29 and called merit achieved without becoming.30 They are “the reflection of true reality,”31 and “the reflection of the Dharma-nature”32; they are the buddhas’ concentrated state of samādhi, they are the attainment of the buddhas’ dhāraṇī, they are the anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi-mind,33 they are arhathood, and they are the realization of Buddha. Apart from this there is no method which is free of doing or free of becoming.

[179] Nevertheless, stupid people of the Small Vehicle say: “The building of images and erecting of stupas is achieved through intentional doing;34 we should set it aside and not perform it. Ceasing thought and concentrating the mind is no doing. Nonarising and non-becoming are true reality. Observing and practicing the real form of the Dharma-nature is no doing.” They have made such assertions into their custom in India in the west and in the Eastern Lands, from ancient times to the present. This is why, although they commit heavy sins and deadly sins, they do not build images or erect stupas; and, although they dirty themselves in thickets of dusty toil, they are not mindful of the Buddha and they do not read sutras. These are people who not only ruin the potential of human beings and gods but also negate the buddha nature of the Tathāgata. It is truly regrettable that, having lived at the time

238a of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, they have become enemies of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; that, having climbed the Three Treasure mountain, they return empty-handed; and that, having entered the Three Treasure ocean, they return empty-handed. Even if they meet the appearance in the world of a thousand buddhas and ten thousand patriarchs, they will have no chance of attaining salvation and they will lack the means of establishing the mind. They are like this because they do not follow the sutras and do not follow [good] counselors. Many are like this because they follow false teachers of non-Buddhism. We should quickly throw away views and opinions that efforts such as building stupas are not the establishment of the bodhi-mind. Washing out the mind, washing out the body, washing out the ears, and washing out the eyes, we should not see or hear [those views and opinions]. We should just devote ourselves to the right Dharma, following the Buddhist sutras and following [good] counselors, and should practice the Buddha Dharma.

[181] In the great truth of the Buddha-Dharma, the sutras of the great thousandfold [world]35 are present in an atom, and countless buddhas are present in an atom. Each weed and each tree are a body-mind. Because the myriad dharmas are beyond appearance, even the undivided mind is beyond appearance.36And because all dharmas are real form, every atom is real form. Thus, one undivided mind is all dharmas, and all dharmas are one undivided mind, which is the whole body.37 If building stupas were artificial, Buddhahood, bodhi, reality as it is, and the buddha-nature, would also be artificial. Because reality as it is and the buddha-nature are not artificial, building images and erecting stupas are not artificial. They are the natural establishment of the bodhi-mind: they are merit achieved without artificiality, without anything superfluous.38 We should definitely decide, believe, and understand that efforts such as building images and erecting stupas are establishment of the bodhi-mind. Through these efforts hundred millions of kalpas of practice and vows will be promoted. [These efforts] are establishment of the mind which will not be overturned in hundred millions of koṭis of myriad kalpas. They are called “meeting Buddha and hearing the Dharma.” Remember, to build a buddha or to build a stupa by gathering wood and stone, by heaping up mud and earth, and by collecting gold, silver, and the seven treasures,39 is to build a stupa or to build an image by gathering undivided mind,40 is to 238b make a buddha by accumulating emptiness upon emptiness,41 is to build a buddha through the mustering of individual minds,42 is to build a stupa by amassing stupa upon stupa,43 and is to build a buddha by causing momentary instances of buddha44 to be realized. This is why a sutra says, “At the time of this consideration, the buddhas of the ten directions all appear.”45 Remember, when one individual’s thinking is making a buddha, thinking buddhas of the ten directions all appear. And when one dharma is being made into a buddha, all dharmas are being made into a buddha.

[183] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “When the bright star appeared, I, together with the earth and all sentient beings, simultaneously realized the truth.”

So establishment of the mind, training, bodhi, and nirvana may be [such] “simultaneous”46 establishment of the mind, training, bodhi, and nirvana. The body-mind of the Buddha’s truth is grass, trees, tiles, and pebbles, and is wind, rain, water, and fire. Utilizing these so that the Buddha’s truth is realized is just the establishment of the mind. Grasping space, we should build stupas and build buddhas. Scooping water from mountain streams, we should build buddhas and build stupas. This is establishment of the truth of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, and it is hundred thousand myriads of establishments of the one establishment of the bodhi-mind. Practice and experience is also like this. When we hear, on the contrary, that the establishment of the mind is a one-off occurrence, after which the mind is not established again, and that training is endless [but] experience of the effect is a one-off experience, we are not hearing the Buddha-Dharma, we have not come upon the Buddha-Dharma, and we are not meeting the Buddha-Dharma. Thousands of koṭis of establishments of the mind are, inevitably, occurrences of the one establishment of the mind. Thousands of koṭis of people’s establishment of the mind are occurrences of the one establishment of the mind. And one establishment of the mind is thousands of koṭis of establishments of the mind. Practice and experience, and preaching the Dharma, are also like this.47 If it were not such things as grass and trees, how could the body-mind exist? If they were not the body-mind, how could grass and trees exist? Apart from grass and trees, there are no grass and trees; therefore [grass and trees] are like this. Sitting in zazen and pursuing the truth is establishment of the

mind. Establishment of the mind is beyond oneness and difference, and sitting in zazen is beyond oneness and difference; they are beyond repetition, and beyond division. All things should be investigated like this. If the whole process of gathering grass, trees, and the seven treasures, and building stupas and building buddhas, were intentional doing and therefore useless for realizing the truth, then the thirty-seven auxiliary bodhi methods48 would also be intentional doing, and each instance of mustering the body-mind of a human being or god of the triple world in order to do training would be intentional doing, and realization of the ultimate state would be impossible. Grass, trees, tiles, and pebbles, and the four elements and five aggregates, are all equally “the mind alone,”49 and are all equally “real form.”50 The whole universe in ten directions, and the true and real buddha-nature, are both the Dharma abiding in the Dharma’s place. In the true and real buddha-nature, how could there be such things as “grass” and “trees”? How could grass, trees, and so on not be the true and real buddha-nature? All dharmas are beyond “intentional doing” and beyond “no doing”; they are real form. Real form is real form as it is, and the as-it-is is the body-mind here and now. With this body-mind we should establish the mind. Do not be averse to treading in water or treading on rocks. Just to take one stalk of grass and make it into the sixteen-foot golden body, or to take one particle of dust and construct an eternal buddha’s stupa or shrine, is the establishment of the bodhi-mind itself. It is to meet Buddha, to listen to Buddha, to meet Dharma, to listen to Dharma, to become Buddha, and to act as Buddha.

[187] Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Upāsakas and upāsikās,51 good sons and good daughters, serve to the Three Treasures offerings of the flesh of wives and children, and serve to the Three Treasures offerings of the flesh of their own bodies. When bhikṣus have received devout offerings, how could they be remiss in practice?”

Clearly, to serve to the Three Treasures offerings of food and drink, clothes, bedding, medicine, monks’ lodgings, fields and woods, and so on is to serve offerings of the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of one’s own body and of wives and children. Those who have thus entered the ocean of virtue of the Three Treasures are of the one taste.52 Because they are of the one taste 239a already, they are the Three Treasures. [The condition] for the virtue of the Three Treasures actually to be realized in the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of one’s own body and of wives and children, is diligent effort in pursuing the truth.53 Now, upholding the nature and the form of the World-honored One, we must grasp the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the Buddha’s truth. The devout offering of the present is the establishment of the mind. How could receiving bhikṣus be remiss in practice? We should be right from the head to the tail. Thus, at whatever moment a single particle of dust is established, the undivided mind will be established accordingly. If the undivided mind is established first, it will not be long before undivided space is established.

[189] In summary, when the sentient and the insentient establish the mind, they are able to plant for the first time a seed of the buddha-nature. If they [then] wholeheartedly practice by embracing the four elements and five aggregates, they will attain the truth. [Again,] if they wholeheartedly practice by embracing grass, trees, fences, and walls, they will be able to attain the truth— because the four elements and five aggregates,54 and grass, trees, fences, and walls,55 are experiencing the same state, because they share the same nature, because they are of the same mind and the same life, and because they are of the same body and the same makings. Thus, in the orders of Buddhist patriarchs, many have pursued the truth by taking up the mind of grass and trees. This is a characteristic of establishment of the bodhi-mind. The Fifth Patriarch56 at one time was a being who practiced the Way by planting pines.57 Rinzai experienced the effort of planting cedars and pines on Ōbaku zan.58 There was the old man Ryū who planted pine trees on Tōzan Moun tain.59 By taking on the constancy of pines and oaks, they scooped out the Eye of the Buddhist patriarchs. This was real manifestation of the identity of power in playing with the lively

Eye and clarification of the Eye. To build stupas, to build buddhas, and so on, are to play with the Eye,60 are to taste the establishment of the mind, and are to use the establishment of the mind. Without getting the Eye of building stupas and so on, there is no realization of the Buddhist patriarchs’ truth. After getting the Eye of building buddhas, we become buddhas and become patriarchs. The words that “building stupas and so on eventually turns to dust and is not real merit, whereas training in which nothing arises is solid and enduring and is 239b not tainted by dust and dirt,”61 are not the Buddha’s words. If stupas turn to dust, the state without arising62 also turns to dust. If the state without arising is beyond turning to dust, then stupas also cannot turn to dust. “This is where something ineffable is taking place.” Explain it as intentional doing or explain it as nondoing!63

[192] A sutra says, “When bodhisattvas, in living and dying, first establish the mind, they solely pursue the truth of bodhi; they are steadfast and unshakable. The virtue of that singlemindedness is deep and vast without limit. If the Tathāgata were to analyze and explain it, even for whole kalpas, he would not be able to finish.”64

Clearly know: to establish the mind by grasping life and death is “the sole pursuit of bodhi.” “That singlemindedness” must be the same as a single stalk of grass and a single tree—because it is a single moment of living and a single moment of dying. At the same time, the depth of its virtue is without limit, and the vastness of its virtue is without limit. Even if the Tathāgata analyzes this [virtue], making whole kalpas into words, there will be no finish. Because when the sea dries up the sea bed remains and because even when a person dies the mind may remain, [all things] are “not able to be finished.” Just as the depth and vastness of “that singlemindedness” are without limit, the depth and vastness of a weed, a tree, a rock, and a tile also are without limit. If a weed or a rock is seven feet or eight feet, “that single mindedness” is seven feet or eight feet, and establishment of the mind is also seven feet or eight feet. In conclusion, to go deep into the mountains to consider the Buddha’s truth may be easy, [but] to build stupas and to build buddhas is very difficult. Although each is accomplished through diligence and tirelessness, actively grasping the mind and being grasped by the mind may be much different. Through the piling up of such establishments of the bodhi-mind, Buddhist patriarchs are realized.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Hotsu-mujōshin

             Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in the

                                              Yoshida district of Esshū65 on the fourteenth

                                    day of the second lunar month in the second                                     year of Kangen.66

Notes

1     Saigoku [no] kōso means Gautama Buddha.

2     Setsuzan (“Snow Mountains”) means the Himalayas. 3 Kōsonshukugoroku, chap. 2.

4            mind is like trees and stones.” Ibid.Shin-shin-nyo-bokuseki, or shin-shin [wa] bokuseki[no] goto[shi], literally, “mind5 is” or “itself.”Shin-nyo. Nyo, goto[shi], which in the quotation means “is like,” here means “as it

6     Igen’s description of what he was thinking in zazen. See, for example, Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), Shiryō-ko-fushiryō-tei,Zazenshin;“thinking the concrete state of not thinking,” is Master Yakusan Chapter Fifty-eight, Zazengi.

7     Fūshō. Fū means atmosphere, style, customs, habits, and shō means voice. Fūshō the traditional Buddhist teaching. therefore means the voice that emerges from the practice of Buddhist habits, that is, 8 Master Nan’yō Echū (d. 775), successor of Master Daikan Enō. National Master Daishō is his posthumous title.

9     Keitokudentōroku, chap. 28. See also Chapter Forty-four, Kobusshin.

10    substituted coming like this.” See, for example, Chapter Sixty-two, Ko[[rere]] shimo-butsu inmo rai, shimo-butsu inmo genjōgenjō, “to be realized,” for “What is it that comes like this?” or “This is somethingis a variation of Master Daikan Enō’s famous phrase  rai, “to come.” Hensan. Here Master Dōgen ko

11    for example, LS 3.128.Kū-ō (King of Emptiness) is identified with King of Majestic Voice (from the Sanskritkalpa of emptiness. See,

Bhīṣmagarjita svara rāja), the first buddha to appear in the

12    Shuku-soku han-soku, meal.” This phrase appears elsewhere in the II), Busshō, paragraph 73; Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), “being satisfied with breakfast and being satisfied with the midday Shōbōgenzō,Arakan,e.g., Chapter Twenty-two (Vol.paragraph 91. 13 Sō-soku sui-soku. the contented state of a castrated water buffalo—described by Master Enchi Daianin Chapter Sixty-four, This phrase does not appear elsewhere. It suggests, for example, Kajō, paragraph 110.

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14 In a legendary conversation between a woman and the god Indra, a tree without rootsis cited as something that cannot be. The story is recorded in the Rentōeyō, chap. 1.

15 sand when the Buddha comes by on an almsround puts an offering of sand into the Alludes to a story in the Aikuōkyō (King Aśoka Sutra): a child who is playing in the

Buddha’s alms bowl, and by virtue of this act of generosity he later becomes KingAśoka. 16 Chap. 8 of the Daichidoron records that an old woman served rice water to the Buddha. 17 The who, by offering a ball of food, was able to plant a good root of salvation.” In Thailand Bibasharon (Sanskrit Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra pātra by forming it into a ball and) says, “There was a person today, for example, monks eat rice from their picking it up in the hand.

18    flowers for five hundred silver coins and serving those flowers to Śākyamuni Buddha. The Zuiōhongikyō (Sutra of Auspicious Past Occurrences) describes buying five

19    Nenbutsu,buddhā nu smṛti.“mindfulness of the Buddha,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Sometimes nenbutsu specifically means “to recite the Buddha’s Zanmai-ō-zanmai, paragraph 233); but here the literal translation has been preferred.name” (see, for example, Chapter Seventy-two,

20    The Monier-Williams Namu-butsu represents the sound of the Sanskrit devotional formula Sanskrit-English Dictionary defines namas as “bow, obeisance, Namas buddha. reverential salutation, adoration (by gesture or by word).”

21    Buddhist process which Master Dōgen has just listed. gate, a part, a division, or (with Buddhists) a constituent element of being.”Hō-un, “Dharma aggregates,” is here used as a general term for the elements of the Un represents the Sanskrit defines as “an aggres kandha, which Monier-Williams’ Sanskrit-English Dictionary

22    a nation/Forsakes his palace, his followers,/And the five desires for the superior and See, for example, Lotus Sutra, Anrakugyō: “And in the action of a dream the king of bodhi tree,/He sits on the fine,/And he goes to a place of the truth./At the foot of a

(lion seat,/Pursues the truth for seven days,/And attains the wisdom of the buddhas.” LS 2.282)

23    contained in the martens’ tails,” which derided government officers who wore a marten’s tail from their In 1837 Master Ōsen Mujaku published a twenty-volume commentary on quotations Shōbōgenzō.). This alludes to the Chinese saying “dogs’ tails following Out of humility he called it ShōtenzokuchōShōtenzokuchōDaichidoron.(lit., A Com-traces mentary to Follow Martens

cap to denote high rank but who were not capable officers. The the example of establishing the bodhi-mind in drunkenness to the

24    Hige-rakuyō. The Shōtenzokuchō traces these words to the Bibasharon.

25    Chikan. See Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Tōka-suichiku. Tōka,Shigon, and suichiku,“peach blossoms,” refers to the realization of Master Reiun “green bamboo,” refers to the realization of Master KyōgenKeisei-sanshiki.

Chapter Sixty-nine

26    in Tuṣita HeavenThe Shōtenzokuchō), and the cites the ShakubukurakangyōMirokujōshōkyō (Sutra of Maitreya’s Ascent and Birth(Sutra of the Defeat of the Arhat).

27    “I, in the sea, am constantly preaching only the The Shōtenzokuchō cites the Lotus Sutra, Daibadatta Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Won-(“Devadatta”): Mañjuśrī said, derful Dharma.” (LS 2.218)

28    It may be helpful to remember, especially if reading the text aloud, that the is pronounced with a long “o” (as in “abode”).        “bo” of

“bodhi”

29    connotation of artificiality, intentionality, or interference. an adjective means “without artificiality” or “natural,” and as a noun means “nondoing,”Mui no kudoku,i.e., letting things be as they naturally are, not doing anything superfluous. In hisperson at ease in the truth, who is through with study and free of doing.” In the openingpoem Shōdōka, Master Yōka Genkaku speaks of “merit achieved without artificiality.” Bendōwa, Master Dōgen describes zazen as zetsugaku-muiI, “doing,” often carries the Mui, “without doing,” as[no] kandō-nin,saijō-“a

asaṃskṛtamui no myōjutsu,sentence of Chapter One (Vol. I), and saṃskṛta“a subtle method that is supreme and without intention.” See also in Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

30    Musa no kudoku. Musa, “non-becoming,” represents the negation of idealistic effort.

31    Shinnyo-kan.muso-kan, “reflection of true reality.” The “reflection in which there are no [separate] forms,” is called Yōrakuhongyōkyō (Sutra of Past Deeds as a String of Pearlsshinnyo-) says that kan,

32    causal grounds of all things,” is called Hōsshō-kan. The Yōrakuhongyōkyō hosshō-kan, says that issai-shuchi-kan,“reflection of the Dharma-nature.” “reflection of the

33    say of Sanskrit Terms. The will to the supreme right, balanced, and integrated state of truth. See Vol. I, Glos34 U-i,“intentional doing” or “artificiality. ”literally, “with doing.” U-i as an adjective means “artificial” and as a noun means

35    Daisen, thousandfold world,” that is, the domain of a buddha. Such a domain is thought to comprise one billion (one thousand to the power of three) worlds.“great thousand,” stands for sanzen-daisen-sekai, “three-thousand-great-

36    Fushō, “beyond appearance” or “not appearing,” describes the state at the moment graph 40.Three (Vol. I), taneous. Master Dōgen explains this meaning of of the present. All things, even wholehearted devotion to Buddhist practice, are instan-Genjō-kōan, paragraph 87. See also Chapter Forty-three, fushō, “not appearing,” in ChapterKūge, para-

37    enty-one, Zenshin suggests the universe as the whole body of the Tathāgata. See Chapter Sev-Nyorai-zenshin.

38    Murō,see Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms). The lit., “without leakage” or “without excess,” represents the Sanskrit Lotus Sutra begins by associatinganāsrava

(

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Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), arhathood with the ending of shoro,Arakan. “all excesses” or “all superfluities.” See LS 1.8; 39 Shippō, “seven treasures” or “the precious seven,” from the Sanskrit sapta ratnāni, are for example gold, silver, coral, pearls, jewels, moonstones, and agates. 40 Isshin.

41    Kū-kū.

42    Shin-shin. 43 Tō-tō.

44 Butsu-butsu.or “space-space”; lit., “buddha-buddha” follow the characteristic progression of Master Dōgen’s The elements shin-shin,isshin, lit., “mind-mind”; lit., “one mind”; tō-tō,kū-kū,lit., “stupa-stupa”; and lit., “emptiness-emptiness” butsubutsu,to the suggestion of momentary realization of reality in action.thought from the general and inclusive through the individual and increasingly concrete 45 i Sa-ze-shi-i-ji, juppō-butsu-kai-gen,means “this consideration” or “attention to the concrete.”from the Lotus Sutra, Hōben (LS 1.124). Ze-shi-

46    present moment: the Buddha’s realization of the truth had oneness of subject and Dōjiness of subject and object in the here and now.object in the here and now, and our establishment of the will to the truth also has one-here means “sameness in time”; that is, identity of subject and object in the

47    contained in one moment and subject and object being indivisible.Kakunogotoshi, “like this,” means in the state of total integration—all moments being

48    Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō is the title of Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV).

49    Yuishin. See Chapter Forty-seven, Sangai-yuishin.

50    Jissō. See Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō. 51 Laymen and laywomen.

52    cause, e.g., a gang of conspirators or a group of partisans. At the same time, “one taste” may be interpreted literally as the essence of the Dharma; in the Shinpitsubon, lifting the spirit” or “the flavor of the Dharma soothing the soul.”Ichi-mi, lit., “[people of] one taste,” is a term applied to people united by a common Master Dōgen writes of hō-mi shin [o] tasu[ke], “the taste of the DharmaFukanzazengi,

53    Shōgon no bendō-kufu steady application rather than short bursts of intense effort. The character read as here is written elsewhere in the see for example Chapter One (Vol. I), old characters; the character used here, into a certain task,” in which the middle radical represents strength. The compound suggests the daily practice of zazen. Shōbōgenzōben,Bendōwa. Benmeans “to apply effort, to put one’s energy in a different form, also read as is a simplified form of several Shōgon, “diligence,” means bendō;bendō Chapter Sixty-nine

193)effort, and 2) to consider, to apply one’s mental faculties, to think out the means ofinally represented a craftsman’s application of mental energy to the planning and performance of construction work. In the kufu, which is equivalent to another form also read as Shōbōgenzō, kufukufumeans 1) to strive, to make in modern Japanese, Dōtoku, paragraph doing something (see also notes to Chapter Thirty-nine [Vol. II],

one’s energy into practicing the truth,” as an expression of zazen itself.. Master Dōgen often used bendō-kufu, “effort in pursuing the truth” or “directing 54 being in traditional Buddhist philosophy. Shidai go-un, “four elements and five aggregates,” are the constituent elements of 55 everybody. Master Dōgen saw these and the four elements and five aggregates as Sō-moku-shō-heki, “grass, trees, fences, and walls,” are concrete objects familiar to completely the same.

56    Master Daiman Kōnin, the Fifth Patriarch in China.

57    Twenty-two (Vol. II), Saishō-dōja,paragraph 173.“pine-planting pilgrim.” The words come from a story quoted in Chapter Busshō, paragraph 22. See also Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji,

58    See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Gyōji, paragraph 172.

59    Ryū is mentioned in the Keitokudentōroku, chap. 17, in the section on Master Tōzan

Tōzan Shiken. Tōzan Mountain was home to the order of Master Tōzan Ryōkai and Master 60 action. Rō-ganzei, “to play with the Eye,” means to enjoy easy mastery of the viewpoint of

61    is the Jinnai, bodhi“dust and dirt,” alludes to the following verse by Ācārya Jinshū: “The bodytree,/The mind is like the stand of a clear mirror./At every moment we work to wipe and polish it/To keep it free of dust and dirt.” See Chapter Twenty (Vol.I), Kōkyō, paragraph 134.

62    a synonym for nirvana. Mushōmeans “not being subject to rebirth on the wheel of samsara,” and as such is used as means “nonerasing,” “nonappearance,” or “nonbirth.” Sometimes mushō

63    Alludes to the Fuke overturns a dinner table. Master Rinzai says, “Very coarse person!” Fuke says, “This is where something ineffable exists. Explain it as coarse or explain it as fine.”Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 96: In response to a question from Rinzai,

64    Shinyaku Kegongyō,(265–420of the edition of the  C.E.).    lit., Garland SutraNew Translation of the Flower Adornment Sutra, translated during the years of the Jin dynasty is the name

65    Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 66 1244.

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[Chapter Seventy]

Hotsu-bodaishin

Establishment of the Bodhi-mind

Translator’s Note: It is supposed that this chapter and the previous chapter originally had the same title, i.e., Hotsu-bodaishin, “Establishment of the Bodhi-mind,” but that the title of the previous chapter was changed to Hotsumujōshin, “Establishment of the Will to the Supreme,” for the purpose of distinction. Dr. Fumio Masutani believes that the former chapter was a sermon for laypeople and this chapter was a sermon given on the same day to monks and nuns. Whatever Master Dōgen’s intention was, one point is that this chapter includes a presentation of the “The Theory of the Momentary Appearance and Disappearance of the Universe.” In Buddhist theory, action is esteemed highly; when we consider the meaning of life, we can consider that our life is just a series of moments of action. Why do we say that our life is momentary? Because once we have done an act we can never return to the past to undo it. At the same time, we can never perform an act until its time comes to the present. So an act is always done just at the moment of the present. Furthermore, the moment of the present is cut off from the moment immediately before it and the moment immediately after it, because we can never act in the past and we can never act in the future. According to Buddhist theory, then, our life is momentary, and the whole universe appears and disappears at every moment. This theory, also known as “The Theory of Instantaneousness,” is important in resolving the conflict between human freedom and the law of cause and effect; that is, free will versus determinism. In this chapter, Master Dōgen clearly explains the theory.

[196] In general there are three kinds of mind. “The first, citta,1 is here2 called thinking mind.3 The second, hṛdaya,4 is here called the mind of grass and trees.5 The third, vṛddha,6 is here called experienced and concentrated mind.”7

Among these, the bodhi-mind is inevitably established relying upon thinking

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mind. Bodhi is the sound of an Indian word; here it is called “the truth.”8 Citta is the sound of an Indian word; here it is called “thinking mind.” Without this thinking mind it is impossible to establish the bodhi-mind. That is not to say that this thinking mind is the bodhi-mind itself, but we establish the bodhi-mind with this thinking mind. To establish the bodhi-mind means to vow that, and to endeavor so that, “Before I myself cross over,9 I will take across all living beings.” Even if their form is humble, those who establish this mind are already the guiding teachers of all living beings. This mind is not innate and it does not now suddenly arise; it is neither one nor many; it is not natural and it is not formed; it does not abide in our body, and our body does not abide in the mind. This mind does not pervade the Dharma world; it is neither of the past nor of the future; it is neither present nor absent; it is not of a subjective nature, it is not of an objective nature, it is not of a combined nature, and it is not of a causeless nature. Nevertheless, at a place where there is mystical communication of the truth,10 establishment of the bodhi-

240a mind occurs. It is not conferred upon us by the buddhas and bodhisattvas, and it is beyond our own ability. Establishment of the mind occurs during mystical communication of the truth, and so it is not inherent. This establishment of the bodhi-mind is most often able to occur in a human body, on the southern continent of Jambudvīpa. Rarely, it also occurs in the eight troubled worlds,11 but not often. After establishing the bodhi-mind, we do training for three asaṃkhya kalpas, or for a hundred great kalpas. In some cases we practice for countless kalpas and become a buddha. In other cases we practice for countless kalpas to make living beings cross over before us, finally not becoming a buddha ourself but only taking across living beings and benefiting living beings—this accords with the attitude of delight in bodhi. In general, the bodhi-mind ceaselessly operates through the three forms of behavior12 so that all living beings may somehow be caused to establish the bodhi-mind and be led to the Buddha’s truth. Vainly to confer worldly pleasures is not to benefit living beings. This establishment of the mind and this practice and experience have far transcended the facade of delusion and enlightenment, have risen above the triple world, and have surpassed all things. They are quite beyond śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas.

[200] Bodhisattva Mahākāśyapa praises Śākyamuni Buddha in verse, saying:

Establishing the mind and the ultimate state: the two are without     separation.

Of these two states of mind the former mind is harder [to realize]:

It is to deliver others before attaining one’s own deliverance.

For this reason, I bow to [your] first establishment of the mind.      

With the first establishment, already the teacher of gods and     humans,

You rose above śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas.

Such establishment of the mind surpasses the triple world,

Therefore we are able to call it the Supreme.13

“Establishing the mind” means establishing, for the first time, the will “to deliver others before attaining one’s own deliverance”; this is described as “the first establishment of the mind.” After establishing this mind, we then meet innumerable buddhas and serve offerings to them, during which time 240b we meet Buddha and hear Dharma, and further establish the bodhi-mind— covering snow with frost. What has been called “the ultimate state” is Buddhahood, the state of bodhi. If we compare the state of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi and the first establishment of the bodhi-mind, they may be like the holocaust at the end of a kalpa and the fire of a firefly. At the same time, if we establish the will to deliver others before we ourselves attain deliverance, “the two are without separation.”

[201] Constantly making this my thought:

How can I make living beings

Able to enter the supreme truth

And swiftly realize a buddha’s body?14

This is the Tathāgata’s lifetime itself. Buddhas’ establishment of the mind, training, and experience of the effect, are all like this. Benefiting living beings means causing living beings to establish the will to deliver others before they attain their own deliverance. We should not expect to become buddha by virtue of having established the will to deliver others before we ourselves attain deliverance. Even if virtue which might make us buddha has matured and is about to be consummated, we turn it toward living beings’ realization of buddha and attainment of the truth. This mind is not in the self, is not in others, and it does not appear, but after this establishment of the mind when we embrace the earth it turns completely to gold and when we stir the ocean it at once becomes sweet dew. Henceforth, to take hold of soil, stones, sand, and pebbles is just to grasp the bodhi-mind; and to go exploring the spray of water, foam, and flame is to be carrying the bodhi-mind intimately. So to give away a nation, a city, a wife, a child, the seven treasures, a man, a woman, or one’s head, eyes, marrow, brain, body, flesh, hands, and feet, is, in every case, the clamoring of the bodhi-mind and the vigorous activity of the bodhi-mind. Citta, the thinking mind of the present, is neither close nor distant and neither of the self nor of others; even so, if we turn this mind

240c to the principle of delivering others before we attain deliverance ourselves, without regressing or straying, that is establishment of the bodhi-mind. When we thus give up for the bodhi-mind the grass, trees, tiles, pebbles, gold, silver, and precious treasures which all living beings of the present are clutching to themselves as their own possessions, how could that not be the establishment of the bodhi-mind itself? Because mind and real dharmas are both beyond subject, object, combination, and causelessness, if we establish this bodhi-mind for a single kṣaṇa,15 the myriad dharmas will all become promoting conditions.16 In general, establishment of the mind and attainment of the truth rely upon the instantaneous arising and vanishing17 of all things. If [all things] did not arise and vanish instantaneously, bad done in the previous instant could not depart. If bad done in the previous instant had not yet departed, good in the next instant could not be realized in the present. Only the Tathāgata clearly knows the length of this instant. [The teaching that] “Mind can produce one word of speech at a time, and speech can express one word of writing at a time”18 is also of the Tathāgata alone—it is beyond the ability of other saints. In roughly the time it takes a man to click his fingers, there are sixty-five kṣaṇas, [in each of which] the five aggregates arise and vanish, but no common person has ever sensed it or known it. Even common people have known the length of a tatkṣaṇa.19 In the passing of one day and one night there are six billion, four hundred million, ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and eighty kṣaṇas,20 [in each of which] all five aggregates arise and vanish, but common people never sense or know it. Because they do not sense or know it, they do not establish the bodhi-mind. Those who do not know the Buddha-Dharma and do not believe the Buddha-Dharma do not believe the principle of instantaneous arising and vanishing. One who clarifies the Tathāgata’s right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana inevitably believes this principle of instantaneous arising and vanishing. Meeting now the Tathāgata’s teaching, we feel as if we clearly understand, but we are merely aware of periods of a tatkṣaṇa or longer, and we 241a only believe the principle to be true. Our failure to clarify and failure to know all the dharmas that the World-honored One taught is like our failure to know the length of a kṣaṇa: students must never carelessly become proud. We are not only ignorant of the extremely small; we are also ignorant of the extremely large. And yet, even ordinary beings, when we rely on the power of the Tathāgata’s truth, see the three-thousandfold-world.21 In sum, as we pass from living existence22 into middle existence,23 and from middle existence into the next living existence,24 all things move in a continuous process, kṣāṇa by kṣāṇa. Thus, regardless of our own intentions, and led by past behavior, the cycle of life and death continues without stopping for a single kṣāṇa. With the body-mind that is swept like this through life and death, we should establish at once the bodhi-mind which is the will to deliver others before we ourselves attain deliverance. Even if, on the way to establishing the bodhimind, we begrudge the body-mind, it is born, grows old, becomes sick, and dies; in the end, it is not our own possession.

[207] The ceaselessness and swiftness with which the course through

life of living beings arises and vanishes:

While the World-honored One is in the world there is a bhikṣu who visits the Buddha, bows his head at the Buddha’s two feet, then stands back to one side and addresses the World-honored One, saying, “How fast is the arising and vanishing of the course through life of living beings?”

The Buddha says, “Even if I could explain it, you could not

know it.”

The bhikṣu says, “Is there no allegory that can demonstrate it?”

The Buddha says, “There is, and I will tell it to you now. For example, four skilled archers each take a bow and arrow, stand together back to back, and prepare to shoot in the four directions. An agile man comes along and says to them, ‘You may now shoot your arrows at once, and I will be able to catch each one before it falls to the ground.’ What does it mean? Is he fast or not?”

The bhikṣu says to the Buddha, “Very fast, World-honored One.”

241b The Buddha says, “That man is not as fast as earthbound yakṣas. Earthbound yakṣas are not as fast as skyborne yakṣas. Skyborne yakṣas are not as fast as the four heavenly kings.25 Those gods are not as fast as the two wheels of the sun and the moon. The two wheels of the sun and moon are not as fast as the gods26 who pull the chariot whose wheels are the sun and moon. Though the gods described here have become progressively swifter, the arising and vanishing of the course of a life is swifter still. [Life] flows at every instant, without the slightest pause.”27

[209]    The swiftness of the arising, vanishing, and instantaneous flowingof the course of our life is like this. Moment by moment, practitioners should not forget this principle. While experiencing the swiftness of this instantaneous arising, vanishing, and flowing, if we arouse one thought of delivering others before we attain deliverance ourselves, the eternal lifetime will manifest itself before us at once. The buddhas of the three times and the ten directions, together with the Seven World-honored Buddhas, plus the twenty-eight patriarchs of India in the west, the six patriarchs of China in the east, and all the other ancestral masters who have transmitted the Buddha’s right Dharma eye treasury and fine mind of nirvana, each has maintained and relied upon the bodhi-mind. Those who have never established the bodhi-mind are not ancestral masters.

[210]    The Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries,28 question one hundred

and twenty, says, “Have you awakened the bodhi-mind, or not?”

Clearly remember: in the Buddhist patriarchs’ learning of the truth, to awaken the bodhi-mind is inevitably seen as foremost. This is the eternal rule29 of the Buddhist patriarchs. “To awaken”30 means to be clear in; it does not refer to the great realization of the truth31 itself. Even those who have suddenly experienced the ten states32 are still bodhisattvas. The twenty-eight patriarchs of India, the six patriarchs of China, and all the other great ancestral masters are bodhisattvas: they are not buddhas; and they are not śrāvakas, pratyekabuddhas, or the like. Among practitioners of this age there is not one person who clearly knows that [these patriarchs] are bodhisattvas, not

241c śrāvakas. [Practitioners of this age] just randomly call themselves patchrobed monks and patch-robed disciples without knowing the reality of the

matter, and so they have created confusion. It is pitiful that in a decadent age the truth of the patriarchs has degenerated. This being so, whether we are laypeople or ones who have left home, whether in the heavens above or in the human world, whether in suffering or in happiness, we should quickly establish the will to deliver others before we attain deliverance ourselves. Although the world of living beings is beyond limit and beyond limitlessness, we establish the mind to deliver, ahead of ourselves, all living beings. This is just the bodhi-mind. When bodhisattvas one life away [from Buddhahood]33 are about to descend to Jambudvīpa, they say in their ultimate teaching for the gods in Tuṣita Heaven:34 “The bodhi-mind is a gate of Dharma illumination, for it prevents negation of the Three Treasures.”35 Clearly, non-negation of the Three Treasures is by virtue of the bodhi-mind. After establishing the bodhi-mind we should steadfastly guard it, never regressing or going astray.

[212]        The Buddha says:

How do bodhisattvas guard the one matter, namely the bodhi-mind? Bodhisattva mahāsattvas constantly endeavor to guard this bodhi-mind as worldly people protect an only child or as the one-eyed protect their remaining eye. Just as those who, journeying through a vast wilderness, protect their guide, bodhisattvas again guard the bodhi-mind like this. Because they guard the bodhi-mind like this, they attain the truth of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. Because they attain the truth of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, they are replete with constancy, happiness, autonomy, and purity,36 which are supreme and great parinirvāṇa. For this reason, bodhisattvas guard [this] one dharma.37

[213]        The Buddha’s words on guarding the bodhi-mind are, evidently, like this. The reason we guard it and never permit backsliding is that, as popular custom has it, there are three things which, though born, do not reach maturity. They are fish eggs, āmra38 fruit, and a bodhisattva who has estab- 242a lished the mind. Because, in general, there are so many people who regress and lose [the bodhi-mind], I have long feared that I also might regress and lose it. For this reason I guard the bodhi-mind. Bodhisattvas often regress or stray from the bodhi-mind when they are beginners because they do not meet a true teacher. Without meeting a true teacher, they do not hear the right Dharma. Without hearing the right Dharma, they are likely to negate cause and effect, to negate salvation, to negate the Three Treasures, and to negate all the dharmas of the three times. Idly craving the five desires39 of the present, they lose the virtue for future [attainment of] bodhi. Sometimes, in order to hinder a practitioner, celestial demons, pāpīyas, and the like40 will take on the shape of a buddha or will appear in the shape of a parent, a teacher, or relatives, gods, and so on; thus drawing near, they concoct fictions and prevail upon the bodhisattva, saying, “The Buddha’s truth is far distant. You would suffer long hardships and experience the deepest sorrow. The better course is to resolve our own life and death first and then to deliver living beings.” The practitioner, hearing these tales, regresses from the bodhi-mind and regresses in the conduct of a bodhisattva. Remember, talk such as the above is just the talk of demons. Bodhisattvas must recognize it and must not follow it. Just never regress or stray from your conduct and vow to deliver others before attaining deliverance yourself. Know [talk] that would turn you against the conduct and vow to deliver others before attaining deliverance yourself as the talk of demons, know it as the talk of non-Buddhists, and know it as the talk of bad companions. Never follow it at all.

[216] There are four kinds of demons: The first is demons of hindrance, the second is demons of the five aggregates, the third is demons of

death, and the fourth is celestial demons.41

“Demons of hindrance”42—of what are called the one hundred and eight hindrances and so on43—discriminate eighty-four thousand

242b         miscellaneous hindrances.

“Demons of the five aggregates”44 are the primary and cooperating causes which combine to produce hindrances. We have got this body of the four elements;45 together with matter made from the four elements and matter [sensed through] the eyes and other organs, this is called “the aggregate of matter.”46 The sum of feelings such as those of the one hundred and eight hindrances is called “the aggregate of feeling.”47 Differentiation and synthesis of the countless thoughts, great and small that we have is called “the aggregate of thought.”48 Through the occurrence of pleasure and displeasure, there can arise habits which accommodate or do not accommodate mental states such as greed, anger, and so on: this is called “the aggregate of conduct.”49 Combination of the six senses50 and their six objects51 gives rise to the six kinds of consciousness.52 The countless and limitless states of mind which are the differentiation and synthesis of these six kinds of consciousness are called “the aggregate of consciousness.”53

“Demons of death,”54 through the impermanence of direct and cooperating causes, break the momentary succession of the lives of the five aggregates and utterly remove three things: consciousness, heat, and life. Therefore we call them “demons of death.”

“Celestial demons,55 as rulers of the world of desire,56 deeply attach to worldly pleasures and rely upon expectation of gain;57 therefore, they give rise to wrong views. They hate and envy all sages’ and saints’ ways and methods of nirvana. We call these “celestial demons.”

Māra58 is an Indian word; in China it is called a being that is able to steal life. Only demons of death can actually steal life, but the others also are able to produce the direct and cooperating causes of the taking of life; moreover, they take away the life of wisdom. For this reason we call them killers.

Someone asks, “One category, the demons of the five aggregates, covers the other three kinds of demon. Why do you separate them and explain the four?” The answer is as follows: “In fact it is one demon. [But] for the purpose of analysis, there are the four.”

[219] The foregoing is the teaching of the ancestral Master Nāgārjuna. Practitioners should know it and should diligently learn it. Never idly be worried by demons into regressing or straying from the bodhi-mind. This is to guard the bodhi-mind.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Hotsu-bodaishin

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     the Yoshida district of Esshū on the fourteenth                                     day of the second lunar month in the second                                     year of Kangen.59

 

Notes

1     thinking, reflecting, imagining, thought; intention, aim, wish; memory; intelligence, Monier-Williams’ Sanskrit-English Dictionary defines Shinjin-gakudō,citta as attending, observing; paragraph 144. reason. See also Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II),

2     Shihō, lit., “this direction” or “this quarter,” means the Eastern Lands, China and text. Japan. The sentences in quote marks are in the form of a quotation from a Chinese 3 Ryo-chi-shin, lit., “considering and recognizing mind,” in other words, reason. 4 Monier-Williams’ of the heart as the seat of feeling and sensations); soul, mind; the heart or interior of Sanskrit-English Dictionary defines hṛdaya as the heart (or region the body.

5     in the life force itself and that are present prior to consciousness. Sō-moku-shin, “mind of grass and trees,” describes the instinctive processes that exist

6     larger or longer or stronger, increased, augmented; great, large; grown up, full grown, Monier-Williams’ aged, old, senior; experienced, wise, learned. Sanskrit-English Dictionary defines vṛddha as grown, become

7     Shakujū-shōyō-shin means the regulated mind of real wisdom, i.e., prajñā.

8     as in the Fourth Noble Truth genzō, dōDō (Ch. Dao usually represents the Sanskrit ) literally means “Way.” In some cases dōtai, from the Sanskrit bodhi, which means the truth or the state dōmārga-satya .represents the Sanskrit defines bodhi But in the as “perfect Shōbō-mārga, the harmonized state of the body-mind in zazen; it is not a means to an end but is enlightened intellect.” In the of truth. Monier-Williams’ knowledge or wisdom (by which a [person] becomes a buddha); the illuminated orSanskrit-English DictionaryShōbōgenzō, however, wisdom is not intellectual but is complete in itself.

9     Wataru, “to cross over,” means to be delivered, to attain the truth.

10    Kannō-dōkō means 1) mystical communication of the truth to living beings, 2) empathy Shinjin-gakudō, paragraph 144.between a master and disciple. See also Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II),

11    Hachi-nan-sho of distress,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit the realms of naraka(“eight troubled worlds”), lit., “eight places of difficulty” or “eight states(hell), tiryañc (animals), pretaaṣṭākṣaṇāḥ.(hungry ghosts), The eight places are dīrghāyur-deva

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ness), and Terms. countries), (gods in heaven with interminably long lives), tathāgatānām-anutpādaindriyavaikalya (loss of power of the senses), (absence of the Buddha). See Glossary of Sanskritpratyantajanapadamithyādarśana(remote or barbarian(pretentious-

12    Sangō: the three forms of behavior or actions of body, speech, and mind.

13    Daihatsunehankyō (Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra), chap. 38.

14    The closing words of Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō. See LS 3.36.

15    Setsunaas an adverb means in a moment or instantaneously. Represents the Sanskrit kṣaṇa, which as a noun means moment or instant and

16    to advance, to improve; and literally as “promoting conditions,” i.e., circumstances that are favorable to attainment condition, a favorable circumstance. Therefore in context Zōjō-en. Zō means to add on, to increase, or to promote; en means a connection, an indirect or cooperating cause, zōjō-en represents the Sanskrit or four types of circumstance. Thezōjō-enjō means to go above, oradhipati-pratyaya,may be interpreted samanan-

  which is the fourth of the four are: tara-pratyaya,of the truth. At the same time, pratyaya, overarching circumstances, all circumstances over and above the preceding. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. hetu-pratyaya, circumstances indirectly connected with the event; and circumstances immediately contiguous to the event; circumstances directly responsible for the event; catvāraḥ pratyayāḥ,      adhipati-pratyaya,ālambana-

17    the “Theory of the Momentary Appearance and Disappearance of the Universe” men-Setsuna-shōmetsu, “appearance and disappearance in a kṣaṇa.” This phrase introduces tioned in the introduction to this chapter.

18    Bibasharon (Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra), chap. 15.

19    Gō-setsuna. Gō, which means “constant,” is thought to be a misprint of tat. As a unit of measurement, the Sanskrit Tan, which tatkṣaṇa, represents the sound of the Sanskrit alent to one hundred and twenty which literally means “that moment,” i.e., a definite period of time, is equiv-kṣāṇas. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 20 Rokujū-shi-oku, kyuman, kyusen, kyuhyaku, hachijū no setsuna.units of one hundred million (dred million,” i.e., 6,400 million, is expressed in Chinese and Japanese as sixty-fouroku). “Six billion four hun-

21    Sanzenkaito the power of three) constituent worlds.(“three-thousandfold-world”), the whole world of one billion (one thousand

22    existence at the moment of one’s death; and of death. stage through which conscious beings are supposed to pass following the moment forms of existence.” They are Hon-u. Traditionally there are said to be four stages of life, known as shō-u, “birth existence,” existence at the moment of shi-u “death existence,”shi-u, or “four one’s birth; hon-u, “original existence,” the living of one’s life; chū-u, “middle existence,” an intermediate Chapter Seventy

23    which was originally a Brahmanistic concept describing the soul in an intermediate Chū-u, “middle existence,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit antarā-bhava, biku, Eighty-four (Vol. IV), stage between death and regeneration. Buddhist masters utilized the concept to emphasize the importance of profound belief in cause and effect. See for example Chapter paragraph 23. Sanji-no-gō, paragraph  44; Chapter Ninety (Vol. IV), Shizen-

24    for Tō-hon-u. Tōtōrai, “the future.” means “the present,” “this one”; at the same time, it sometimes stands

25    under the god Indra who inhabit the first and lowest of the six heavens of the world Shi-tennō, “four quarter kings,” from the Sanskrit catvāro mahā-rājāḥ, are four gods

Sumeru. Their names are Dhṛtarāṣṭra, ruler of the eastern continent; Virūḍhaka, ruler of the northern continent (who is mentioned by name in LS 3.252).of desire and who each guard one quadrant of the four continents surrounding Mountof the southern continent; Virūpākṣa, ruler of the western continent; and Vaiśravaṇa,

26    Sanskrit proper name for these particular gods. However, such a name has not been Kengyō-tenshi, “firmly going sons of heaven,” probably represents the meaning of a traced.

27    Bibasharon, chap. 136.

28    The Zen’enshingi. Its editing was completed by Master Chōro Sōsaku in 1103.

29    Jōhō. Jōthis context means rule, method, or Dharma. means constant or eternal, and at the same time usual or everyday. in

30    of something in a limited sense, with one’s thinking mind; 2) to realize reality in the Hotsu-go. HotsuGo, sato[ru] means 1) to perceive, to realize, to wake up to, or to become conscious means to establish, to initiate, or to arouse, as in the chapter title. Daigo. widest sense, through the whole body-mind. See Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II),

31    Daigaku. Dai means “great.” Kaku means the state of truth, or realization of the state of truth.

32    forty-one to fifty of the fifty-two stages through which bodhisattvas must pass before The next three groups of ten stages are Juchi, state of truth,” and the fifty-second stage is becoming buddhas. The first group of ten stages is “ten states,” generally means jusshō,sanken, the ten sacred stages that constitute stages the three clever stages. The fifth group jisshin, the ten stages of belief. tōkaku, “the balanced of ten stages is the ten sacred stages. The fifty-first stage is myōkaku, “the fine state of truth.”

33    identified with means a bodhisattva who is living his or her last life in Tuṣita Heaven before descending Isshō-hosho no bosatsu, lit., “a bodhisattva at the place of assignment in one life,”Isshō-hosho, “place of assignment in one life” is to the world to become a buddha. two stages. myōkaku, “fine state of truth,” i.e., the last of the bodhisattva’s fifty-

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1)

34    who enjoy pleasures provided by themselves”); 6) trāyastriṃśāof the dead); 4) Tuṣita Heaven is usually listed as the fourth of world of] desire” (from the Sanskrit  caturmahārāja-kāyikās (thirty-three gods living on top of Mount Sumeru, eight in each quadrants (deities attending the four quarter kings; see note 25); 2)yāmākāmāvacaras (deities under Yama, who rules the spiritsroku-yoku-ten,). The six heavens are inhabited bynirmāṇa-rataya “six heavens of [these (“gods (“gods

surrounding Indra in the center); 3) tuṣitās (indeterminate celestial beings); 5)

who constantly enjoy pleasures provided by others”). Monier-Williams’ English Dictionary has tuṣitās in the third heaven and paranirmita-vaśa-vartinayāmās in the fourth. Sanskrit-

35    Butsuhongyōjikkyō. This part of the sutra is also quoted in the Shōbōgenzō. See Vol. IV, Appendix III.Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon in the twelve-chapter edition of the

36    of nirvana.Jō-raku-ga-jō, “constancy, happiness, autonomy, and purity,” are the four attributes

37    Daihatsunehankyō, chap. 25.

38    The Sanskrit āmra means mango.

39    Goyoku, and touch. They are also categorized as desires for property, sexual love, food and drink, fame, and sleep. “five desires,” are desires for pleasure through sight, sound, smell, taste,

40    concept, “celestial pāpīyaor Māraḥ-pāpīyān, the king of demons. Tenma-hajun-tō. Tenma,the Paranirmitavaśavartin Heaven, which was thought to house the palace of Māra,s, which means “most wicked ones.” “celestial demons,” generally refers to the demons who rule HajunTen-mahajunrepresents the sound of the Sanskritmay be understood as one

Terms. Māraḥ-pāpīyān.” Here, however, māraḥ-pāpīyas,” and as referring to one individual, “the celestial to indicates plurality, etc. See Glossary of Sanskrit

41    prajñā pāramitopadeśaThis section (one paragraph in the source text) is from the ), chap. 68. The original MahāprajñāpāramitopadeśaDaichidoron (Skt. is a com-Mahā into Chinese by Kumārajīva ca. 405mentary attributed to Master Nāgārjuna, the fourteenth patriarch. It was translated. 42 of suffering, that which disturbs our balance and hinders our action. Bonnō-ma, from the Sanskrit kleśa-māra. Kleśa means affliction, trouble, the cause

43       Hyakuhachi-bonnō-tō(ten following nineteen (which there are five categories, tradition the six hindrances. According to the unbelief), lack of reserve), mūla-kleśas, basic causes of suffering, and varying numbers of mūla-kleśaupa kleśamāna refers to lists in Buddhist commentaries enumerating six or(arrogance), Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary,s are enumerated as pramādapañca ḍrṣṭyah(vicikitsānegligence), ); the (doubt), and rāgaAbhidharmakośa-śāstrakausīdya(shamelessness), (mātsaryacraving), ḍrṣṭi(indolence), upakleśa(in the Vijñānavādapratigha(meanness), wrong views, ofanapatrāpyas, secondary aśraddha(lists theanger),īrṣyā mūḍha (ignorance),

         styāna (krodhasloth), auddhatya(wrath), s:    mrakṣa(disdain), (hypocrisy), āhrīkya

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(enmity), and kleśaenvy), kaukṛtyas listed in the pradāsamāyā((remorse). Monier-Williams’ duplicity), (affliction), SarvadarśanasaṃgrahaDharmasaṃgraha.śāṭhyavihiṃsā(roguery), (See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.tendency to do harm), madaand refers to “twenty-four minor evil pas-Sanskrit-English Dictionary(presumption), middhaupanāha(drowsiness),(continualcites ten sions” listed in the

44       Goshū-ma, from the Sanskrit pañca-skandha-māra. The pañca skandhaSanskrit-Englishs (“five agggre-saṃjñā (per-

gates”) are the five constituent elements of being. Monier-Williams’ Dictionaryception), 4) lists them as 1) saṃskāra (aggregate of formations), and 5) rūpa (bodily form), 2) vedana (

them as 1) matter; 2) sensations or feelings; 3) perceptions, or sense recognition fol-hension of determining marks; 4) the forces, mental and material, that condition exis-tential entities; and 5) consciousness, or pure awareness without content. Ven. Dr. U.Rewata Dhamma, translating from the Pāli (Buddhism tioning(s), and 5) consciousness. T. R. V. Murti (in form, or bodily and physical forms, 2) feeling(s), 3) perception(s), 4) mental func-thought faculty). Thich Nhat Hanh (in ) lists them as 1) matter, or material forms; 2) feeling; 3) ideation, appreThe Miracle of Mindfulness The First Sermon of the Buddha The Central Philosophy of vijñānasens ation), 3) (consciousness or) lists them as ), lists1)-

lowing the arising of sensations; 4) mental formations, i.e., all our actions and preconceptions are not volitional actions and so do not produce any karmic force, whereas in daily life; 5) consciousness. Ven. Rewata Dhamma notes that sensations and per-produces actual karmic effects. saṃskāra

45       Shidai, “four elements,” from the Sanskrit catvāri mahābhūtāni, are 1) earth (repre-

3)sending the qualities of heaviness and lightness), ibid., 2) water (cohesion or fluidity), fire (heat and cold), and 4) wind (motions and movements).

46       Shiki-shū. Shiki is literally “color” or “form.”

47       confirms that the term Ju-shū. Ju(etc.).sensing of external stimuli) but also mental or emotional (greed, anger, pride, doubt, is literally “receive,” “accept,” or “take in.” Master Nāgārjuna’s comment Vedana embraces all feelings, not only physical or sensory

48       Sō-shū. Sōs, Monier-Williams’ is literally “idea,” “conception,” or “thought.” For Sanskrit-English Dictionary gives “perception,” but its saṃjñā as one of the general definition of the term includes “clear conception” and “direction.” See Glossary skandha of Sanskrit Terms.

49       Williams’ Gyō-shū. Gyō means going, conducting oneself, acting, carrying out, performing, become as one of the skan dhas, Mongering operative, being translated into action. For

concrete self-conduct as the criterion of formation of good or bad habits. The mind, training, education. In Master Nāgārjuna’s explanation mind,” but it defines Sanskrit-English Dictionarysaṃskāra in general as forming well, accomplishment, forming gives “mental conformation or creation of the saṃskāra indicates

50       The six sense organs are Roku-jō (“six sense organs”), usually called cakṣus (eyes), śrotrarokkon,(ears), represents the Sanskrit ghrāṇa (nose), jihvā (ṣad indriyāṇi.tongue), kāya

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(

etc. In Buddhist philosophy the mind as a sense organ is sometimes subdivided intoall mental faculties: intellect, understanding, perception, motor faculty, conscience, skrit-English Dictionary, manas body), and manas (the mind as a sense organ). According to Monier-Williams’ originally means mind in a wide sense as applied toSan-

two components (see also note 51).

51       (Roku-jin (“six sense objects”), also called rūpadharma(form), (objects of the mind such as thoughts, wishes, ideas, śabda (sound), rokkyo,gandharepresents the Sanskrit (odor), rasa (taste), ṣad viṣayaḥ.sparśa

The six objects are

attributes, patterns, movements, etc.).tangible objects), and

52       when meeting a mental object. Subdivision of the mind into kinesthetic and intellectual Roku-shik iarises in the eyes when seeing a visible object, the ears when hearing a sound, the nose when smelling an odor, the body when touching a tangible object, and the mind(“six kinds of consciousness”) are the momentary consciousness that eight (Vol. II), faculties results in seven kinds of consciousness, as mentioned in Chapter Twenty-Butsu-kōjō-no-ji, paragraph 63.

53       Shiki-shū. Shiki,object, is the basis of the teaching of reality of consciousness, whereby grass, trees, stars, pebbles, and so on are all seenmātratā(stemming from the twenty-first patriarch Vasubandhu), affirms the all-embracing). This teaching, elucidated in the so-called Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda school “consciousness,” thus defined as the combination of subject andyui-shiki, “consciousness only” (Sanskrit: ālayavijñāna).      vijñānaas manifestations of seeds of the store consciousness (

54       Shima represents the Sanskrit mṛtyu-māra. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

55       putra-māra.Tenshima, lit., “demons who are the sons of heaven,” represents the Sanskrit Here the term refers to demons in the Paranirmitavaśavartin Heaven,deva the sixth and highest heaven in the world of desire. See note 40.

56       Yokkai, Forty-seven, “world of desire or volition,” represents the Sanskrit Sangai-yuishin.    kāmadhātu. See Chapter

57       or “nonattainment,” describes the action of one who is living fully in the present Ushotokumoment. See also Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), Master Dōgen sometimes attributes to celestial demons; see, for example, Chapter Eight (Vol. I), means having an ulterior motive or idealistic aim in mind—a tendency that Raihai-tokuzui, paragraph 194. The antonym Kuyō-shōbutsu,mushotoku,paragraph 131.“non-gaining”

58       Ma,the Sanskrit hitherto translated as “demon,” represents both the sound and the meaning of māra, which means 1) killing, and 2) demon. See Glossary of Sanskrit

Terms.

59       1244.

[Chapter Seventy-one]

                                          Nyorai-zenshin                                 242c3

The Whole Body of the Tathāgata

Translator’s Note: Nyorai represents the Chinese translation of the Sanskrit word Tathāgata, which means a person who has arrived at the truth. Sometimes, as in this case, nyorai means Gautama Buddha himself. Zenshin means “whole body.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen teaches that Buddhist sutras are Gautama Buddha’s whole body, using the word “sutras” to express the real form of the universe. Thus Master Dōgen insists that the universe is Gautama Buddha’s whole body.

[221]           At that time, Śākyamuni Buddha was living on Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa1 at Rājagṛha.2 He addressed Bodhisattva Medicine King, saying:

Medicine King! In every place where [this sutra] is preached, or read, or recited, or copied, or where volumes of the sutra are kept, we should establish a stupa3 of the seven treasures, making it most high, wide, and ornate. [But] there is no need to place bones4 in it. Why? [Because] in it there is already the whole body of the Tathāgata. This stupa should be served, revered, honored, and extolled with all kinds of flowers, fragrances, strings of pearls,5 silk canopies, banners, flags, music, and songs of praise. If any people, being able to see this stupa, do prostrations and serve offerings to it, know that they are all close to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.6

[222]           What has been called ”volumes of the sutra” is concrete preachingitself,7 is concrete reading itself, is concrete reciting itself, and is concrete copying itself. “Volumes of the sutra” are real form itself.8 “There will be established the Stupa of the Seven Treasures”:9 this expresses real form as a stupa. The “height and width” of “utmost making” are inevitably the dimensions of real form. “In this10 there is already the whole body of the Tathāgata”: for

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volumes of the sutra are the whole body itself. Thus, concrete preaching, concrete reading, concrete reciting, concrete copying, and so on, are themselves the whole body of the Tathāgata. We should serve, revere, honor, and extol them with all kinds of flowers, fragrances, strings of pearls, silk canopies, banners, flags, music, and songs of praise. Those may be celestial flowers, celestial fragrances, celestial canopies, and so on, all of which are real form. Or they may be the choice flowers, choice fragrances, fine robes, and fine clothes of the human world—these are all real form. Serving offerings and showing reverence are real form. We should establish the stupa, “but there is no need to place bones in it”: clearly, volumes of the sutra are themselves the bones of the Tathāgata and the whole body of the Tathāgata. These are the golden words of the Buddha’s own mouth; there can be no virtue greater than seeing and hearing them. We should be quick to accumulate merit and to heap

up virtue. If any people do prostrations and serve offerings to this stupa, remember, “they are totally close to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” When we are able to see this stupa, we should wholeheartedly do prostrations and serve offerings to this stupa; just those actions may be “total closeness” to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. “Being close” is neither closeness following separation nor closeness following coming together. Anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi is called “total closeness.” Our own experience here and now of receiving, retaining, reading, reciting, interpreting, and copying is “being able to see this stupa.” We should rejoice: it is the total closeness of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. [225] So the volumes of the sutra are the whole body of the Tathāgata. To do prostrations to volumes of the sutra is to do prostrations to the Tathāgata. To have met volumes of the sutra is to be meeting the Tathāgata. The volumes of the sutra are the bones of the Tathāgata. Because this is so, bones may be this sutra.11 Even if we know that volumes of the sutra are the bones, if we do not know that bones are volumes of the sutra, that is not yet the Buddha’s truth. The real form of all dharmas here and now is volumes of the sutra. The human world, the heavens above, the ocean, space, this land, and other realms all are real form, are volumes of the sutra, and are bones. Receiving, retaining, reading, reciting, interpreting, and copying bones we should disclose realization: this is [called] “sometimes following the sutras.” There are bones of eternal buddhas, bones of present buddhas, bones of pratyekabuddhas, and bones of wheel-turning kings. There are lion bones, there are wooden buddha bones

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and painted buddha bones, and there are human bones. In the great kingdom of Song today, several generations of Buddhist patriarchs are manifesting their bones while they are living; and many have yielded their bones after cremation.12 These cases are all volumes of the sutra.

[226]  Śākyamuni Buddha addressed the great assembly, saying, “The 243b

lifetime that I have realized by my original practice of the bodhisattva way is not even yet exhausted but will still be twice the previous number.”13

The eighty-four gallons of bones of the present are just the Buddha’s lifetime itself. The lifetime of “original practice of the bodhisattva way” is not confined to the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world; it may be incalculable. Such is the whole body of the Tathāgata. Such are the volumes of the sutra.

[227]  Bodhisattva Wisdom Accumulation said, “I have seen [how] Śākyamuni Tathāgata, during countless kalpas of hard practice and painful practice, accumulating merit and heaping up virtue, has pursued the bodhisattva way and has never ceased. I have observed that in the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world, there is no place even the size of a mustard seed where he has not abandoned his body and life as a bodhisattva for the sake of living beings. After acting thus, he was then able to realize the truth of bodhi.”14

Clearly, this three-thousand-great-thousandfold world is a single instance of red mind, is a single concrete space, and is the whole body of the Tathāgata, which can never depend upon abandonment or non-abandonment. Bones are neither prior to the Buddha nor subsequent to the Buddha; nor are they arranged side by side with the Buddha.15 Countless kalpas of hard practice and painful practice are the vivid activity of the Buddha’s womb or the Buddha’s abdomen; they are the Buddha’s skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. It says “he has never ceased”: having attained Buddhahood he practices all the more vigorously, and having educated the great-thousandfold world he is still going forward. The vigorous activity of the whole body is like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Nyorai-zenshin

Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in  the Yoshida district of Esshū on the fifteenth  day of the second lunar month in the second  year of Kangen.16

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Notes

1     Dharma; mountain, a natural platform overlooking the Rājagṛha valley, was the stage on which was set the Buddha’s preaching of the The Sanskrit Gṛdhrakūṭa, here represented phonetically, means “Vulture Peak.” Thisi.e., the sutra of the Lotus Universe (the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Lotus Sutra). See LS 1.8.

2     Ōshajō, lit., “City of Royal Palaces,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Rājagṛha, which was the name of the capital of the ancient kingdom of Magadha.

3     the Sanskrit text of the sutras) as opposed to stupas (repositories for relics). On the other hand, Monier-Tō, literally, “tower.” On the one hand, Sanskrit-English Dictionary Lotus Sutra stresses the building of here has suggests that the two terms, The Threefold Lotus Sutracaitya. Furthermore, LSW notes that caityas (repositories for(caitya LSW) notes that and stupa, from this place on, the Lotus Sutra

      Williams’ 160are interchangeable. See Vol. I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Master Dōgen discussesthe problem further in Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), . In general, we have translated as “stupa.”                 Kuyō-shōbutsu, paragraph

4     Shari represents the Sanskrit śarīra, which means a body, dead body, or bones (relics).

5     Yōraku, lit., “necklaces,” represents the Sanskrit muktāhāra, which means a string of pearls or jewels worn by royalty and nobility in ancient India.

6     Lotus Sutra, Hōsshi. See LS 2.154.

      7      Nyaku-setsu. In the Lotus Sutra quotation, moshi[ku wa] is used as the conjunction

“or,” but here Master Dōgen uses the character as an intensifier to suggest real preachingas it is. The same applies to reading, reciting, and copying. Similar usage of occurs in Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), (Vol. II), Busshō, paragraph 14. Kōkyō, paragraph 153 and in Chapter Twenty-twonyaku

8     Kyogan wa jissō kore nari.Flower of the Wonderful Dharma,”kyōgan,but also the concrete manifestations of this Lotus Universe as a sutra. form,” also means the universe itself, or reality itself (see Chapter Fifty, “volumes of the sutra,” means not only copies of the sutra of the Lotus UniverseMaster Dōgen saw as an expression of the universe itself. Therefore,Myōhōrengekyō, “Sutra of the LotusShohō-jissōJissō, “real).

9     Ō-ki-shippō-tō. The meaning suggested in the Lotus Sutra is “we should erect a stupashippō-tō, “Stupa of the Seven Treasures,” is used as another figurative expression of the substantial formof the seven treasures.” But in Master Dōgen’s interpretation

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will arise”; i.e., it suggests not only the propriety of building a stupa out of bracket., but also the inevitability of the momentary establishment of the real universe. of the real universe. Here, o-ki means not only “[we] should erect” but also “[there]

10    therefore be interpreted as referring to 1) volumes of the Shichū, “in this,” means “in this concrete reality here and now.” Lotus Sutra,Shi,2) action, 3) real “this,” may

3sentence he says that in each of these four elements, which he has thus directly or indirectly identified with each other, there is the whole body of the Tathāgata. form or reality, and 4) the stupa of the seven treasures. In the first sentence of this para-graph Master Dōgen has identified items 1 and 2; in the second sentence items 1 and; in the third sentence items 3 and 4; and in the fourth sentence items 2 and 3. In this

11    Shari wa shikyo naru beshi. Shari,crete, and shikyō, “this sutra,” means “a sutra of this concrete reality.” “bones” or “relics,” are here a symbol of the con-

12    Ja-i represents the pronunciation of the Prakrit term jhāpita, which means cremation. 13 See LS 3.12, 3.20.Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō. number of kalpas that had passed since the beginning of the Buddha’s Buddhahood. The “previous number” refers to the astronomically large

14 Lotus Sutra, Daibadatta (“Devadatta”). See LS 2.218–220. 15 Concrete bones and the Buddha cannot be separated. 16 1244.

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[Chapter Seventy-two] Zanmai-ō-zanmai

The Samādhiof Samādhi That Is the Kings

Translator’s Note: Zanmai is the Japanese pronunciation of the phonetic rendering in Chinese of the Sanskrit word “samādhi,” which means the state in zazen; that is, the balanced state of body and mind. Ō means “king.” We can consider that there are many kinds of samādhi in our daily lives. However, according to Buddhist theory the most important and best samādhi is just the samādhi that we can experience in zazen. Therefore, we call the state in zazen “the king of samādhis.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains what zazen is, and so he chose the title Zanmai-ō-zanmai, “The Samādhi That Is the King of Samādhis.”

[231] To transcend the whole universe at once, to live a great and valuable life in the house of the Buddhist patriarchs, is to sit in the full lotus posture. To tread over the heads of non-Buddhists and demons; to become, in the inner 243c sanctum of the Buddhist patriarchs, a person in the concrete state, is to sit in the full lotus posture. To transcend the supremacy of the Buddhist patriarchs’ supremacy, there is only this one method. Therefore, Buddhist patriarchs practice it solely, having no other practices at all. Remember, the universe in sitting is far different from other universes. Clearly understanding this truth, Buddhist patriarchs pursue and realize the establishment of the will, training, the state of bodhi, and nirvana. Just in the moment of sitting, investigate whether the universe is vertical, and whether it is horizontal. Just in the moment of sitting, what is the sitting itself? Is it a somersault? Is it a state of vigorous activity? Is it thinking? Is it beyond thinking? Is it doing something? Is it not doing anything? Is it sitting inside of sitting? Is it sitting inside of the body-mind? Is it sitting that is free of “the inside of sitting,” “the inside of the body-mind,” and so on? There should be investigation of thousands and tens of thousands

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of points like these. Sit in the full lotus posture with the body. Sit in the full lotus posture with the mind. Sit in the full lotus posture being free of body and mind.

[233] My late master, the eternal buddha, says, “To practice [za]zen is to get free of body and mind. Just to sit is to have attainment from the beginning. It is not necessary to burn incense, to do prostrations, to recite the Buddha’s name, to confess, or to read sutras.”

Clearly, in the last four or five hundred years, only one person, my late master, has scooped out the Eye of the Buddhist Patriarch and sat inside the Eye of the Buddhist Patriarch; few people have equaled him, even in China. Very few people realize that the act of sitting is the Buddha-Dharma and that the Buddha-Dharma is the act of sitting. Even if some physically understand sitting to be the Buddha-Dharma, none has realized sitting as sitting. How then can any be maintaining and relying upon the Buddha-Dharma as the Buddha-Dharma? This being so, there is sitting with the mind, which is not the same as sitting with the body. There is sitting with the body, which is not

the same as sitting with the mind. And there is sitting that is free of body and mind, which is not the same as “sitting that is free of body and mind.” Already to have attained the state like this is the Buddhist patriarchs’ state in which practice and understanding are in mutual accord. Maintain and rely upon this awareness, thought, reflection. Investigate this mind, will, consciousness. [235] Śākyamuni Buddha addresses a large assembly: “If we sit in the full lotus posture, the body-mind will experience samādhi, and many people will revere the dignity and virtue of the state. Like the sun lighting up the world, it clears away sleepy, lazy, and melancholy mind. The body is light and tireless. Perception and consciousness are also light and responsive. We should sit like coiled dragons.1 On seeing just a picture of the lotus posture, even the king of demons is afraid. How much more so if he sees a person really experiencing the state of truth, sitting without inclination or agitation?”2

Thus, on seeing a picture of the lotus posture, even the king of demons is surprised, worried, and afraid. Still more, when we really sit in the lotus posture, the virtue is beyond imagination. In short, the happiness and virtue of everyday sitting are limitless.

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[236]     Śākyamuni Buddha addresses a large assembly: “This is why west in the full lotus posture.” Then the Tathāgata, the World-honored One, teaches his disciples that they should sit like this. Sometimes no Buddhists pursue the truth by continuously standing on tiptoes, sometimes they pursue the truth by continuously standing up, and sometimes they pursue the truth by carrying the legs on the shoulders. Mad and obstinate mind like this sinks into the sea of wrongness, and the body is not peaceful. For this reason, the Buddha teaches his disciples to sit in the full lotus posture, sitting with the mind upright. Why? [Because] if the body is upright, the mind is easily set right. When the body sits upright, the mind is not weary, the mind is regulated, the intention is right, and the attention is bound to what is immediately present. If the mind races or becomes distracted and if the body leans or becomes agitated, [sitting upright] regulates them and causes them to recover. When we want to experience samādhi and want to enter samādhi, even if the mind is chasing various images and is variously distracted, [sitting upright] completely regulates all such states. Practicing like this, we experience and enter the samādhi that is king of samādhis.3

[237]     Evidently, sitting in the full lotus posture is just the samādhi that is king of samādhis, and is just experience and entry. All samādhis are the followers4 of this, the king of samādhis. To sit in the full lotus posture is to set the body straight,5 to set the mind straight, to set the body-mind straight, 244b to set Buddhist patriarchs straight, to set practice and experience straight, to set the brain straight, and to set the life-blood straight. Now, sitting our human skin, flesh, bones, and marrow in the full lotus posture, we sit the samādhi that is king among samādhis in the full lotus posture. The World-honored One is constantly maintaining and relying upon the practice of sitting in the full lotus posture. He authentically transmits the practice of sitting in the full lotus posture to his disciples, and he teaches human beings and gods to sit in the full lotus posture. The mind-seal authentically transmitted by the Seven Buddhas is just this. Under the bodhi tree Śākyamuni Buddha passes fifty minor kalpas, passes sixty kalpas, and passes countless kalpas, sitting in the lotus posture. Sitting in the full lotus posture for three weeks, or sitting for hours, is the turning of the splendid Dharma wheel, and is the lifelong teaching of the Buddha. It lacks nothing. It is just a yellow scroll on a red stick.6 The

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Shōbōgenzō Volume III meeting of Buddha with Buddha is this moment. This is just the time when living beings become buddha.

[239] The First Patriarch,7 Venerable Bodhidharma, after arriving from the west, passed nine years facing the wall at Shōrinji on Shōshitsuhō in the Sūgaku Mountains, sitting in zazen in the lotus posture. From that time through to today, brains and eyes have pervaded China. The lifeblood of the First Patriarch is only the practice of sitting in the full lotus posture. Before the First Patriarch came from the west the people of Eastern Lands never knew sitting in the full lotus posture. Since the ancestral master came from the west they have known it. This being so, just to sit in the lotus posture, day and night, from the beginning to the end of this life, and for tens of thousands of lives, without leaving the temple grounds8 and without having any other practices, is the samādhi that is the king of samādhis.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Zanmai-ō-zanmai

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in

244c                                                 Etsu district,9 on the fifteenth day of the second                                     lunar month in the second year of Kangen.10

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Notes

1 Ryūposture in which there is stability and power without undue rigidity or exertion.[no] wadakama[ru ga] goto[ku seyo], “like a dragon in its coil,” suggests a sitting 2 pāramitopadeśaQuoted from vol. 7 of the . Daichidoron, the Chinese translation of the Mahāprajñā 3 Also quoted from vol. 7 of the Daichidoron.

4         a god or a king. See LS 1.14.Kenzoku,dents, followers). The words are used in the lit., “family,” “household,” or “kin,” represents the Sanskrit Lotus Sutra to indicate the followers ofparivāra (depen-

5         Jiki-shin, jiki, naomeans straight or upright. Used here as a transitive verb, upright, to set straight, to rectify, to restore to order or normality, or to cure.[su], used in the previous paragraph as an adjective and as an adverb,jiki, nao[su] means to make

6         A concrete sutra.

7         Patriarch in China.Master Bodhidharma (d. ca. 528), the twenty-eighth patriarch in India and the First

8         where many practitioners are gathered for Buddhist practice; or, more widely, the state of Buddhist practice. See Chapter Thirty-nine (Vol. II), Furi sōrin. Sōrin, lit., “thicket-forest,” from the Sanskrit piṇḍavana,Dōtoku. suggests a place

9         Modern-day Fukui prefecture. 10 1244.

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Appendix Chinese Masters

JapaneseBanzan Hōshaku                                   Panshan Baoji                                           Pinyin

Baso Dōitsu                                          Mazu Daoyi

Bokushū Dōmyō                                   Muzhou Daoming Busshō Hōtai                                        Foxing Fatai

Chimon Kōso                                        Zhimen Guangzu Chōrei (Fukushu) Shutaku                   Changqing Daan

Chōsha Keishin                                    Changsha Jingcen Daibai Hōjō                                          Damei Fachang Daie Sōkō                                             Dahui Zonggao

Daikan Enō                                           Dajian Huineng Dōfuku                                                  Daofu

Dōgo Enchi                                           Daowu Yuanjie Dōiku                                                    Daoyu Enchi Daian                                          Yuanzhi Daan Engo Kokugon                                      Yuanwu Keqin Esshū Kenpō                                         Yuezhou Qianfeng Fuyō Dōkai                                           Furong Daokai Fuyō Reikun                                         Furong Lingxun Gensha Shibi                                        Xuansha Shibei

Goso Hōen                                            Wuzu Fayan Gutei                                                     Juzhi

Hōgen Bun’eki                                     Fayan Wenyi

Honei Ninyū                                         Baoning Renyong Hōun Ihaku                                           Fayun Weibai

Hyakujō Ekai                                        Baizhang Huaihai Isan Reiyū                                             Guishan Lingyou

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Appendix

Jinshū                                                    Shenxiu

Jōshū Jūshin                                          Zhaozhou Congshen Kaigen Chisō                                        Huiyan Zhicong Kanchi Sōsan                                        Jianzhi Sengcan Kakuhan Ekō                                        Jiaofan Huihong Kazan Shujun                                       Heshan Shouxun

Kisū Chijō                                            Guizong Zhichang Kōan Daigu                                          Gaoan Daiyu

Koboku Hōjō                                        Kumu Facheng Kyōgen Chikan                                     Xiangyan Zhixian Kyōzan Ejaku                                       Yangshan Huiji

Nangaku Ejō                                         Nanyue Huairang Nansen Fugan                                       Nanquan Puyuan

Nan’yō Echū                                         Nanyang Huizhong Ōan Donge                                            Yingan Tanhua Ōbaku Kiun                                          Huangbo Xiyun

Ōryū Enan                                            Huanglong Huinan

Rakan Keichin                                      Luohan Guichen Rinzai Gigen                                         Linji Yixuan

Rōya Ekaku                                          Langye Huijiao

Sanshō Enen                                         Sansheng Huiran Seigen Gyōshi                                      Qingyuan Xingsi Sekimon Etetsu                                     Shimen Huiche

Sekisō Keisho                                       Shishuang Qingzhu Sekitō Kisen                                         Shitou Xiqian

Sempuku Shōko                                    Jianfu Chenggu

Seppō Gison                                         Xuefeng Yicun

Setchō Chikan                                      Xuedou Zhijian

Setchō Jūken                                         Xuedou Chongxian Shinzan Sōmitsu                                   Shenshan Zongmi Sōji                                                       Zongchi

Sōzan Honjaku                                     Caoshan Benji

Sozan Kōnin                                         Shushan Guangren Taigen Fu                                              Taiyuan Fu

Taiso Eka                                              Dazu Huike

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Appendix

Tandō Bunjun                                       Zhantang Wenzhun Tanka Shijun                                         Danxia Zichun

Tendō Nyojō                                         Tiantong Rujing Tenryū                                                   Tianlong

Tokusan Senkan                                    Deshan Xuanjian

Tōsu Daidō                                           Touzi Datong

Tōsu Gisei                                            Touzi Yiqing Tōzan Ryōkai                                        Dongshan Liangjie Ungan Donjō                                        Yunyan Tansheng Ungo Dōyō                                           Yunju Daoying

Unmown Bun’en                                     Yunmen Wenyan Wanshi Shōgaku                                   Hongzhi Zhengjue Yakusan Igen                                        Yueshan Weiyan

Zengen Chūkō                                      Jianyuan Zhongxing

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Glossary of Sanskrit Terms

in the Glossaries of Sanskrit Terms in Volumes I and II. Definitions are drawn in general from cases from the This glossary contains Sanskrit terms appearing in Volume III that are not already listed Chapter references, unless otherwise stated, refer to chapters of the A Sanskrit-English Dictionary Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary by Sir Monier Monier-Williams [MW], and in some[JEBD].                                                    Shōbōgenzō.

Arrangement is according to the English alphabet. abhaya-dāna[MW] Giving assurance of safety. (giving of fearlessness). Represented by Abhaya: unfearful, not dangerous, secure; fearless, mui-se, “giving of fearlessness. Dāna: giving. Recharter 25. undaunted; absence or removal of fear, peace, safety, security. Chapter Forty-five, Bodaisatta-shishōbō, paragraph 72; Lotus Sutra,

adhipati-pratyayaregent, king. over and above; promoting circumstances.” [MW] (overarching circumstances). Represented by Adhipati:Adhi: as a prefix to verbs andzōjō-en,a ruler, commander, “circumstances nouns, expresses above, over and above, besides.

paragraph 201.of circumstance (see Pratyaya:catvāraḥ pratyayāḥa cooperating cause, a circumstance. One of the four types). Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin,

āhrīkya paragraph 216.“shameless beggar,” a Buddhist mendicant. [JEBD] (shamelessness). [MW] upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Ahrī: shameless (as a beggar), shamelessness. Āhrīkya: shamelessness. One Hotsu-bodaishin,Ahrīka: of the

Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya (name; “Kauṇḍinya, He Who Has Known”). Represented phonetically. An-ājñāta:[MW] Name of one of the first five pupils of Śākyamuni. unknown. Ref. Chapter Fifty-five, Ango. Darani, paragraph 112; Chapter Sev-Ājñāta: see an-ājñāta. enty-nine (Vol. IV),

ālambana-pratyaya circumstance.” [MW] (connected circumstance). Represented by Ālambana: depending on or resting upon; hanging from; sup-sho-en-en, “a connected five attributes of things (apprehended by or connected with the five senses). porting, sustaining; foundation, base; reason, cause; (in rhetoric) the natural and necessary connection of a sensation with the cause that excites it; (with Buddhists) Thea cooperating cause, a circumstance. One of the four types of circumstance (seecatvāraḥ pratyayāḥ). Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 201.Pratyaya:

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Ālayavijñānad welling; a receptacle, asylum; (often at the end of a compound; e.g., “abode of snow”). Hotsu-bodaishin,(store consciousness). Represented phonetically. [MW] paragraph 216.Vijñāna: consciousness (see Volume I). Ref. Chapter Seventy,Ālaya:himālaya,a house, āmiṣa-dānaparagraph 72.Āmiṣa:(giving of material objects). Represented by flesh; food, meat, prey; an object of enjoyment, a pleasing or beautifulDāna: giving. Ref. Chapter Forty-five, zaise, “giving of goods.” [MW]Bodaisatta-shishōbō, object; a gift, boon, fee.

Āmra tree. Ref. Chapter Forty-five, (mango) Represented phonetically. [MW] The mango tree, the fruit of the mango paragraph 213.Bodaisatta-shishōbō, paragraph 72; Chapter Seventy,

Hotsu-bodaishin,

Anapatrāpya face. upa kleśa, graph 216.Anapatra:(lack of reserve). [MW] or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, shameless. [JEBD] Apatrap:Anapatrāpya:to be ashamed or bashful, turn away then on-bashfulness. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, para-

anatman Not self, another; something different from spirit or soul; not spiritual, corporeal;(not self, not spiritual). Represented by muga, Butsudō,“no self; without self.” [MW]paragraph 158; Chapter destitute of spirit or mind. Ref. Chapter Forty-nine, Seventy-three, Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō, paragraph 12.

anuttara-pūjāprostration.” [MW] respect, reverence, veneration, homage to superiors or adoration of the gods.  Ref.(highest worship). Represented by Darani,Anuttara: paragraph 110.chief, principal, best, excellent. saijō-raihai, “highest worship; highestPūjā: honor, worship,

Chapter Fifty-five,

artha-caryā aim, purpose; cause, motive, reason; advantage, use, utility; substance, wealth, prop-satta-shishōbō,erty. Caryā: (useful conduct). Represented by conduct (see Volume I, paragraph 80. Brahmacarya rigyō, “beneficial conduct.” [MW] ). Ref. Chapter Forty-five, Bodai -Artha: aśraddhahindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (unbelief). [MW] Want of trust, unbelief. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.upakleśa, or secondary aṣṭākṣaṇāḥof difficulty.” [MW] bodaishin,(eight inopportune situations). Represented by paragraph 196.Aṣṭa: eight. Ākṣaṇa: inopportune. Ref. Chapter Seventy, hachi-nan-sho, “eight places Hotsuauddhatya Restlessness. One of the (disdain). [MW] Arrogance, insolence, overbearing manner, disdain. [JEBDparagraph 216.upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy,]

Hotsu-bodaishin, bhūta (actually happened). Represented by jōtai, “true, real.” [MW] Become, been, gone, past; actually happened, true, real; existing, present. Ref. Chapter Sixty-one, paragraph 39.       Kenbutsu,

buddhānusmṛtiof the Buddha.” [MW] Continual meditation on Buddha; name of a Buddhist sutra.Ref. Chapter Sixty-nine, (mindfulness of the Buddha). Represented by Hotsu-mujōshin, paragraph 175.nenbutsu, “mindfulness

Candrasūryapradīpa (Sun Moon Light; name of a buddha). Represented by Jitsu-get su-Pradīpa :tōmyō, “Sun Moon Torchlight.”[MW] the brilliancy or hue of light (said of gods, of water); the moon (also personified as Candra: glittering, shining (as gold); having Sūrya: the sun or its deity. a deity); “the moon of,” i.e., the most excellent among. explanation. Ref. Chapter Fifty, a light, lamp, lantern; also in titles of explanatory works = elucidation,Shohō-jissō, paragraph 214; Lotus Sutra, chapter 1.

caturmahārāja-kāyikaden, “gods of the four kings.” [MW] “Belonging to the attendance of those four(deities serving the four quarter kings). Represented by Catur: four. Mahārāja: great king; (withshi-ō against the demons). great kings,” name of a class of deities. Buddhists) a particular class of divine beings (the guardians of the earth and heaven sbodaishin, compounds) belonging to an assemblage or multitude. Ref. Chapter Seventy, paragraph 210.Kāyika: performed with the body; corporeal; (at the end of Hotsu-

catvāraḥ pratyayāḥthe concurrent occasion of an event as distinguished from its approximate cause(paragraph 201.resented by pratyaya, see also Volume I). The four are Pratyaya: and shi-en,(adhipati-pratyaya four classes of cooperating cause, four types of circumstance). Reground, basis, motive, or cause of anything; a cooperating cause;“four circumstances; four types of connection.” [MW] hetu-pratyaya, samanantara-pratyaya, ālambana-(q.v.). Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin,Catur:four.

Daśabala-kāśyapa (name; “Kāśyapa, Possessor of Ten Powers”). Represented by Jūriki-five, muni. kashō, “Ten-Powers Kāśyapa.” [MW] Name of one of the first five pupils of Śākya-Darani,Daśabala:paragraph 112.“possessing ten powers,” name of a buddha. Ref. Chapter Fifty-

devaputra-māra of gods.” [MW] Name of one of the four (celestial demons). Represented by māras, Buddhist literature. tenshi-ma,Putra: a son, child. “demons who are sons Deva:Māra: heavenly,[q.v.] demons. Ref. Chapter Seventy, divine; a deity god; (rarely applied to) evil demons. Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

Dharmasaṃgrahatechnical terms. Note: The (name of a Buddhist glossary). [MW] Name of a collection of Buddhist Hotsu-bodaishin,Dharmasaṃgrahaparagraph 216.is attributed to Master Nāgārjuna.

Ref. Chapter Seventy, dharma-svabhāva-mudrāform.” [MW] Dharma:(the seal of reality itself). Represented by reality. Svabhāva: native place; own condition or state ofjissō-in, “seal of real being, natural state or constitution, innate or inherent disposition, nature. seal. Ref. Chapter Fifty, Shohō-jissō, paragraph 213; Lotus Sutra, chapter 2.Mudrā:

dharmoddānaseal.” [MW] Dharma: the teaching of the Buddha. (that which fastens the Dharma together). Represented byUddāna: Butsudō,the act of binding on,hō-in, paragraph 158.“Dharmafastening together, stringing. Ref. Chapter Forty-nine,

dīrghāyur-devaDīrghāyu:(aṣṭākṣaṇāḥ(long-lived. gods of long life). Represented by ). Ref. Chapter Seventy, Deva: god, deity. One of the eight inopportune situations Hotsu-bodaishin,chōju-ten, paragraph 196.“gods of long life.” [MW] dvāra-bhūtānimeans” [MW] (gate of actual occurrences). Represented by Dvāra: door, gate, passage, entrance. hōben-mon,Bhūta:Shohō-jissō,[q.v.] an actual occur “gate of expedient paragraph 215;-

Lotus Sutra,rence, fact, matter of fact, reality. Ref. Chapter Fifty, chapter 10.

dveṣaSenmen,(hatred). [MW] Hatred, dislike, repugnance, enmity to. Ref. Chapter Fifty-six, paragraph 124.

hetu-pratyayaHotsu-bodaishin,the four types of circumstance (see section; a circumstance that is a direct cause.” [MW] cause, cause of, reason for. (a directly responsible circumstance). Represented by paragraph 201.Pratyaya:catvāraḥ pratyayāḥa cooperating cause, a circumstance. One of Hetu:). Ref. Chapter Seventy, “impulse,” motive, innen, “causal con-

indriyavaikalya Chapter Seventy, of sense. muteness.” [MW] the mighty Indra; bodily power, power of the senses; faculty of sense, sense, organ Vaikalya:(impairment of the senses). Represented by Indriya: imperfection, weakness, defectiveness, incompetency, power, force, the quality of which belongs especially tomō-rō-a, “blindness, deafness, aṣṭākṣaṇāḥ). Ref. confusion, flurry. One of the eight inopportune situations (Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 196.

īrṣyā One of the (envy). [MW] Envy or impatience of another’s success; spite, malice; jealousy. upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

kāmadhātuDhātu: region of the wishes, seat of the (layer, constituent part; element (see Volume I). Ref. Chapter Forty-seven,world of volition). Represented by paragraph 107; Chapter Seventy, kāmāvacarayokkai,(q.v.). Hotsu-bodaishin,“world of desire.” [MW] The Kāma: wish, desire, longing. paragraph 216.

Sangai-yuishin,

Kāmāvacaraten also called caturmahārāja-kāyikā6) paranirmitavaśa-vartina, “six heavens of desire.” [MW] The spheres or worlds of desire (six in number,(worlds of desire; the gods or inhabitants thereof). Represented by devaloka), Buddhist; the gods or inhabitants of the worlds of desire: s, 2) s. Ref. Chapter Seventy, trāyastriṃśās, 3) tuṣitās, 4) Hotsu-bodaishin,yāmās, 5) nirmāṇa-ratayaparagraph 216.roku-yoku-1)s, Kanyākubja (name of ancient city). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of an ancient a branch of the Gangā, in the modern district of Farrukhabad . . . the ruins of the city of great note (in the northwestern provinces of India, situated on the Kālīnadī, seven, ancient city are said to occupy a site larger than that of London). Ref. Chapter Fifty-Menju, paragraph 170. kaukṛty a secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (remorse). [MW] Evil doing, wickedness, repentance. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.upakleśa, or kausīdyaor secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (indolence). [MW] Sloth, indolence; the practice of usury. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.upa kleśa, kleśa“aversion”; and Pain, affliction, distress, pain from disease, anguish; (in yoga philosophy five are named, viz. (affliction, trouble). Represented by abhiniveśa,avidyā, “ignorance”; “tenacity of mundane existence”; the Buddhists reckonbonnō,asmitā,“affliction, trouble, hindrance.” [MW]“egotism”; rāga, “desire”; dveṣa,kleśas abuse, unprofitable conversation], three of the mind [covetousness, malice, skep-ten, viz. three of the body [murder, theft, adultery], four of speech [lying, slander, ticism]); wrath, anger; worldly occupation, care, trouble. Ref. Chapter Fifty-seven,Menju, paragraph 170; Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

kleśāvaraṇa“anguish-obstacle” or trouble. (Āvaraṇa:the obstacle of delusion, layers of interference). Represented by hiding, concealing; shutting, enclosing; an obstruction, interruption;waku-shō, “delusion-obstacle.” [MW] Kleśa: [q.v.] affliction, bonnō-shō, a covering, garment, cloth; anything that protects, an outer bar or fence; a wall, ashield; (in philosophy) mental blindness. veils the real nature of things). Ref. Chapter Fifty-seven, Śakti: the power of illusion (that which Menju, paragraph 170. krodhadrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (wrath). [MW] Anger, wrath, passion. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.upakleśa, or secondary hinmadaRef. Chapter Seventy, passion for; sexual desire or enjoyment, wanton lust, brutishness; pride, arrogance,(presumption). [MW] Hilarity, rapture, excitement, inspiration, intoxication; ardentupakleśa, or secondary hindrances. presumption, conceit of or about. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

Malaya (name of a mountain range). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of a mountain Chapter Fifty-six, range on the west of Malabar, the Western Ghāts (abounding in sandal trees). Ref.Senmen, paragraph 130.

mānaRef. Chapter Seventy, conceit; arrogance, pride; (with Buddhists, one of the six evil feelings; or one of the ten fetters to be got rid of). One of the (arrogance). [MW] Opinion, notion, conception, idea; purpose, wish, design; self Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.mūla-kleśa, or root causes of suffering. mañjūṣaka species of celestial flower. Ref. Chapter Fifty-nine, (name of a celestial flower). Represented phonetically. [MW] Name of aBaike, paragraph 204. māra[MW] Killing, destroying; death, pestilence; slaying, killing; an obstacle, hindrance;(death, the Evil One, demons). Represented by ma, “demon, devil, evil spirit.” the passion of love, god of love; (with Buddhists) the Destroyer, Evil One (who tempts men to indulge their passions and is the great enemy of the Buddha and his Maras are enumerated in

Ref. Chapter Seventy, races of gods led to the figment of millions of kleśa-māra, devaputra-māra, religion; four Hotsu-bodaishin, and mṛityu-māra;Dharmasaṃgraha paragraph 216.mārabut the later Buddhist theory of s ruled over by a chief Māra).80, viz. skandha-māra, mātsaryaor secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (meanness). [MW] Envy, jealousy. [JEBD] Parsimony. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.upakleśa, māyālanguage); illusion, unreality, deception, fraud, trick, sorcery, witchcraft, magic;duplicity (with Buddhists one of the twenty-four minor evil passions), saṃgrahaHotsu-bodaishin,(duplicity). [MW] Wisdom, extraordinary or supernatural power (only in the earlier69. One of the paragraph 216.upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Dharma-

middhaevil passions, secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (indolence, drowsiness). [MW] Sloth, indolence (one of the twenty-four minor Dharmasaṃgraha 69). [JEBD] Drowsiness. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.upakleśa, or

mithyādarśana view, doctrine, philosophical system; appearance (before the judge); appearance, seeing, observing, looking, noticing, observation, perception; audience, meeting; experiencing; judgment; discernment, understanding, intellect; opinion; intention; tearily, incorrectly, wrongly, improperly. “worldly wise and fast-talking.” [MW] A false appearance. (pretentiousness; making a false show). Represented by Darśana: showing; exhibiting, teaching; Mithyā:aṣṭākṣaṇāḥ invertedly, con-sechi-bensō,). Ref. aspect, semblance; color. One of the eight inopportune situations (Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 196.

mrakṣaof the twenty-four minor evil qualities), (hypocrisy). [MW] Concealment of one’s vices, hypocrisy (with Buddhists, oneDharmasaṃgrahaHotsu-bodaishin,69. One of the paragraph 216.upa kleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, mṛtyu-māra Buddhists) name of one of the four (demons of death). Represented by Hotsu-bodaishin,māras. paragraph 216.Mṛtyu:shima,death, dying. “demons of death.” [MW] (with Māra: [q.v.] demons.

Ref. Chapter Seventy,

mūḍhaloss about; stupid, foolish, dull, silly, simple; swooned, indolent; gone astray orin delivery); not to be ascertained, not clear, indistinct; confusion of mind. One of adrift; driven out of its course (as a ship); wrong, out of the right place (as the fetus(ignorance). [MW] Stupified, bewildered, perplexed, confused, uncertain or at amūla-kleśa, or root causes of suffering. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, the paragraph 216.

Namas paragraph 152; Chapter Eighty-eight (Vol. IV), reverential salutation, adoration (by gesture or word). Ref. Chapter Sixty-nine,(obeisance, reverential salutation). Represented phonetically. [MW] Bow, obeisance, paragraph 175; Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), Kie-sanbō; Chapter Ninety-threeKuyō-shobutsu,

Hotsu-mujōshin,

(Vol. IV), Doshin.

Nikāya paragraph 132.group, class, association (especially of persons who perform the same duties); con-(school, collection). Represented by bu, “part.” [MW] A heap, an assemblage, a Senmen, aggregation, school; collection (of Buddhist sutras). Ref. Chapter Fifty-six,

nirmāṇakāya and the body of transformation. making, creating, creation, building, composition, work; (with Buddhists) transformation. saṃbhogakāya.Kāya:(body of transformation). Represented by body. One of the three bodies, the other two being the Ref. Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II), Nirmāṇa:Tsuki, paragraph 3; measuring, measure, reach, extent; forming, Lotus Sutra,ōjin, “the befitting body.” [MW]Gyōbutsu-yuigi, chapter 25.dharmakāyaparagraph 99; Chapter Forty-two,

nirmāṇarati- devaresented by keraku-ten,(name of inhabitants of the fifth heaven in the world of desire). Rep “gods who create pleasure.” [MW] “Enjoying pleasures pro-Nirmā: to build,fondness for; the pleasure of love, sexual passion or union, amorous enjoyment.Deva:make out of, form, fabricate, produce, create. vided by themselves,” a class of beings inhabiting the fifth heaven. a deity, god. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin,Rati: pleasure, enjoyment, delight in,paragraph 210.

nivāsanaLiving, residing, sojourn, abode; passing or spending time. Ref. Chapter SevenVol. I), ([garment for] everyday living). Represented by Senjō; Chapter Fifty-six, Senmen, paragraph 132.kun or kunzu, “skirt.” [MW]

(

oṃ (“Truly!”). Represented phonetically. [MW] A word of solemn affirmation and respectful assent, sometimes translated by “yes, verily, so be it” (and in this sense compared mystical formulary in six syllables [viz. Vedas or previously to any prayer; it is also regarded as a particle of auspicious with “amen”; it is placed at the commencement of most Hindu works, and as a salutation [Hail]). Buddhists place sacred exclamation may be uttered at the beginning and end of a reading of theoṃ at the beginning of their oṃ maṇi padme hūṃ]. Ref. Chapter Sixty vidyā ṣadakṣarī or-one, Kenbutsu, paragraph 54.

pāpīyasworse off, lower, poorer, more or most wicked or miserable; a villain, a rascal; (withbodaishin. Buddhists) (most wicked ones, evil spirits, the devil). Represented phonetically. [MW] Worse, māraḥ-pāpīyān, the evil spirit, the devil. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-

paranirmita-vaśa-vartin Represented by take-jizai-ten,(name of deities in the sixth heaven in the world of desire“gods who transform others and do as they please.”). [Buddhist deities. Ref. Chapter Seventy, MW] “Constantly enjoying pleasures provided by others,” name of a class of Hotsu-bodaishin.

parivrājakaRef. Chapter Fifty-six, (a wandering religious mendicant). [MW] A wandering religious mendicant.Senmen, paragraph 142. pitṛ (deceased father, grandfathers and great-grandfathers of any particular person, and deceased ancestor). [MW] Deceased ancestors (they are of two classes, viz. the the progenitors of mankind generally; they inhabit a peculiar region, which, according to some, is the moon.) See under Yamarāja.bhuvas or region of the air, according to others, the orbit of the

pradāsaDāsa:Ref. Chapter Seventy, (devil). [MW] fiend, demon. [JEBD] Affliction. One of the Pra:Hotsu-bodaishin ,as prefix to substantive; in nouns of relationship = great-.paragraph 216.upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Pramāda of the (negligence). [MW] Intoxication, insanity; negligence, carelessness about. One upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

Pratigha anger, wrath, enmity (one of the six evil passions). One of the (anger). [MW] Hindrance, obstruction, resistance, opposition; struggling against;Hotsu-bodaishin,mūla-kleśa,paragraph 216.or root causes of suffering. Ref. Chapter Seventy,

Pratipādana producing, causing, effecting, accomplishing; stating, setting forth; explaining; beginning, commencement; action, worldly conduct. Ref. Chapter Sixty-one, butsu,[MW] Causing to attain, giving, granting; putting in, appointing to; inauguration; paragraph 54.(accomplishing, action). Represented by shukō, “plan, device, scheme.”Ken-

pratisammodana[MW] Greeting, salutation. Ref. Chapter Fifty-five, (salutation). Represented by monjin, “inquiring after [a person’s health].”Darani, paragraph 106.

pratyantajanapadapada: A bordering country. (bordering country). Represented by Pratyanta: bordering on, adjacent or contiguous to, skirting;henchi, “remote place.” [MW]Janaa bordering country; i.e. a country occupied by barbarians; barbarous tribes.

    Hotsu-bodaishin, country. One of the eight inopportune situations (a community, nation, people (as opposed to the sovereign); an empire, inhabited paragraph 196. aṣṭākṣaṇāḥ). Ref. Chapter Seventy,

priyākhyāna beloved, dear to, liked, favorite; dear, expensive; pleasant, agreeable; love, kindness.(kind communication). Represented by telling, communication. Ref. Chapter Forty-five, aigo, “loving words.” [MW] Bodaisatta-shishōbō.Priya:

Ākhyāna: rāja-samādhiRāja: a king, sovereign, chief or best of its kind. (king of samādhis). Represented by ō-zanmai,Samādhi:“king of putting together, joiningsamādhis.” [MW] last stage of settlement; justification of a statement, proof; bringing into harmony, agreement, assent; intense application or fixing the mind on, intentness, attention; concentration gate, set; completion, accomplishment, conclusion; setting to rights, adjustment, ticular object (so as to identify the contemplator with the object meditated upon;of the thoughts, profound or abstract meditation, intense contemplation of any par-or combining with; a joint or a particular position of the neck; union, a whole, aggre-samādhi is the fourth and this is the eighth and last stage of yoga; with Buddhists

trance. Note: among these definitions, “union,” “setting to rights,” and “bringinginto harmony,” are most relevant to the meaning of dhyāna or intense abstract meditation); intense absorption or a kind of mai-ō-zanmai.set right; to be directed or informed or instructed. Ref. Chapter Seventy-two, Shōbōgenzō. Also instructive is the definition of samādheya:samādhito be put in order oras described in the Zan-

rūpadhātu of form, original seat or region of form (with Buddhists; the other two elements(kāmadhātu world of form). Represented by (q.v.) and ārūpyadhātu,shikikai,“element of formlessness”). “world of form.” [MW] The elementRūpa: any being

material form. Forty-seven, outward appearance or phenomenon or color, form, shape, figure; (with Buddhists)Sangai-yuishin.Dhātu: layer, constituent part; element (see Volume I). Ref. Chapter

samāna-arthatāation.” [MW] Equivalence; having the same object or end; identity of meaning. same, identical, uniform, one; alike, similar, equal; holding the middle(sharing the same aim). Represented by dōji, “identity of task; cooper-Artha:

Samāna: aim, purpose. Ref. Chapter Forty-five, between two extremes, middling, moderate; common, general, universal. Bodaisatta-shishōbō.

samanantara-pratyayastance. One of the four types of circumstance (see en, “immediate circumstance.” [MW] (immediately contiguous circumstance). Represented by Samanantara: Pratyaya:catvāraḥ pratyayāḥa cooperating cause, a circum-immediately contiguous to or). Ref. Chapte rtōmukenfollowing; immediately behind or after.

Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 201.

saṃgrahavastūnirelations; methods for social relations.” [MW] Elements of popularity. (elements of sociability). Represented by shōbō, “elements of social Sarah: attracting, kind treatment, propitiation, entertaining. really existing or abiding substance or essence, thing, object, article; the pith or substance of anything. Ref. Chapter Forty-five, assembling (of men); collecting, gathering; inclusion; check, restraint, control; holding together, seizing, grasping, taking, reception, obtainment; bringing together, Bodaisatta-shishōbō.Vastu: the seat or place of; any

saṃjñāmutual understanding, harmony; consciousness, clear knowledge or understanding(thought). Represented by sō, “idea, thought, conception.” [MW] Agreement, or notion or conception; a sign, token, signal, gesture (with the hand, eyes, etc.);direction; a track; a name, appellation; (with Buddhists) perception (one of the fiveskandhas). Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216. śāṭhyakleśa,216.(roguery). [MW] Wickedness, deceit, guile, roguery, dishonesty. One of the or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraphupa śrī (to diffuse light). Represented phonetically. [MW] To burn, flame, diffuse light. Ref. Chapter Sixty-one, Kenbutsu, paragraph 54. styānaof the (sloth). [MW] Idleness, sloth, apathy (see Volume I). [JEBD] Low spirits. One upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

Śubhavyūharāja (name of a legendary king). Represented by Myō-shōgon-ō, “King Won-Śubha:derfully Adorned,” “King Resplendent.” [MW] Name of a king, Buddhist literature. righteous, virtuous. 27.Rāja:ment of the parts of the whole; military array; form, manifestation, appearance. king. Ref. Chapter Sixty-one, splendid, bright, beautiful; pleasant, good; auspicious; good (in moral sense),Vyūha: placing apart, distribution, arrangement; orderly arrange-Kenbutsu, paragraph 47; Lotus Sutra, chapter

sūryaone, (the sun). Represented phonetically. [MW] The sun or its deity. Ref. Chapter Sixty Kenbutsu, paragraph 54.                                                                                        -

tathāgatānām-anutpādago, Seventy, taking effect. One of the eight inopportune situations ((epithet of the Buddha). “periods before and after the Buddha.” [MW] Tathāgata: “being in such a state” Hotsu-bodaishin,(absence of the Tathāgata). Represented by Anutpāda: paragraph 196.non-production; not coming into existence; notaṣṭākṣaṇāḥbutsu-zen-butsu-). Ref. Chapter tatkṣaṇaan eye, moment; a moment regarded as a measure of time. Ref. Chapter Seventy,moment; at the same moment, directly, immediately. (“that moment”; a measure of time). Represented phonetically. [MW] The same paragraph 196.Kṣaṇa: any instantaneous point of time, instant, twinkling ofTat: (in compounds for tad) he, she, it, that, this.

Hotsu-bodaishin,

tiryañcanimal (amphibious, animal, bird, etc.). One of the eight inopportune situations(aṣṭākṣaṇāḥ(animals). Represented by ). Ref. Chapter Seventy, chikushō,Hotsu-bodaishin,“animals.” [MW] “Going horizontally,” anparagraph 196.

Trāyastriṃśa (numbering thirty-three; name of a heaven). Represented by “thirty-three gods.” [MW] The thirty-third; consisting of thirty-three parts; numbering thirty-three (the gods). Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin. sanjūsan-ten, trayo dhātavaḥTraya: triple, threefold, consisting of three, of three kinds. Ref. Chapter Forty-seven,(triple world). Represented by sangai, “three worlds, triple world.” [MW]

Sangai-yuishin.

upakleśa[MW] (With Buddhists) a lesser (secondary hindrances). Represented by (prefixed to nouns upa expresses) direction toward, nearness, contiguity inkleśa or cause of misery (as conceit, pride, etc.).zui-bonnō, “secondary hindrances.”

Upa: subordination and inferiority. Ref. Chapter Seventy, space, time, number, degree, resemblance, and relationship, but with the idea of Hotsu-bodaishin,Kleśa: (q.v.) affliction, pain from disease, trouble. Paragraph 216.

upanāha ciliary glands, stye; the tie of a lute (the lower part of the tail piece where the wires(continual enmity). [MW] Bundle, a plaster, unguent; inflammation of the upakleśa, or secondary hindrances. Ref. are fixed); continual enmity. One of the Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

vaiḍūrya(Sixty-one, at the end of a compound: “a jewel” = “anything excellent of its kind”). Ref. Chapter(cat’s eye gem; lapis lazuli). Represented phonetically. [MW] A cat’s eye gemKenbutsu, paragraph 39.

Vajragarbha (Diamond Treasury; name of a bodhisattva). Represented by Kongōzō, “Dia-Vajrasattva). Mond Treasury.” [MW] Name of a bodhisattva. Garbha: the womb; the inside, middle, interior of anything, calyx (asVajra: a diamond (see Volume I, of a lotus); (at the end of a compound “having in the interior, containing, filledwith”). Ref. Chapter Forty-two, Tsuki, paragraph 12. vicikitsāmūla-kleśa, paragraph 216.(doubt). [MW] Doubt, uncertainty, question, inquiry; error, mistake. One of theor root causes of suffering. Ref. Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-bodaishin, vidyā ṣaḍakṣarī arship, philosophy (see Volume I). (“six-syllable philosophy”). [MW] Kenbutsu, paragraph 54.Ṣaḍakṣarī:Vidyā:consisting of six syllables. Ref.knowledge, learning, school

Chapter Sixty-one,

vihiṃsāondary hindrances. Ref. Chapter Seventy, (harming). [MW] The act of harming or injuring. One of the Hotsu-bodaishin,upakleśa, paragraph 216.or secvijñāna-mātratā matter; (at the end of compounds) measure, quantity, sum, size, duration, measure of “consciousness alone.” [MW] (consciousness as no more or less than it is). Represented by Vijñāna: consciousness. Mātra: an element, elementary yuishiki, less than anything. Ref. Chapter Seventy, any kind; the full or simple measure of anything; the whole or totality, the one thing and no more. Mātratā: (at the end of compounds) the being as much as, no more nor Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 216.

Vijñānavāda (doctrine of consciousness). [MW] The doctrine (of the Yogācāras) that consciousness or thought-faculty (one of the five constituent elements or only intelligence has reality (not the objects exterior to us). Vijñāna: (with Buddhistsskan dhas),) also considered as one of the six elements or in the chain of causation. Vāda: thesis, proposition, argument, doctrine. Note: Indhātus, and as one of the twelve links bodaishin ,be confused with idealism. Ref. Chapter Forty-three, of external objects; it affirms the reality of consciousness. Vijñānavāda should not spite of MW’s interpretation here, Vijñānavāda teaching does not deny the reality paragraph 216.      Kūge; Chapter Seventy, Hotsu-

Yamarāja (King Yama, ruler of the spirits of the dead). Represented phonetically. [MW]and rules the spirits of the dead; in post-Vedic mythology he is the appointed judge curbing, suppression, restraint; name of the god who presides over the King Yama. Yama: a rein, curb, bridle; a driver, charioteer; the act of checking or pitṛs (q.v.)

    and “restrainer” or “punisher” of the dead; his abode is in some region of the lowerworld called Yamapura. Chapter Fifty-two, Bukkyō,Shukke-kudoku,Rāja:paragraph 49; Chapter Seventy, a king, sovereign, chief or best of its kind. Ref.paragraph 88. Hotsu-bodaishin; Chapter

Eighty-six (Vol. IV),

Bibliography

I . Main Chinese Sources Quoted by Master Dōgen in the Shōbōgenzō

A. SutrasAttempts at English translations of sutra titles are provisional, and provided only forreference.

AgonkyōZōagongyōJōagongyō(Āgama sutras). In Chinese translation, there are four(Long Āgama Sutra;(Middle Āgama Sutra;Pāli Skt. Dīgha-nikāyaMadhyamāgama;Skt. Saṃyuktāgama;)                                             :Pāli Majjhima-nikāyaPāli Samyutta- )

Chūagongyō(Miscellaneous Āgama Sutra;

ZōitsuagongyōAṅguttara-nikāyanikāya)              (Āgama Sutras Increased by One;)    Skt. Ekottarāgama; Pāli

These are supplemented by the

comprises fifteen short books.Āgamas. In the Pāli canon, the kāgama; Pāli Khuddaka-nikāyaKhuddaka-nikāyaShōagongyō), a collection of all the Āgamas beside the four(Small Āgama Sutras;is the fifth of the five Nikāyas andSkt. Kṣudra -

Aikuōkyō (Aśoka Sutra)

Butsuhongyōjikkyō (Sutra of Collected Past Deeds of the Buddha)

Daibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōman and the Buddha) (Sutra of Questions and Answers between Mahābrah-

Daihannyagyō Great Prajñāpāramitā;(Great Prajñā SutraSkt. Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra), short for Daihannyaharamittakyō )                                                     (Sutra of the

Daihatsunehangyō (Sutra of the Great Demise; Skt. Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra) Daihōkōengakushutararyōgikyō (Mahāvaipulya Round Realization Sutra) Daihōkōhōkyōgyō (Mahāvaipulya Treasure Chest Sutra)

Daihōshakkyō (Great Treasure Accumulation Sutra; Skt. Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtra)

DaijōhonshōshinchikankyōLives) (Mahayana Sutra of Reflection on the Mental State in Past

Daishūkyō (Great Collection Sutra; Skt. Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra) Engakukyō (Sutra of Round Realization)

Fuyōkyō (Sutra of Diffusion of Shining Artlessness; Skt. Lalitavistara-sūtra)

393

Higekyō (Flower of Compassion Sutra; Skt. Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtra)

Hokkekyōof the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma;(Lotus Sutra, Sutra of the Flower of DharmaSkt. ), short for Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraMyōhōrengekyō (Sutra)

Hokkukyō (Sutra of Dharma Phrases; Pāli Dhammapada)

Honjōgyō (Past Lives Sutra; Skt. Jātaka)

Juōkyō (Ten Kings Sutra)

Kanfugenbosatsugyōbōkyō Universal Virtue) (Sutra of Reflection on the Practice of Dharma by Bodhisattva

Kegongyō (Garland Sutra; Skt. Avataṃsaka-sūtra)

Kengukyō (Sutra of the Wise and the Foolish)

Keukōryōkudokukyō (Sutra of Comparison of the Merits of Rare Occurrences)

Kongōkyō Prajñāpāramitā;(Diamond SutraSkt. ), short for Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtraKongōhannyaharamitsukyō ) (Sutra of the Diamond

Konkōmyōkyōof the Supreme King;(Golden Light SutraSkt. Suvarṇaprabhāsottamarāja-sūtra), short for Konkōmyōsaishōkyō) (Golden Light Sutra

Mirokujōshōkyō (Sutra of Maitreya’s Ascent and Birth in Tuṣita Heaven)

Mizouinnenkyō (Sutra of Unprecedented Episodes)

Ninnōgyō Sutra of the Benevolent King(Benevolent King Sutra), short for )                                                         Ninnōhannyaharamitsugyō  (Prajñā pāramitā

Senjūhyakuenkyō (Sutra of a Hundred Collected Stories) Shakubukurakangyō (Sutra of the Defeat of the Arhat)

Shobutsuyōshūkyō (Sutra of the Collected Essentials of the Buddhas) Shugyōhongikyō (Sutra of Past Occurrences of Practice)

Shuryōgonkyō (Śūraṃgama Sutra; Skt. Śūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśa-sūtra) Yōrakuhongikyō (Sutra of Past Deeds as a String of Pearls)

Yuimagyō (Vimalakīrti Sutra; Skt. Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtra) Zuiōhongikyō (Sutra of Auspicious Past Occurrences)

  1. B.  Precepts

Bonmōkyō (Pure Net Sutra)

Daibikusanzenyuigikyō (Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms for Ordained Monks)

Jūjuritsu Sarvāstivādin school(Precepts in Ten Parts), a sixty-one–fascicle translation of the Vinaya of the Konponsetsuissaiubuhyakuichikatsuma sarvāsti vādin School) (One Hundred and One Customs of the Mūla -

Makasōgiritsuof the Mahāsaṃghika school of Hinayana Buddhism (Precepts for the Great Sangha), a forty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya Shibunritsu the Dharmaguptaka school(Precepts in Four Divisions), a sixty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya of

Zen’enshingi (Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries)

C. Commentaries

Bosatsuchijikyō (Sutra of Maintaining the Bodhisattva State)

Daibibasharon (Skt. Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra)

Daichidoron prajñā pāramitopadeśa(Commentary on the Accomplishment which is Great Wisdom;)                                                                                              Skt. Mahā -

Daijōgishō (Writings on the Mahayana Teachings)

HokkezanmaisengiDharma) (A Humble Expression of the Form of the Samādhi of the Flower of

Kusharon (Abhidharmakośa-śāstra)

Makashikan Chigi, founder of the Tendai sect(Great Quietness and Reflection), a record of the lectures of Master Tendai

Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu Quietness and ReflectionKeikei Tannen       ), a Chinese commentary on the (Extensive Decisions Transmitted in Support of GreatMakashikan by Master

D. General Chinese Buddhist Records

Daitōsaiikiki (Great Tang Records of Western Lands)

Gotōroku Tenshōkotōroku in the Kataifutōroku compiled during the Song era (960–1279). They are represented in summary form(Five Records of the TorchGotōegen Supplementary Record of the Torch(Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch(Collection of the Fundamentals of the Five Torches(Keitoku Era Record of the Transmission of the Torch), five independent but complementary collections)                                      ) ) ). They are) :

Rentōeyō Keitokudentōroku (Collection of Essentials for Continuation of the Torch

       Zokutōroku (    (Tensho Era Record of the Widely Extending Torch)

Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record)

Hōonjurin in one hundred volumes(A Forest of Pearls in the Garden of Dharma), a kind of Buddhist encyclopedia

Kaigenshakkyōroku (Kaigen Era Records of Śākyamuni’s Teaching)

Kosonshukugoroku (Record of the Words of the Venerable Patriarchs of the Past) Rinkanroku (Forest Record), short for Sekimonrinkanroku (Sekimon’s Forest Record) Sōkōsōden (Biographies of Noble Monks of the Song Era)

Zenmonshososhigeju (Verses and Eulogies of Ancestral Masters of the Zen Lineages) Zenrinhōkun (Treasure Instruction from the Zen Forest)

Zenshūjukorenjutsūshū of the Zen Sect)  (Complete String-of-Pearls Collection of Eulogies to Past Masters Zokudentōroku in China in 1635 as a sequel to the (Continuation of the Record of the Transmission of the TorchKeitokuden tōroku  ), published

Zokukankosonshukugyō of the Past) (Summarized Collection of the Words of the Venerable Patriarchs

E. Records of and Independent Works by Chinese Masters

Basodōitsuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Baso Dōitsu)

Bukkagekisetsuroku of Master Setchō Jūken(Record of Bukka’s Attacks on Knotty Problems); Bukka is an alias

Chōreishutakuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Chōrei Shutaku)

Daiefugakuzenjishūmonbuko Sōkō]) (War Chest of the School of Zen Master Daie Fugaku [Daie

Daiegoroku (Record of the Words of Daie Sōkō)

Daiezenjitōmei (Inscriptions on the Stupa of Zen Master Daie Sōkō)

Engozenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Engo Kokugon) Jōshūroku (Records of Jōshū Jūshin)

Jūgendan (Discussion of the Ten Kinds of Profundity), by Master Dōan Josatsu Hōezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Yōgi Hōe)

Hōkyōzanmai (Samādhi, the State of a Jewel Mirror), by Master Tōzan Ryōkai

Hōneininyūzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Hōnei Ninyu)

Hyakujōroku (Record of Hyakujō Ekai)

Kidōshū by Rinsen Jurin(Kidō Collection), a collection of the words of Master Tanka Shijun, compiled

Kōkezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Kōke Sonshō) Nyojōoshōgoroku (Record of the Words of Master Tendō Nyojō)

Ōandongezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Oan Donge) Rinzaizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Rinzai Gigen)

Rokusodaishihōbōdankyō attributed to Master Daikan Enō(Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patrirach’s Dharma Treasure),

Sandōkai (Experiencing the State), by Master Sekitō Kisen

Sekitōsōan-no-uta (Songs from Sekitō’s Thatched Hut), by Master Sekitō Kisen

Setchōmyōkakuzenjigoroku Jūken]) (Record of the Words of Zen Master Setchō Myōkaku [Setchō

Shinjinmei (Inscription on Believing Mind), by Master Kanchi Sōsan

Shōdōka (Song of Experiencing the Truth), by Master Yōka Genkaku

Sōtairoku (Record of Answers to an Emperor), by Master Busshō Tokkō

Tōzangoroku (Record of the Words of Tōzan Ryōkai)

Unmongoroku (Broad Record of Unmown Bun’en)

Wanshijuko Record()Wanshi’s Eulogies to Past Masters), also known as the Sho yo roku (Relaxation

Wanshikoroku (Broad Record of Wanshi Shōgaku)

Wanshizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Wanshi Shōgaku)

Yafudōsenkongōkyō (Yafu Dōsen’s Diamond Sutra)

F. Chinese Non-Buddhist and Secular Works

Confucianist:Rongo Kōkyō ((Book of Filial PietyDiscourses of Confucius) )

Daoist:Shishi,Rikutō Bunshi,Inzui Kanshi,(Rhymes of Good Fortune(from the Chinese Six Strategiesfrom the Chinese (History of the Three Elements and Five Elements) Wenzi,Shizi,Guanzi,the name of the supposed author)the name of the author to whom the text is ascribedthe name of the supposed author the name of a disciple of Laozi (the ancient)

Sangoryakuki

Sōji,Chinese philosopher regarded as the founder of Daoism)from the Chinese from the Chinese Zhangzi,

Miscellaneous:Meihōki Jiruisenshū Jibutsugenki (Jōkan Era Treatise on the Essence of GovernmentCollection of Matters and Examples(Record of the Origin of Things) )       )       )                                                                        )

Jōkanseiyō

Taiheikōki (Chronicles of the Underworld((Widely Extending Record of the Taihei Era

II. Other Works by Master Dōgen

Eiheikōroku (Broad Record of Eihei)

Eiheishingi Fushukuhanhō Cook), etc.(Pure Criteria of Eihei(The Method of Taking Meals), including: Bendōhō ), Tenzokyōkun (Methods of Pursuing the Truth(Instructions for the),

Fukanzazengi (Universal Guide to the Standard Method of Zazen) Gakudōyōjinshū (Collection of Concerns in Learning the Truth) Hōgyōki (Hōgyō Era Record)

Shinji-shōbōgenzō (Right Dharma-eye Treasury, in Original Chinese Characters) III. Japanese References Akiyama, Hanji. Dōgen-no-kenkyū. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1935.

Eto, Soku-o. Shōbōgenzō-ji-i. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1965.

Hakuju, Ui, ed. Bukkyo-jiten. Tokyo: Daito Shuppansha, 1935.

Hashida, Kunihiko. Shōbōgenzō-shaku-i. 4 vols. Tokyo: Sankibo Busshorin, 1939–1950. Hokkekyō. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1964–1967.

Jinbo, Nyoten, and Bunei Ando, eds.

—. Zengaku-jiten.Genzo Chūkai Zensho Kankōkai, 1965–1968.Kyoto: Heirakuji Shoten, 1976.Shōbōgenzō-chūkai-zensho. 10 vols. Tokyo: Shōbō

Jingde chuan deng lu (Keitokudentōroku). Taipei: Zhenshan mei chu ban she, 1967. Kindaichi, Kyosuke, ed. Jikai. Tokyo: Sanseidō, 1970.

Morohashi, Tetsuji. Dai-kanwa-jiten. 13 vols. Tokyo: Daishūkan Shoten, 1955–1960.

Mujaku, Kosen. Shōbō Genzō Shoten-zoku-cho. Tokyo: Komeisha, 1896.

Nakajima, Kenzo, ed. Sōgō-rekishi-nenpyō. Tokyo: Nitchi Shuppan, 1951.

—.Nakamura, Hajime, ed. Shin-bukkyo-jiten. Tokyo: Seishin Shobo, 1962.Bukkyogo-daijiten. 3 vols. Tokyo: Tokyo Shoseki, 1975.

Nishiari, Bokuzan. Shōbōgenzō-keiteki. Tokyo: Daihorinkaku, 1979–1980.

—.Nishijima, Gudo. Tokyo: Kanazawa Bunko, 1982–1986.volumes plus a one-volume appendix. Tokyo: Kana zawa Bunko, 1970–1981.ShōbōgenzōteishorokuGendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese(Record of Lectures on Shōbōgenzō). Thirty-four volumes.). Twelve

Ōkubo, Dōshū. Dōgen-zenji-den-no-kenkyū. Tokyo: Chikuma Shobo, 1966.

Oyanagi, Shigeta. Shinshū-kanwa-daijiten. Tokyo: Hakubunkan, 1937.

Satomi, Ton. Dōgen-zenji-no-hanashi. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1953.

Sawaki, Kodo. Sawaki-kodo-zenshu. 19 vols. Tokyo: Daihōrinkaku, 1962–1967.

Shōbōgenzō.and Yaoko Mizuno. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, n.d.Commentaries by Minoru Nishio, Genryu Kaga mi shi ma, Tokugen Sakai,

Taishō-shinshū-daizōkyō. Tokyo: Taishō Issaikyō Kankōkai, 1924–1932.

Tetsugaku-jiten. Tokyo: Hibonsha, 1971.

Tetsugaku-shōjiten. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1938.

Watsuji, Tetsuro. Watsuji-tetsuro-zenshū. Vols. 4, 5. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1961–1963. Zengaku-daijiten.1985. Edited by scholars of Komazawa University. Tokyo: Daishūkan Shoten,

Zokuzōkyō.Taipei: Xin Wen Feng chu ban gong si, 1976–1977.Collection of Buddhist sutras not included in the Taishō-shinshū-daizōkyō.

IV. English References

Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary. Tokyo: Daitō Shuppansha, 1979.

Masuda, Koh, ed. 1974.        Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-English Dictionary. Tokyo: Kenkyusha, Monier-Williams, Sir Monier. Press, 1899. A Sanskrit-English Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Nelson, Andrew. 1974. Japanese-English Character Dictionary. Rutland, VT: Charles Tuttle,

Schiffer, Wilhelm, and Yoshiro Tamura. 1975(1930). A revised version of  by Bunno Kato and William Soothill.The Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful LawThe Threefold Lotus Sutra. New York: Weatherhill,

Schumann, H. W. The Historical Buddha. New York: Arkana, 1989.

Spahn, Mark, and Wolfgang Hadamitzky. Asssociates, 1989. Japanese Character Dictionary. Tokyo: Nichigai

 

Index

A

Abundant Treasures  263, 264Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra. SeeAbhidharmakośā-śāstraAbhidharma (Bibasharon110, 309, 310, see also Tripiṭaka)  46315362 aggregate(s)  142, 337, 344, 356, 357, 363ācāryaĀgama sutras  45Aikuōkyōfive  14, 50, 58, 191, 203, 327, 333,340, 341, 347, 352, 356, 45, 46, 273, 344  357

Ajita-Keśakambala (Ajātaśatru, King  220Buddhist teachers)  206see also six nonĀmrapāli  221Akṣobhya  50, 57ālayavijñāna. SeeĀjñāta-Kauṇḍinya  182, 187consciousness, store

Ānanda  50, 53, 54, 57, 95, 112, 136,Anavatapta (Āmrapālivana  213, 221210, 219 see also Lake Anavatapta)

Anhui province  169, 283, 307267 See Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya20, 113, 115,

Āññāta-Koṇḍañña. arhathood  153, 196, 236, 337, 346anuttara samyaksaṃbodhiarhat(s)  147, 237, 273sixteen  245, 273171355, 203, 264, 265, 337, 339, 351,, 365, 366 ārūpyadhātu. See

Aśoka, King  40, 45, 46, 220, 267, 268,Aśvajit  182asura344world; world, of non-matters  140, 151 three worlds, triple

Avataṃsaka-sūtraAvalokiteśvara  27, 242Sutra; Kegongyō(see also Garland)  242, 283

B

BendōwaBanpō Peak  295, 296Baso Dōitsu  11, 27, 35, 104, 105, 106,Banzan Hōshaku  4Baoning Renyong. Bāṣpa  182, 187Baizhang Huaihai. Benares (One)  225126177, 145, 153, 172, 173, 174, 175,, 216, 217, 222, 223, 269, see also(see also Shōbōgenzō,Vārāṇasī)  220SeeSee Hyakujō EkaiHonei NinyūChapter283

Bhadrika  182Bhadiya. Benka  236, 245See Bhadrika

Bhāradvāja  245bhagavats  251, 255  (, 340, 341, 353, s) (see also monk)  xvii, 9, 195,354see also King of bhikṣu

Bhīṣmagarjitasvararāja (196

401

Bi, Bizuda (281Majestic Voice)  152see also Gensha Shibi)  275,

Bimbisāra, King  206, 221BibasharonBihar  220  344, 360, See361Enshinryū Blue Cliff Record. See HekiganrokuBlessed Mind school.

159339367

Bodhidharma  23, 24, 49, 53, 54, 57, 58,bodhiBodhgayā (methods, thirty-seven auxiliary  214,59153242276332340-, 83, 84, 88, 91, 103, 104, 135, 152,mind  76, 265, 335, 336, 337, 338,6, 340, 341, 344, 349–52, 354, 355,, , 187, 209, 214, 219, 221, 241,, 243, 244, 245, 250, 270, 275,, 277, 281, 282, 287, 288, 319,, 333, 374, , 171, 182, 233, 260, 287, 338,, 342, 345, 350, 351, 356, 359,, , 15, 49, 62, 102, 112, 114, 115,357371see also375Uruvilvā)  220, 227

bodhi339

bodhisattva(s)  39, 40, 43, 113–114, 124,great  210, 262356139262, 141, 153, 172, 189, 190, 197,, 342, 350, 354, 355, 356, 361, 367

Bokushū Dōmyō (body(ies), of the Buddha, buddha(s),bodhibodhi-way  113, 197, 259, 367social relations, elements of  39–43, 45100Tathā gata (373tree  142, 220, 227, 327, 344, 347,seat  190, 108, 148, 183, 214, 220, 257, 272,, 327, 328, 345, 351, 365–67, see alsosee alsoDharma body)  5,Chen)  55, 58,370

284

Brahma Heavens  180Book of Filial Piety. See Kōkyōbonnō. See kleśa106, 151, 152, (s153)

Brahmanistic  361brahman(s)  206, 245, 253

49

Bu, Emperor  57Buddha (102153191212236249262269327351373133xv, xvi, xvii, 6, 19, 20, 26, 40, 45, 46,, 57, 58, 62, 69, 87, 91, 95, 100,, 104, 112, 114, 116, 125, 132,, 163, 175, 182, 183, 184, 186,, 195–96, 199, 201, 206, 207, 210,, 213, 219, 220, 221, 232, 235,, 237, 242, 244, 245, 247, 248,, 250, 253, 254, 257, 258, 261,, 263, 264, 265, 266, 267, 268,, 271, 273, 284, 295, 300, 307,, 331, 336, 337, 338, 340, 344,, 353–54, 355, 360, 367, 369, 370,, 374 , 143, 146, 147, 148, 149, 152,see also Gautama; Śākyamuni)

face  210, 211, 214death  46, 207, 220disciple(s)  4, 5, 10, 85, 94, 143, 148,eye(s), Eye  17, 100, 133, 211, 242,almsbowl  45, 344body  3, 4, 108, 184, 220brightness  199, 214196264, 197, , 295 248

name  344, 372mouth  206, 261, 366order  206, 221, 245, 264, 273

Way  77, 78wisdom  91, 125, 270, 296words  69, 92, 100, 104, 248, 254, 262,truth  4, 54, 73, 81, 87, 88, 89, 91, 92,world  32, 83teaching(s)  18, 85, 147, 171, 177, 187,relics  220, 22194146–47215342242269, 95, 99, 101, 116, 118, 119, 133,, 217, 227, 314, 336, 339, 341,, 350, 356, , , 341, 373, 148, 150, 190, 198, 214,355 366 buddha(s)  5, 15, 17, 20, 21, 22, 29, 31, 36,4079, 52, 57, 61, 64, 65, 69, 70, 73, 74,, 87, 89, 90, 91, 95, 97, 100, 102,, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 116, 121,, 125, 129, 130, 132, 133, 135, 136,, 141, 142, 144, 145, 152, 155, 156,

109123139159190, 214, 216, 219, 220, 226, 230, 234,, 191, 192, 193, 197, 198, 210, 211,, 160, 161, 162, 167, 172, 173, 184,

213236

287332, 270, 272, 273, 276, 277, 280, 282,, 237, 245, 247, 248, 254, 257–68,

body(ies)  5, 214, 351eternal  5, 29–33, 35, 36, 50, 54, 55, 87,ascendant state of  1, 27236134326991145216237280296, 345, 346, 350, 351, 354, 356, 359,, 367, , 336, 337, 338, 339, 340, 341, 342,, 291–92, 320, 324, 325, 326, 328,, 92, 93, 99, 116, 117, 119, 120,, 165, 184, 201, 209, 210, 215,, 229, 230, 231, 232, 235, 236,, 238, 265, 275, 276, 278, 279,, 285, 287, 288, 289, 294, 295,, 328, 336, 340, 346, 366, 374      372

-past  76, 91, 92, 167, 184, 216, 264seven ancient (forty  29, 87, 114image(s)  57, 197mind, -mind–seal  85, Buddhas)  103, 124, 219see also214Seven

Buddha-Dharma  7, 9, 31, 54, 55, 65, 66,-truth  80, 90, 209, 248transformed  263, 272wisdom  141, 6797118145182214310, 75, 78, 88, 89, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96,, 98, 100, 102, 103, 115–116, 117,, 119, 125, 131, 132, 133, 143, 144,, 146, 147, 148, 152, 157, 164,, 189, 190, 192, 197, 198, 207,, 259, 264, 265, 269, 270, 272,, 311, 312, 338, 339, 352, 344    372 Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha (see also

Buddhahood  338, 351, 355, 367, 370buddha land(s)  57, 100, 112, 237, 247,buddha-nature  15, 24, 46, 74, 75, 78, 83,Buddha hall  18, 25, 254, 276, 296, 328buddhānusmṛti. SeeBuddha’s Mind sect  91, 100Three Treasures)  xv, 192, 338248Buddha; 84, 338, 340, , 249, 260, nenbutsu341270mindfulness, of thesee also)      Tathāgata)

buddha-tathāgata(s) (

241307

Buddhist(s)  xvi, 15, 36, 39, 45, 57, 61,Buddhism  xv, xvi, 3, 15, 16, 39, 41, 46,almsbowl (attitude  272, 291, 309791863003436112515, 131, 132, 139, 146, 155, 171, 183,, 73, 79, 87, 95, 96, 104, 109, 119,, 242, , 189, 207, 209, 273, 274, 283,, 303, 308, 314, 317, 319, 325,, 344, , 242, 245, 272, 273, 293, 303,, 319, 325, 335, , 129, 139, 151, 157, 189, 209,331362see also pātra343)  299

lecture, preaching, teaching  167, 168,learning, practice, training  77, 79,effort  84, 104effect  171, 213intellectual (343105, 222, 331, 345, see also śrāvaka375      )  153

monk(s)  61, 73, 206, 229, 253, 273, 275master(s), teacher(s)  189, 222, 273,life  39, 189, 293285, 325, 361

patriarchs  xvi, 4, 5, 10, 11, 14, 15, 20,order  107, 1082288109, 29, 50, 51, 52, 53, 55, 74, 75, 79,, 89, 90, 91, 93, 98, 100, 101, 102,, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, Buddhist(s) (patriarch(s) (131145179193210237, 132, 133, 134, 139, 142, 144,, 146, 155–56, 159, 165, 166,, 180, 182, 183, 190, 191, 192,, 195, 197, 198, 201, 202, 204,, 211, 215, 216, 218, 230, 234,, 275, 277, 284, 285, 286, 293,, 295, 297, 303, 304, 309, 310,, 322, 327, 328, 331, 332, 336,, 342, 354, 367, 371, 372, , 241, 248, 258, 259, 262, 265,continuedcontinued) ) 118, 121, 130,373

268294313

practitioner(s)  26, 126, 272, 300philosophy  3, 24, 49, 87, 247, 347,364341

process  281, 308, 344

sutra(s)  24, 139, 140, 142, 143, 144,state  69, 70, 85, 275sect(s)  87, 100146213, 147, 148, 150, 151, 152, 153,, 248, 265, 325, 338, 365

truth  39, 73, 87, 325, 335theory, thought  xv, 3, 61, 73, 293, 349,temple(s)  148, 269, 307, 308371

Buddhist Patriarch (view, viewpoint  285, 291Patriarch)  63, 102, 143, 162, 210,, 251, 337, see also Buddha;

212

Bukkagekisetsurokusee also 372Seven Buddhas)  234

Bunka era  xviiBukkoku (Bukkan Egon  313Seven ( see also Hōun Ihaku)  218, 223324

Bunnō, King  94, 101, 105Buō, King  105Busshō Hōtai (see also Hōtai)  316

C

Candrasūryapradīpa. caityaLight(s) (see also stupa)  369See Sun Moon Changqing Daan. Central Philosophy of Buddhism, TheCaoshan Benji. SeeSeeSeeSōzan HonjakuChōrei ShutakuChōsha Keishin363

Chen (Changsha Jingcen. 145see also, 152, see also153Bokushū Dōmyō)  98,

Children’s Day  47Chimon Kōso (Chikan (58, 316, 324see alsoKyōgen Chikan)  319Hokutō Kōso)

China  xvi, 10, 31, 35, 36, 43, 49, 57, 58,83118, 91, 95, 101, 103, 104, 105, 116,

Chinese  xviii, 11, 47, 73, 106, 107, 108,153354316283245209167, 126, 136, 139, 148, 154, 158,, 189, 199, 207, 241, 291, 299,, 317, 319, 324, 325, , 169, 192, 198, 201, 204, 207,, 246, 248, 270, 280, 281, 282,, 291, 292, 293, 303, 307, 315,, 317, 319, 325, 332, 336, 347,, 357, 359, 372, 374, , 212, 214, 222, 225, 232, 237,344375

Chiyō district  280Chishō 332Chisō (Chinshū Fuke (Chinshū district  97, 268language  xvii, xviii, 9, 11, 45, 46, 126,anthology, book, chronicle, history,31525413546316source, text, translation  xviii, 10,see also, 47, 83, 222, 223, 254, 270, 282,, 179, 180, 185, 187, 242, 253,, 271, 360, 362, , 332 see alsoKaigen Chisō)  100, 101Hōtei)  11371

Chōreishutakuzenjigoroku

Chōro Sōsaku  206, 361Chō Setsu  18Chōsha KeishinChūsō, Emperor  153, 154Chōrei Shutaku  312, 316Chōkei-in Temple  296, 300316

Complete String-of-Pearls Collection ofCommentary to Follow Martens, A. SeecittaSect. See ZenshūjukorenjutsūshūEulogies to Past Masters of the ZenShōtenzokuchō352(see also, 359                    mind, thinking)  349, 350,

Confucius  146, 147, 177, 265consciousness  25, 46, 58, 80, 162, 163,Confucian, Confucianism, Confucianist70172333, 116, 125, 147, , 203, 204, 226, 235, 305, 306,, 357, 359, 363, 364, 177                           372

mind-  162, 327karmic  287auditory  161

Cross, Chodo  xviiConstellation King of Flower Wisdomconsciousness only (seven  364six  357, 364store  364with Voice of Thunder  264Vijñānavāda school)  364see also Yogācāra-

D

Daibai Hōjō  119, 126, 283, 307Daian (Dahui Zonggao. see also Enchi Daian)  296See Daie Sōkō 219), 325

Daibyakumyōzan (Daibutsuji (DaibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōNenge chapter  103, 331(“Picking Up of a Flower”see alsosee alsoEiheiji)  335Tendō Moun-

229tain, Tendō Temple, Tendōzan)  209,see also Hyakujō Ekai)  96, 105,

Daichidoron Daichi (153 (see also Mahāprajñā pāra -

Daidō Myōkaku. mitopadeśa)  10, 45, 344, 362, See Tōsu Daidō 375 Daie (Daien (see alsosee alsoNangaku Ejō)  275–76, 282Isan Reiyū)  96, 10583Sōkō) 74, 83

Dai Hōgen (DaihatsunehangyōDaigu (Daie ShōbōgenzōDaie Sōkō (Daie’s Right Dharma-eye Treasury. SeeDaie Shōbōgenzōsee alsosee also see alsoKōan Daigu)  97, 145, 152360Hōgen Bun’eki)  98,, 362

DaihōkōengakushutararyōgikyōDaii (107319see also, 258, , 332 269Isan Reiyū)  54, 96, 105,11, 187

Daii Mountain, Daiizan  96, 105, 313Daii Dōshin  283

Daijaku (Daii sect  96see also Baso Dōitsu)  92, 172,

124178273

Daiyūhō (Daitsu. Daishū  295Daiman Kōnin (Daikōmyōzō. Daishō (Daikan Enō (3658282ness35177, 156, 161, 167, 336, , 103, 151, 152, 153, 187, 219, 227,, 36, 46, 58, 103, 104, 106, 107,, 283, 333, 347 , 135, 151, 152, 153, 154, 167,, 187, 209, 219, 244, 269, 270,, 282, 317, 333,  Seesee alsosee alsoJinshūsee alsoSeesee alsoNan’yō Echū)  29, 31,Vault of Great Bright-Great and MightySixth Patriarch)343Fifth Patriarch)343

dānaDamei Fachang. Dajian Huineng. Daiyurei Mountain  30, 35104Peak; Hyakujōzan)  299(see also pāramitā, dāna-See Daibai HōjōDaikan Enō)  39, 45,

See

Dāna school. Danaryū  26 See Danaryū

Daofu. Dao, Daoism, Daoist(s)  47, 105, 116,Danxia Zichun. 125, 146, 147, 153, 207, See DōfukuSee Tanka Shijun Daoyu. Dasabala-Kassapa. Daowu Yuanjie. KāśyapaSee DōikuSeeSeesee alsoDōgo EnchiDaśabala-317

demon(s) (Dazu Huike. Dayang Jingxuan. Daśabala-Kāśyapa (celestial  116, 144, 356, 357, 362, 364113251, 151, 156, 172, 182, 238, 248,, 336, 356–57, 362, 364, see also asuraSee Taiso EkaSee Taiyō Kyōgen )  88, 89, 95,Bāṣpa)  187371

devadhāraṇīDeshan Xuanjian. four kinds of  356–57king of (337s ( (s)  xvii, 16, 17, 20, 24, 46, 65,see alsoSeeMāra)  362, 372Tokusan Senkan see also(s)  179–80, 183–84, 187, 194,god)  151

dharma74115233, 100, 109–110, 111–112, 113, 114,, 121, 124, 174, 178, 190, 203,, 353, 355, 356, 364, , 235, 238, 262, 338, 339, 346,see also Buddha-Dharma;366

Dharma (Dharma-eye treasury)  xv, xvii, xviii, 4,Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; right352, 13, 14, 31, 36, 39, 40, 41, 45, 50, 52,, 90, 92, 93, 97, 98, 102, 104, 109,, 113, 114, 115, 116, 119, 124, 126,, 132, 133, 136, 141, 144, 145, 146,, 149, 151, 153, 155, 156, 157, 158,, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 169,, 173, 180, 182, 183, 184, 189, 191,, 196, 201, 203, 207, 209, 212, 216,, 218, 220, 221, 231, 233, 241, 242,, 248, 270, 272, 317, 331, 337, 338,, 346, 351, 361

553112130147159171192217247

aggregates  337, 344340

gate(s)  91, 104, 156, 200, 210, 226, 355-benevolence  181, 182, 186child, descendant(s), grandchild, suc-eye(s)  xviii, xix, 133, 242, cessor  31, 78, 91, 98, 217, 218,312, 313 295

pivot  120, 121, 196latter, age of  9

preaching  116, 132, 141, 155–61, 162,practice  132, 336163245, 164, 165, 167, 168, 186, 203,, 248, 262, 265, 291, 339

right  91, 95, 116, 126, 143, 164, 179,183

world  xvi, 142, 191, 232, 350wheel  5, 74, 132, 167, 183, 184, 213,transmission  43, 104, 130, 140, 141,succession  29, 50, 112, 216, 217, 218seal  90, 103231209213, 232, 248, 287, 291, 324, , 190, 191, 192, 194, 201, 207,, 233, 338, 356     373

Dharmaguptakas  105Dharma Flower (Dharma body(ies)  3, 4, 15, 64, 304Dharmacakra Stupa  220Dharma) see also Flower of

Dharmarājika Stupa  220Dharma-nature  75, 171–75, 178, 337, 345Dharma King (dharmakāya. SeeDharma hall  91, 92, 119, 215, 222, 229,230289, 235, 236, 279, 285, 286, 288,, 295, 296see alsoDharma body363Buddha)  187 dhyānaDharmasaṃgrahadhūtaDhṛtarāṣṭra  361six)  88, 89, 103, 104, 227, 260, 271difficult, hard; twelve ancient)  197,(s) , 275, (see also(see also281meditation; practice, ascetic,pāramitās,

206

Dōan Dōhi  99, 107Diamond SutraDiamond Treasury (garbha)  6   269see also, 270 Vajra -

3770

Dōgo Enchi  25, 36, 280, 283, 307Doan Jōsatsu  23Dōfuku  50, 52, 57Dōgen (lineage  35, 83, 104, 107, 135, 291,1081391712042252552823083253478, 9, 10, 13, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 35,299, 39, 43, 45, 46, 47, 49, 57, 61, 69,, 73, 83, 84, 85, 87, 103, 105, 106,, 109, 123, 125, 126, 127, 135, 136,, 151, 152, 153, 155, 167, 168, 169,, 177, 179, 185, 186, 187, 189, 203,, 205, 207, 209, 210, 215, 219, 222,, 229, 241, 244, 245, 246, 247, 254,, 257, 270, 271, 272, 274, 275, 281,, 283, 284, 285, 292, 293, 299, 303,, 309, 315, 316, 317, 319, 323, 324,, 331, 332, 335, 343, 344, 345, 346,, 349, 364, 365, 369, 370, see also, 315   Eihei)  xv–xvii, xviii, 3,371

Dōyō (dragon(s)  9, 10, 149, 182, 230, 241, 243,Dragon King. Dongshan Liangjie. Dōiku  50, 52, 57Dōkai (Dōgozan  36260see also, 267, 303–306, 336, 372, see alsoSeeUngo Dōyō)  136Fuyō Dōkai)  293AnavataptaSee Tōzan Ryōkai375

E

eighteen articles of monks  197Eastern Lands (Eastern Capital (East China Sea  30099276316, 133, 149, 160, 183, 204, 234, 275,, 277, 309, 337, 359, see alsosee alsoChina)  48, 88,Tōkei district)374

eighteen spheres  113

Eighth Patriarch (Eighteenth Patriarch (Dōkai)  299, 315see alsosee alsoSekitō Kisen)Fuyō

eight oceans  31299

Eisai  199, 207EiheikōrokuEiheiji (Eihei (eight stupas  213–214, 220eight troubled worlds  350, 359see alsosee alsosee alsosee also335269Nangaku Ejō)  276Taiso Eka)  50, 52, 209Dōgen)  197Daibutsuji)  xvii, 194,

202, 205, Ejō (

element(s)  92, 190, 347Eka (five  203four  14, 16, 50, 57, 58, 191, 203, 327,six  25, 203333, 340, 341, 347, 356, 363, see also Tōzan370

Enchi Daian  296, 300, 343Engo Kokugon  26, 27, 29, 30, 35, 83,emptiness  22, 24, 28, 142, 144, 191,EngozenjiogorokuEleventh Patriarch (flowers of  22, 28116316204Ryōkai)  291, 315, 124, 125, 281, 311, 313, 315,, , 248, 253, 312, 336, 339, 317of  142, 253, 343281, 316     346 kalpa

Esshū 102, 121, 134, 150, 166, 174,Enshinryū  26Eshō (Enō (Enō (year of)  201184335see alsosee also, 202, 226, 238, 245, 251, 290,, 342, 357, Daikan Enō)  87Rinzai Gigen)  97, 106see alsoSekimon Etetsu)  22367      Kempō) 255

Etsu district, Etsu-shū 67, 81, 215, 297,Etetsu (Esshū Kempō (306, 314, 322, 329, see also 374 Eyes of Human Beings and GodsEye, the  100, 231, 233, 235, 285–90,expedient means, methods (291skillful means)  41, 113, 114, 115,, 328, 341, 347, , 141, 151 372 see also101, 107 124

F

First Patriarch (Fifth Patriarch (Fayun Weibai. Fayan Wenyi. Farrukhabad  22090, 149, 226, 341, SeeSeesee alsosee alsoHōgen Bun’ekiHōun Ihaku347Bodhidharma)Daiman Kōnin)

five aggregates. First Sermon of the Buddha, The49234, 50, 51, 55, 76, 90, 103, 146, 181,, 319, 336, 374, aggregate(s), five  375 363 five eyes  233, 242five companions  182, 186–87See Five Records of the Torch. See Gotōrokufive lakes  277, 282

flower(s) (five sects. five relative positions  93, 105, 144, 146of emptiness  22, 28blossom, flower; utpala, 39, 40, 53, 64, 65, 74, 109, 112,, 126, 131, 132, 134, 136, 141,, 157, 158, 164, 174, 178, 191,, 210, 214, 221, 229, 230, 232,, 234, 236, 241, 242, 243, 244,, 275, 281, 287, 296, 300, 325–28,, 332, 333, 336, 337, 344, 365, )  13–18, 20–22, 25, 27, 31, 33,See sect(s), fivelotus flower; plumuḍumbara flower;366 see also

36115155196233266331

mandārava, mahāmandāravain space  13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22,heavenly  179, 23224242, 28, 65, 232      232232, mañjūṣaka, mahāmañjūṣaka

Flower Adornment Sutra. See Avataṃ -Flower of Dharma (124saka-sūtra, 189, 262      see also Lotus Sutra)

Flower of Dharma Commentary. SeeFounding Patriarch (dharma)  13Hokkeron see alsosee also Gautama)Bodhi -

four continents  39, 361Founding Patriarch (335  See element(s), four

Four Noble Truths  xvi, xvii, 106, 187,four-line discrimination, four lines  248,four heavenly kings, four quarter kingsfour elements. 359253354, 361, 362 

fourth effect (four relations between reflection andfour phases of Buddhist philosophy  87,four peaceful and joyful practices  189,four oceans  277, 282, 285action  144255203                     see also arhat)  236, 237,

Fuke (Fukui prefecture  xvii, 71, 86, 127, 137,Foxing Fatai. Fugen. four thoughts  144, 145four upset states  192, 204Fourth Patriarch (Shinpitsubon154347280245125see also, 169, , 283  , See267, 168 Samantabhadra178SeeKōke Sonshō)  203, 301,104see alsoBusshō HōtaiDaii Dōshin)126

FukanzazengiRufubon (“Popular Edition”)  (“Original Edition”)  26, Fun’yō Zenshō 27, 105Furong Daokai. See

Fuyō Dōkai (Fuyōzan  20Furong Lingxun. Fuyō Reikun (see alsosee alsoSeeFuyō DōkaiDōkai)  46, 299, 315Fuyō ReikunReikun)  27

Fuzan Hōen  105Fuzhou district  20

G

Ganges River  18, 132, 220, 259, 260, 266Garland Sutra347sūtra; Kegongyō(see also Avataṃsaka-)  11, 69, 199, 242,

gasshō, gasshō-monjingate(s)  18, 22, 25, 27, 28, 66, 71, 104,dhāraṇī“Pure Conduct” chapter  194114, 124, 141, 146, 206, 183, 187 186, 253 312 of liberation  114of expedient methods  113, 114–115,Dharma, of Dharma  91, 104, 156,124200, 141, , 210, 226, 151 355 gateless  22, 28, 279, 280Gautama (of teaching  140nirvana’s  251xv, xvi, xvii, 84, 87, 119, 209, 231,see also Buddha; Śākyamuni)

233

General Record of Zen Master UnmonGendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzōjikōroku  Kyōshin. See Unmonkyōshinzen-288, 234, 238, 249, 250, 251, 279, 285,, 325, 327, 328, 331, 343, xvii365

Gensha Shibi  36, 70, 107, 121, 126, 127,Gensha-in Temple  65, 98, 120, 251167291, 255, 276, 278, 280, 281, 283,, 300, 323, 324

German  13Genshazan  275

god(s)  7, 10, 14, 31, 42, 99, 100, 116,Geyāśata  220124153230304355, 129, 130, 144, 145, 147, 151,, 163, 197, 198, 201, 206, 207,, 231, 232, 233, 242, 251, 266,, 336, 338, 340, 344, 351, 354,, 356, 360, 361, 362, 373, 375

Godai Mountain  277, 282Godai Impō 185see also Tōzan Ryōkai)  73, 74,

Goso Hōen (GoshainzuiGolden Light Sutra. See KonkōmyōkyōGohon (98, 159, 286, 291, 47see also Hōen)  35, 125,309317

Gṛdhrakūṭa (GotōrokuGotōegen246, 311, 313, 315, 22211see also, 25, 27, 36, 106, Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa;255

Vulture Peak)  270, 369see also

Great Vehicle (Great Saint (Great Isan Mountain (Great and Mighty Peak (Mountain; Daiizan)  105Daiyūhō)  294, 295, 299see alsosee alsoBuddha)  147see alsoMahayana)  198,Isan

Guanzi. Guishan Lingyou. 258 See KanchuSee

Gutei  277–78, 282, 283Gumō (Guotai Hongdao. Guizong Zhichang. see also Chisō)  101SeeSeeKokutai KōtōIsan ReiyūKisū Chijō

Gyōshi (Gyō, Emperor  293, 294, 299see also Seigen Gyōshi)  99

H

Hangyō Kōzen  xviiHakkun Shutan  246, 317Hakukin  47Hall of Serene Light. Hadamitzky, Wolfgang  221, 333See Jakkōdō heaven(s)  6, 31, 32, 40, 41, 99, 116, 140,Hatano, Yoshishige  37Haradai  281Happy Buddha. sons of  361, 364six, of the world of desire  361, 362,147249360364, 158, 162, 230, 231, 232, 242,, 254, 277, 287, 288, 337, 355,, 362, 366See Hōtei

Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich  xvheavenly  130, 230flowers  179, 232kings  354 11, 315, See Kazan Shujun316

Hekiganroku

Himalayas (Higashiyama district  37Heshan Shouxun. Mountains)  343see also Setsuzan; Snow

Hōgen sect  87, 98Hōgen Bun’eki (Hōen (History of the State of Shin. See Shinjosee also Goso Hōen)  238see also269 Dai Hōgen) 92,

98, 107, 258,

HōgyōkiHōgyō Era Record. See HōgyōkiHōgyō era  119, 210, 215

Hokkeronsee also204

Hongzhi Zhengjue. Hokutō Kōso (Hōjō (Honei Ninyū  268, 273Honeininyūzenjigoroku312 26 see alsoKōboku Hōjō) 310SeeChimon Kōso)Wanshi Shōgaku273

Hōun Hoshu  223hṛdayaHōtatsu  153Hōtei (Hōun Ihaku (Hōtai (see alsosee also(see alsosee alsoChinshū Fuke)  11Busshō Hōtai)  313mind, of grass andBukkoku)  223 trees)  349, 359

Huangbo Xiyun. Huang basin  167See

Hunan province  167, 282, 315, 316Huihan Zhicong. Hubei province  300Huanglong Huinan. SeeSeeŌbaku KiunKaigen ChisōŌryū Enan

Hyakujō Ekai 11, 96, 105, 106, 145,153294, 206, 216, 217, 218, 222, 223,, 299, 300, 323

Hyakujō sect  96Hyakujōzan (and Mighty Peak)  299see also Daiyūhō; Great

I

Igyō (see also

India, Indian  xvi, 46, 58, 88, 95, 105,Igyō sect  87, 96, 98116181219276350Ejaku)  92, 106, 133, 135, 139, 149, 153, 160,, 192, 201, 204, 206, 209, 213,, 220, 234, 237, 242, 272, 275,, 277, 282, 319, 325, 332, 337,, 354, 357, 369, Isan Reiyū; Kyōzan375

Isan Mountain (I-o-nō. Indus River  254Instructions for the Cook. See Tenzo kyō -Indra  31, 344, 361, 362Moun tain)  96, 296, 300kun See Bhīṣmagarjitasvararājasee alsosee alsoDaii)  96, 105, 106,Great Isan                     323

Isan Reiyū (107, 151, 185, 272, 296, 300, 307,

J

Japan  10, 25, 47, 49, 81, 121, 126, 158,Jakkōdō  119, 126Jambudvīpa  350, 355220185, 241, 251, 273, 324, , 199, 201, 204, 205, 207, 215,359

Japanese  xviii, 11, 25, 57, 120, 175, 205,238, 241, 289, 295, 299, 308 language  xvii, xviii, 9, 11, 26, 45, 57,103

Jianzhi Sengcan. Jianyuan Zhongxing. Jetavana Park  100Japanese-English Character DictionaryJapanese-English Buddhist DictionaryJapanese Character Dictionary33357347, 105, 333, , 185, 223, 242, 249, 274, 331,, 360, 371See362SeeSeeSempuku ShōkoKanchi SōsanSeeKakuhan EkōZengen Chūkō221, 333

Jianfu Chenggu.

Jizō-in Temple  65, 98, 107Jisai (Jimyō Soen  107 Jin dynasty  347Jinshū  149, 153, 347Jinso, Emperor  215Jiaofan Huihong. see also, 307    see alsoTōsu Daidō)  5, 165, 169,Koboku Hōjō)

303

Jōin Koboku (Jōji Temple, Jōjiji  289, 294, 295, 299, 300310, 315

Junki era  101Jōshū Jūshin  30, 36, 53, 54, 55, 58, 66,Jōshū district  5, 165, 297, 300, 303, 307Jūken (71, 268, 271, 274, 297, see also Setchō Jūken)  312, 322300

K

Kaigen Era Records of Śākyamuni’sKaigen Chisō (see also Chisō)  107 Kajō era  198KaigenshakkyōrokuTeaching. See Kaigenshakkyōrokusee also332 six non-

Kakuda-Kātyāyana (

kalpaKakuhan Ekō (Buddhist teachers)  206(s)  17, 90, 93, 118, 130, 163, 164,, 182, 184, 193, 212, 266, 285,, 342, 351, 370, see also373Sekimon)  103

168338

of emptiness  142, 253, 343asaṃkhyacountless  17, 172, 173, 217, 304, 350,367, 373152, 184, 350

great  350fifty minor  373

hundred major  235151

Kanchi Sōsan (Kan  316kāmadhātu. Seekalyāṇamitra283world; world, of desiresee alsothree worlds, triple, 272 Third Patriarch)

Kangen era  11, 22, 33, 55, 67, 81, 102,Kanchu  47120202297357, 121, 134, 150, 166, 175, 184,, 215, 226, 251, 268, 280, 290,, 306, 314, 322, 329, 335, 342,, 367, 374

KanshiKant, Immanuel  13KannonkyōKannondōrikōshōhōrinji  8, 22, 55, 20136

42, 47

Kapilavastu (Kanyākubja  213, 220koṭ)  220 see also Piprāvā; Tilaura -

Kauṇḍinya. Kāśyapīyas  105KataifutōrokuKāśyapa (Kassan Mountain  239, 246, 311 Kassan Zenne  246kaṣāya karmic  287, 363103190, 210, , 192, 226, (see alsosee alsoSee219136Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinyarobe)  180, 183, 184,282Mahākāśyapa)  88,, 315 

Kazan Buttō, Kazan Shujun (Kauśāmbī  245Shujun)  313, 317(see also Avataṃsaka-sūtra;)  242                                          see also

Kegongyō Garland Sutra

KeitokudentōrokuKeigenfu, Keigenfu City  209, 229, 296,Keichin (70254300311, 84, 104, 135, 167, 168, 169, 185,, , 255, 281, 282, 284, 291, 299,, 307, 308, 317, 332, 343, 312see also Rakan Keichin)  65, 6610, 23, 25, 27, 37, 58,347

Ken gu kyōKenchō era  202  Kempō (Keiyu era  215Keitokuji  35, 229, 315see also332                         Esshū Kempō)  251

Ken gō kyō

Kichijōzan  194, 202Kenninji  207  Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-EnglishKenkōfu City  279Dictionarysee also20626Kōzei)  35, 222, 317, 57

Kiangsi (

King Aśoka Sutra. See Aikuōkyō

King of Emptiness (see also

King Resplendent  264, 272King of Majestic Voice (235Emptiness)  142, 152, 155, 161, 180,Majestic Voice)  266, 336, 343, 343       see alsoKing ofKing of

Kisū Chijō (Kippōji, Kippō Temple  81, 102, 121,Kinzan Mountain  74134226367314, 150, 166, 175, 184, 202, 215,, 245, 251, 329, 335, 342, 357,, 374, 317(see alsosee also ShunjūShishin)  20, 27,)  314, 317 

Kirin Sutrakirin

Kō (Kisūji  20Kitsureiji (Temple)  238, 245106(s)  26, 221, 362–, 153see alsoSōkō)  84 Kippōji, Kippō31663 kleśa

kōansee also(s)  83, 222, 307,

Koboku Hōjō (Kōan Daigu (Kōkaku (Kōke Sonshō (Konkōmyōkyō  KōkyōKokyū Shōryū  125Kongōhannyaharamitsukyō. See DiamondSutra70see alsosee alsosee alsosee also9  Ungo Dōyō)  129Daigu) 106, 153Jōin Koboku)  315Fuke)  203

KoshingiKośala  206, 245, 273206       Fuyō Reikun)  27

Koshū Tenryū (Kōshū district  172, 313Kōshō (Kōshō (see alsosee alsosee alsoRōya Ekaku)  21, 27Tenryū)  282,

Kōtakuji  31, 156Kōsonshukugoroku283       58, 177, 274, 343

Kōzei district  92, 106, 172Kōzei (Koto Mountain  319see also Baso Dōitsu)  29, 35, 118

Kū-ō. Kyōgen Chikan (Kumu Facheng. Kumārajīva  362Kōzei sect  96185332See , 305, 307, 319, 320, 322, 323,, 344, King of Emptiness378Seesee alsoKoboku HōjōShūtō) 151,

Kyōgenji  304, 319see also

Kyōzan Ejaku  96, 97, 106, 185, 272Kyōshin (Kyoto  59Higashiyama district  37106, 215, 222 Unmown Bun’en)  98,

Kyōzan Unryō  223Kyūhō Dōken  23

L

“Lake of No Suffering from Heat.” Lake Anavatapta  192, 267Lake Anavatapta        See lay Buddhists, disciple, followers (Laozi  115, 125, 147, 153, 265layman, laymen (Langye Huijiao. Land of Joy  57also laypeople, layperson)  18, 45, 245Seesee also upāsakaRōya Ekaku see)  27,

laywomen (laypeople, layperson  10, 136, 198, 199,201101, 213, 269, 335, 349, , 202, see also upāsikā346                     )355  346

Liang dynasty  57, 74, 83, 88Li  80, 121see also order; sect)  75, 78,332

lineage(s) (90, 92, 93, 95, 96, 101, 146,

of Seigen Gyōshi  121, 127Hōgen  92, 98, 107Dōgen  35, 83, 104, 107, 135, 291,Igyō  92Isan  107Rinzai  35, 92, 97, 104, 107, 222of Daikan Enō  106299, 315

lion seat(s)  100, 131, 144, 344Sōtō  92, 99, 104, 316Unmon  92, 98, 107

lotus posture  85, 226, 332, 337, 371,Lotus Sutralotus flower(s)  119, 126, 326lion’s roar  303, 304, 307 blue  14, 23, 241Anrakugyō372178272, 373, , 219, 241, 242, 245, 270, 271,, 273, 300, 345–46, 369, 370, 10374(“Peaceful and Joyful, 14, 36, 109, 123, 151,375

Practice”) chapter  203, 270, 344

Daibadatta345, 370 (“Devadatta”) chapter  45,

Fugen-bosatsu-kanpotsuVirtue”) chapter  271ment of Bodhisattva Universal(“Discrimination of(“Encourage-

Funbetsu-kudokuMerits) chapter  271

HōbenHiyu83(“A Parable”) chapter  69, Hōsshi 242, 123, 124, 125, 151, 167, 178,, 253, 270, 331, (“Expedient Means”) chapter70

Jōfugyō-bosatsuJoDespise”) chapter  152chapter  124, 151, 270, 369(“Introductory”) chapter  (“A Teacher of the Dharma”((“Springing Out from“Bodhisattva Never346    124   )

Jū-chi-yūshutsu

Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumonsal Gate of Bodhisattva Regarder ofthe Earth”) chapter  70(“The Univer-

10the Sounds of the World”) chapter(“Parable of the Magic City”)

Kejō-yu

Ken-hōtōMyō-shōgun-ō-honjichapter  57chapter  272King Resplendent”) chapter  167, 273(“Seeing the Treasure Stupa”(“The Mystical Power(“The Story of )

Nyorai-jinriki

Nyorai-juryōtime”) chapter  26, 36, 69, 242, 272,of the Tathāgata”) chapter  272, 360, (“The Tathāgata’s Life-

273

Luoyang (Lumbinī  220Lotus Universe. Shingechapter  245, 269(“Belief and Understanding”370SeeSeeWestern Capital)  36,Lotus SutraRakan Keichin )

Luohan Guichen. see also

167

M

Mahā kāśya pa (Magadha  206, 220, 369 54130–31210242, 58, 89, 90, 95, 104, 112, 129,, 211, 212, 214, 219, 234, 236,, 244, 254, 300, 325, 327, , 132–33, 134, 136, 154, 209,see also Kāśyapa)  49, 53,350 mahāmañjūṣakamañjūṣakamandārava flowers)  232flowers (see also mahāmandārava

Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtraMahāprajñā pāra mitopadeśaMahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra. See Daihatsu -Mahānāman. Mahānāma  182Daichodoronnehangyō(s)  Seeflowers)  232355)flowers (  10, 362, Mahānāmasee also375222(see also

mahāsattvaMahāvaipulya Round Realization Sutra.See Daihōkōengakushutararyōgikyō

Maheśvara  242Mahayana (see also Great Vehicle)  58

MakasōgiritsuMalaya Mountains  192Mahīsāsakas  105Makashikan 10205

mandāravamañjūṣakamandala  57Malla(s)  220mandā ravaflowers (flowers)  232, 242see also mahā mañjū -see also mahā ṣaka flowers)  232see also flowers (

māraMannenji  101Mañjuśrī ((see alsosee alsodemon)  364Monju) 219, 345

Masutani, Fumio  335, 349Maskari-Gośalīputra (Marx, Karl  xvMāra (Buddhist teachers)  206362 demons, king of)  357,see alsoxviiisix non-

Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo Maudgal yāyana  185See

Meiji Restoration  207meditation (Medicine King  259, 365Mazu Daoyi. see also dhyānaBaso Dōitsu)  88, 226, 227 merit(s), meritorious conduct  40, 76,162

mind  4–5, 19, 29, 31, 32, 36, 40, 41, 42,middle way  xv, 316467092338114144168192, 50, 51, 52, 57, 61, 62, 64–65, 69,, 73–75, 76–81, 83, 84, 85, 86, 90,, 97, 100, 102, 104, 109, 112, 113,, 117, 120, 132, 135, 141, 143,, 184, 203, 230, 238, 248, 337,, 341, 345, 366, , 145, 157, 160, 161, 162, 164,, 215, 216, 219, 220, 226, 233,, 194, 196, 203, 204, 205, 210,, 238, 239, 257, 258, 262, 263,, 172, 177, 179, 183, 190, 191,367

alone, only  61, 64, 65, 66, 67, 70, 340212234264287323338347363, 265, 272, 279, 280, 281, 283,, 304, 307, 308, 310, 313, 322,, 326, 328, 331, 335, 336, 337,, 339, 340, 341, 342, 343, 346,, 350, 351–52, 355, 357, 359, 360,, 364, 371, 372, 76, 265, 335, 336, 337, 338,373

bodhi-body-  5, 6, 25, 27, 52, 76, 85, 91, 92,33935193144190266353, 98, 113, 132, 134, 140, 142,, 340, 341, 342, 344, 349–50,, 352, 353, 354, 355–56, , 145, 147, 148, 162, 173, 189,, 191, 222, 226, 233, 261, 263,, 272, 317, 333, 338, 339, 340,, 359, 361, 371, 372, 373357

-fine, of nirvana  15, 88, 89, 99, 132,-eternal, of eternal buddhas  29, 31, 32,concentrated  11, 349buddha-, Buddha’s  85, 148, 214moon  4–consciousness  162, 20933, , 236, 244, 254, 325, 353, 3365 327 354

one  5, 61, 69, 272, 338, 346pivot of  179, 185of grass and trees  341, 349, 359

profound  262

thinking  349, 350, 352, 361-red (sincere)  253, 300, 367seal  85, 215, 373

mindful, mindfulness  30, 64, 75, 141,of the Buddha  337, 338, 344undivided  263, 272, 338, 339, 341three kinds of  349–50221, 226, 232, 311  See transmind-to-mind transmission.

Monju (Monier Monier-Williams, Sir  26, 151,MirokujōshōkyōMinshū  296Miracle of Mindfulness, The242mission, mind-to-mind, 344, 359, 362, 363, 364, see also Mañjuśrī)  9345see also bhikṣu363369)

monk(s), monkhood (136xvii, 5, 6, 22, 25, 27, 31, 32, 35, 40, 43,, 53, 54, 58, 61, 71, 73, 84, 92, 93,, 105, 106, 117, 119, 120, 121, 126,

156–5719821323627045101297312340, 199, 200, 201, 202, 205, 206, 207,, 220, 221, 222, 223, 229, 231, 235,, 239, 245, 251, 253, 263, 268, 269,, 273, 275, 278, 286, 287, 289, 294,, 145, 146, 148, 149, 153, 154,, 300, 303, 304, 305, 307, 309, 310,, 313, 319, 322, 323, 324, 332, 335,, 344, , 159, 165, 180, 185, 187, 194,349

mountain  215, 216hall  18, 25, 328attendant  106, 180

Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa (Mount Daii  323patch-robed  229, 230, 285, 354see also

Mount Kinka  282Mount Ōbai (Mount Hiei  10140262, , 263, 365  149 see also Ōbai Mountain)Gṛdhrakūṭa) Myoren. Musai (Myōkaku (Mount Yamashibu  268, 280Mujaku  9Murti, T. R. V.  363Mount Sumeru  19, 26, 203, 361, 362Mount Tendō (Muzhou Daoming. Myōhōrengekyō. See Sutra of the Lotus58Flower of the Wonderful Dharma35, 312, 322, , 315 see alsosee alsosee alsoSekitō Kisen)  91, 92, 294324Setchō Jūken)  27, 55,See58Tendō Mountain)Bokushū Dōmyō 

mystical  129, 147, 179, 183, 230, 303Myōkakuzenjigorokucommunication  350, 359See Sōji

power(s)  179, 185, 203, 262, 264, 281foot  107, 274

N

Nangaku Ejō (Nan. Nairañjanā River  220Nāgārjuna  253, 357, 362, 363  35177See Ōryū Enansee also Daie; Ejō)  29,

, 90, 104, 106, 107, 118, 135, 152,

National Master (Nan’yō Echū (Nansen Fugan  11, 58, 125, 185, 253,Nanyang Huizhong. Nanquan Puyuan. Nangaku Mountain, Nangakuzan  91,Master)  29, 36, 167, 283, 343268282277, 271, 274, 280, 283, , , 178, 222, 259, 270, 273, 275–76,, 294282 SeeSeeSeeNansen FuganNangaku EjōDaishō; NationalNan’yo EchūDaishō;300

see also Nanyue Huairang. see also

nenbutsu Buddha)  344158–59Nan’yō Echū)  29, 31, 36, 156–57,(see also, 160, 161, 167, 168, 336, mindfulness, of the343 New Year’s Day  235, 244, 289New Translation of the Flower Adorn-Nepal  220ment Sutra. See Shinyaku Kegongyō

Ninden no Ganmoku. See Eyes of HumanNhat Hanh, Thich  363Beings and Gods

Ninji era  8, 11, 43, 238Ningbo  241, 300, 315      70

Ninnōgokokuhannyaharamitsugyō

nirvana  6, 15, 20, 24, 62, 103, 112, 182,Nirgrantha-Jñatiputra (213339Buddhist teachers) 206, 216, 217, 220, 243, 251, 335,, 347, 357, 362, see also371   six non-

Nishijima, Gudo Wafu  xv, xvii, xixfine mind of  15, 88, 89, 99, 132, 209,236, 244, 254, 325, 353, 354

non-Buddhism, non-Buddhist(s)  15, 64,noble eightfold path  22170174248, 79, 90, 91, 116, 143, 144, 172,, 177, 182, 191, 196, 206, 218,, 265, 303, 336, 338, 356, 371, 373

nun(s)  50, 57, 349Nyojōoshōgoroku299, 300, 334 241, 273, 283, 291,

O

Ōbai Mountain, Ōbaizan (Ōan Donge  117, 118, 125ŌandongezenjigorokuŌbai)  148, 153, 210, 226125see also Mount

Ōbaku Kiun  58, 84, 97, 98, 106, 140,Ōbakuzan   341145269, 151, 152, 153, 216–218, 222,, 300

One Vehicle  247, 270Old Pure Criteria. See Koshingi

order(s) (On Experiencing the State. See Sandōkai52, 83, 90, 92, 97, 99, 107, 108, 117,see also lineage)  22, 36, 49, 50, 142187, 145, 152, 153, 158, 182, 183,

great  162, 264Buddha’s, of the World-honored one28390, 189, 206, 209, 210, 214, 282,, 286, 297, 299, 300, 310, 341, , 206, 221, 245, 264, 273     347

Ōryū Enan  100, 107three hundred and sixty  326, 332

Ōryū sect  100Ōryū Isei  316

Ōsen Mujaku  344

P

pāramitāPanshan Baoji. Pāli  187, 245kṣānti-dāna-dhyāna-canon  46(40s)  464646104, 41, 46, , 45, 104, 104104See Banzan Hōshaku104

Patna  46, 206parivrājakaParanirmitavaśavartin Heaven  362, 364prajñā-śīla-six  41, 46, 104vīrya-1924646, , 197  , 10499, 141, 355 parinirvāṇa 206

pātrapatriarch(s)  15, 17, 19, 22, 49, 57, 74, 78,29510679190145, 80, 87, 88, 90, 92, 95, 96, 100, 102,, 113, 116, 119, 124, 126, 133, 135,, 216, 217, 226, 234, 276, 277, 282,, 191, 192, 193, 198, 209, 210, 211,, 147, 155, 156, 161, 162, 165, 173,

212

Buddhist  xvi, 4, 5, 10, 11, 14, 15, 20,ancestral  29, 89, 97, 99, 116, 159,35416022, , 314, 319, 320, 326, 328, 338, 341,, 29, 50, 51, 52, 53, 55, 74, 75,355, 161, 163, 165, 310 134

79102155–56182197215117, 88, 89, 90–91, 93, 98, 100, 101,, 118, 121, 130, 131, 132, 133,, 109, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116,, 183, 190, 191, 192, 193, 195,, 198, 201, 202, 204, 210, 211,, 259, 262, 265, 268, 275, 279,, 285, 286, 293, 294, 295, 297,, 304, 309, 310, 314, 322, 327,, 331, 332, 336, 341, 342, 354,, 371, 372, , 139, 142, 144, 145, 146,, 216, 218, 230, 237, 241, 248,, 159, 165, 166, 179, 180,Mahākāśyapa)  89373

258284303328

first (forty  29, 87, 115founding  78, 91, 92, 98, 99, 146, 159,367160see also

second (fourth (fourteenth (312see also, 161, 163, 164, 165, 310, 311,, see also314see alsosee alsoUpagupta)  105Nāgārjuna)  362

thirty-eighth (see alsoŚāṇavāsa)  219Ānanda)  219

35, 103, 124, 149,

twenty-eighth (twenty-eight  89, 95, 116, 183, 209,thirty-third (thirty-seventh (third (4921183, 50, 89, 146, , 234, see also354see alsosee also375Vasubandhu)  364Daikan Enō)  30,154Tōzan Ryōkai)Taiso Eka)  49,Bodhidharma)Daii)  332

twenty-first (twenty-ninth (see alsosee also Patriarch (142, 281see also    Prajñātara)

twenty-seventh (192, 197     see also

Patriarch (5263335, 102, 143, 162, 210, 212, 251, 310,, 146–47, 148, , 337, see also372 Buddha; Śākyamuni)Bodhidharma)  50, 51,153 pivot(s)  62, 163, 179Piṇḍola  236, 246, 265–66, 267, 268,Piprāvā (of the mind  179, 185of the Dharma  120, 121, 196273, 274see also Kapilavastu)  220

pivotal  75, 81, 88, 131, 160three  93, 105

plum blossom(s), flower(s), tree(s)  17,Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch’sDharma Treasure. See Rokusodaishi -18236266–67, 20, 25, 229–31, 232–33, 234, 235,bōdangyō, 237, 238–39, 241, 242, 244,, 288, 326, 328, 332, 334

power(s)  30, 41, 203, 214, 217, 223, 239,five  221262, 287, 313, 341, 353, 360, 375

practice(s)  4, 6, 7, 8, 11, 13, 29, 30, 32,mystical  179, 185, 203, 262, 264, 2819050, 93, 101, 102, 109, 110, 112, 113,, 51, 52, 64, 75, 78, 79, 80, 88, 89,, 119, 121, 124, 125, 130, 131, 133,, 136, 140, 142, 143, 144, 145,, 152, 157, 158, 160, 163, 164,, 171, 179, 183, 189, 190, 191,, 197, 198, 199, 201, 213, 215,, 217, 218, 222, 226, 227, 232,, 236, 237, 247, 249, 251, 253,, 258, 259, 261, 265, 270, 272,, 280, 281, 285, 286, 287, 294,, 314, 316, 327, 338, 340, 341,, 345, 371, 372, 373, 374, see also dhūta375       )

114134150165194216234257275303

ascetic, difficult, hard (343

Dharma  132, 136, 336devotional  132, 136, 33677, 281, 367

of zazen  168, 177, 227, 244, 272, 346original  155, 367four peaceful and joyful  189, 203see also dhūta)  206 twelve ancient (

practice and experience  81, 110, 114,134

precepts  9, 46, 186, 192, 197, 198Prātimokṣa-sūtrapratyekabuddhaPrasenajit, King  195, 196, 206, 236,Prajñātara  24, 36, 49, 136, 142, 241,prajñā351237273xvii, 104, 359327, 354, , 245, 265, 266, , 281, , 190, 191, 201, 214, 226, 276,, 331, 336, 339, 350, (see also pāramitā366332 105 273s, six; wisdom)373(see also

(s)  27, 266, 267, 350,

Pūraṇa-Kāśyapa (Precepts for the Great SanghaBuddhist teachers)  206Makasōgiritsu)see also  195                        six non-(see

Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteriesalso Zen’enshingi

Pure Net SutraPure Land sects  136Pure Net Bodhisattva Precepts(see also Sutra of the)  198, 354                                     )  198

Q

Qingyuan Xingsi. See Seigen Gyōshi

R

Rakan Keichin (Rājgir  206Rājagṛha  195, 206, 365, 369Rāhula  210, 21936, 70, 107, 269see also Keichin; Shinō)

Record of the Words of Zen Master ChōreiRecord of Bukka’s Attacks on KnottyRazan Dōkan  35gorokuProblems. See BukkagekisetsurokuShutaku. See Chōreishutaku zenji -

Record of the Words of Zen Master Rin-Record of the Words of Zen Master Ōanzai Gigen. See RinzaizenjigorokuDonge. See Ōandongezenjigoroku Reiun Shigon  11, 151, 328, 332, 334, 344RentōeyōReikun (300, 344see also11, 35, 36, 124, 126, 283, 299,Fuyō Reikun)  20

Rinan City, Rinanfu City  289, 295right Dharma-eye treasury  15, 49, 52,Rewata Dhamma, Ven. Dr. U.  36310220924432588, 89, 90, 91, 92, 97, 98, 99, 101,, 104, 121, 132, 143, 181, 183,, 214, 232, 234, 236, 237, 242,, 249, 254, 268, 310, 311, 320,, 327–28, 353, 105, (108see also Sekimon rinkan -354

Rikutō

Rinzai Gigen (Rinkyō. See Kirin SutraRinkanroku87145–46279roku, 93, 97–98, 105, 106, 134, 144,, 301, 341, )  88, 151, 152, 166, 203, 222, 265,see also347 Eshō)  23, 54, 79,

Ro (RinzaizenjigorokuRinzai lineage, sect  35, 92, 97, 98, 104,Rinzai-in Temple  97107see also, 207, see also kaṣāyaDaikan Enō)  149, 154222 85, 105)  15, 50, 51, 53, Rokuharamitsuji  33, 37robe(s) (saṃghātī23016074, 85, 103, 113, 140, 141, 149, 155,, 241, 243, 250, 251, 283, 326, , 183, 184, 189, 196, 197, 210, 226,89, 195 103 366

rūpadhātu. SeeRōyasan  21Ṛṣipatana (Rokutan Pond  313, 317Roshi  316Rōya Ekaku (Rokusodaishihōbōdangyōsee alsosee alsothree worlds, tripleSārnāth)  220Kōshō)  27, 292

Ryōzan Enkan  22, 27world; world, of matter

Ryū  341, 347

Ryūtan Sōshin  185

S

saindhavasaint(s)  19, 95, 147, 156, 157, 158, 159,Saint (sage(s)  94, 160, 163, 207, 357sahā160realm, world  247, 248, 262, 263see also, 161, 163, 168, 310, 352, 254Bodhidharma)  88–89357

Saisen  119Śākyamuni  3, 6, 16, 29, 30, 49, 61, 62, 64,18613488, 93, 100, 103, 109, 113, 119, 130,, 237, 247, 248, 257, 259, 260, 261,, 263, 264, 265, 266, 267, 271, 272,, 320, 332, 339, 340, 344, 350, 365,, 372, , 209, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214, 218,, 146, 148, 156, 173, 174, 183–84,373

219262278

samādhiŚākyas  220śālaking of  371, 373, 374as the Dharma-nature  171, 172, 173,283367grove  220174–75, 327, 333, 337, 371–(s)  xvi, xvii, 175, 177, 179, 232,see also Universal74

Samanta Bhadra (Virtue)  219, 271(see also

Sañjaya-Vairāṭīputra (sangha  9, 187, 196, 245, 292, 310Sangha. SandōkaiŚāṇavāsa  210, 219saṃskāraBuddhist teachers)  206204, 333, See307Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha363 aggregates, five)see also six nonSanshō Enen  97–98, 106, 122 Sanskrit  xvii, xviii, 9, 11, 23, 24, 26, 36,Sansheng Huiran. Sanpō Mountain  13045126, 46, 47, 57, 69, 103, 104, 107, 124,, 151, 152, 177, 179, 186, 187, 203,See Sanshō Enen 270343204, 271, 272, 273, 274, 281, 315, 325,, 205, 206, 221, 227, 241, 245, 253,

Sanskrit-English Dictionary363, 344, 345, 346, 359, 360, 361, 362,, 364, 365, 369, 371, 375

Sārnāth (Śāriputra  185, 331344, 359, 362, 363, 364, see also Ṛṣipatana)  22036926, 242,

Second Patriarch (Sarvadarśanasaṃgrahascripture(s) (Sarvāstivādins  105Scripture of the Great Existence49214281, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 57, 76, 90, 181,, 259, 270, 275, 276, 277, 280,see alsosee alsosutra)  70, 139, 141363Taiso Eka)64

Seidō Chizō  11, 333sect(s) (secular  41, 94–95, 133, 140, 148, 149,Unmon  87, 98, 105Zen  88, 89–91, 92, 97, 136Buddha’s Mind  91, 100Pure Land  136Hōgen  87, 98Igyō  87, 96, 98five  92, 93, 95–96, 100–101, 107Rinzai  87, 97, 98, 207, 222Shingon  57Sōtō 87, 99, 100Tendai  10, 24, 108, 28295107153, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 104,, 182, 198, 207, 314, see also lineage)  87, 91, 92, 94,317

Seigen Gyōshi  11, 29, 35, 90, 91–92, 98,99299, 104, 106, 121, 127, 129, 135, 274,, 317

Seigen Mountain  99

Seiryō-in Temple  98, 258Seiryō (Seikyō. see alsoSee Western CapitalTendō Nyojō)  279, 283

Seiryōji  279, 287

Sekimon Kenun  27Sekimon (Sekimon Etetsu (28  see alsosee alsoKakuhan Ekō)  88, 103(see also RinkanrokuEtetsu)  22, 27,)

Sekimon’s Forest Record. See Sekimon-Sekimonrinkanrokurinkanroku103

Sekitō Kisen  30, 35, 91, 98, 99, 104,Sekisō Keisho  18, 25, 304–305, 307Sekitō-an Hut, Temple  91, 92, 294Sekimonzan  22107, 227, 299, 307

sense(s), sense organs  13, 19, 26, 129,Sempuku Shōko (Setchō Chikan  134, 136Sensu Tokujō  246Seppō Gison  29, 30, 36, 55, 58, 70, 98,Sempukuji  215Sensō, Emperor  105six. 153106161See, 169, 245, 269, 291, 360, 363, , 167, 222, 246, 275, 276, 281,, 107, 114, 124, 126, 145, 152,six sense organs324see alsosee alsoJūken; Myōkaku)Shōko)  222324                                            364

291, 323,

Setchō Jūken (27, 55, 58, 312, 316, 322,

Shakkyō Ezō  333Seven Buddhas (Setsuzan. Setchōzan  312ancient)  29, 32, 33, 64, 81, 87, 89,, 95, 103, 134, 135, 141, 156, 181,, 211, 212, 216, 325, 354, Seesee alsoSnow Mountainssee alsoGensha Shibi)  278345buddhas, seven373

91

Sha family (209

Shaolin Temple (ShakubukurakangyōShang dynasty  299Shanxi province  282Shōrin Temple)  214186 see also Shōrinji,

shashu

Shingon sect  57Shenxiu. Shimen Huiche. ShikiShenshan Zongmi. 47 See JinshūSeeSee9Sekimon Etetsu, 11, 23, 25, 35, 36,Shinzan Sōmitsu

Shinji-shōbōgenzō58, 71, 83, 103, 106, 126, 135, 151,, 168, 178, 185, 186, 203, 220,, 255, 270, 272, 281, 282, 283,

152253292

Shinjo324, 300, 301, 307, 308, 315, 323,, 331, 333,

Shinkaku (Shinsai (Shinjō Kokubun  317Shinō (Shinsai-in Temple  268, 27470, 10746see alsosee also297Rakan Keichin)  65–66,Jōshū Jūshin)  53, 58,347Seppō Gison)  55347 Sōmitsu)  73, see also

268, 274,

Shitou Xiqian. Shishin (Shishōji  312Shinyaku KegongyōShinzan Sōmitsu (83   see also Kisū Chijō)  20, 27see alsoSee Sekisō Keisho

Shō  319Shishuang Qingzhu. xv–xix, 9, 46, 69, 125, 177,See Sekitō Kisen

ShōbōgenzōChapter Two (Vol. I), Chapter One (Vol. I), 222317haramitsuxvii, 225, 345, 346, 225, 271, 281, 285, 291, 308,, 331, 343, 344, 346, 347, 24, 204BendōwaMaka-hannya-Genjō-kōan345                                     359xv,

Chapter Three (Vol. I),

Chapter Six (Vol. I), Chapter Four (Vol. I), butsu25526, 85, 271, 317, 332, , 282, 291 10 Soku-shin-ze-Ikka-no myōjoSenjō 135,

Chapter Seven (Vol. I), 205, 207, 270

Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Chapter Eleven (Vol. I), Chapter Ten (Vol. I), Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Chapter Eight (Vol. I), 911207, , 85, 151, 332, 334, 151, 364    Shoaku-makusaKeisei-sanshikiRaihai-tokuzuiUjiKesa-kudoku344243

Chapter Eighteen (Vol. I), Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I), toka (The Former)hokke8410310103, , 167, , 244, 270, 177, 135, , 245xvii, 28, 36, 83, 123, 151,331219 271 331BussoShishoShin-fuka-SansuigyōShin-fuka-Hokke-ten-3511,,

153

Chapter Nineteen (Vol. I), toka (The Latter)

Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), 153, 347, , 220, 222, 269, 300, 307, 323,369                58 KokyōKankin36,

331

Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), 1012334346, 11, 24, 25, 37, 46, 58, 83, 84,, 152, 273, 291, 332, , 203, 227, 253, 255, 291, 331,, 347, 369         333Busshō

Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II),Gyōbutsu-yuigi 11, 36, 167, Bukkyō292

Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), 177151139, 273, 333, , 185, , 152, 153, 186, 270 332 361 DaigoJinzūZazen-

Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), shin 225, 281, 323, 343

272

Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), 151kōjō-no-ji, 152, 282, , 331, 333, 24, 35, 84, 136, 254,333364 Gyōji Inmo46Butsu-, 47,

Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), 58222, 70, 83, 103, 126, 135, 152, 206,

Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-one (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II), zanmai324, 227, 242, 270, 281, 307, 317,, 331, 333, 177   347   Kai-in-JukiKannon324

Chapter Thirty-four (Vol. II), 24510, 27, 58, 169, 242, , 343, 346       254 Haku-Arakan

Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. II), jushi

Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), 70, 271       Kōmyō

Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II), setsumugakudō11, 25, 36, 254, 273, 20410, 11, 27, , 270, 300, 125307359DōtokuMuchū-Shinjin-

Chapter Thirty-nine (Vol. II), 347, 375   Gabyō

Chapter Forty-four, Chapter Forty-three, Chapter Forty-two, Chapter Forty-one (Vol. II), Chapter Forty (Vol. II), 695824, 221, 241, 243, 292, 332, , 333, , 27, 220, 343307 Bodaisatta-TsukiKobusshin222Kūge49xvii, 3–8,13–55, 104,Zenki–22, 36,34528129–33,27

Chapter Forty-five, shoshōbō

Chapter Forty-seven, Chapter Forty-six, 26136, 36, 61–67, 324, 346, , , 168, 169, 186, 244, 245, 270,333 39–43, KattōSangai-yushin364

292

ShōbōgenzōChapter Forty-nine, Chapter Forty-eight, 73–81, 104, 125, (continued135ButsudōSesshin-sesshō) 87–102,

Chapter Fifty-two, Chapter Fifty-one, Chapter Fifty, 139–5021969282152, 83, 109–121, 151, 254, 271,, , 331, 346, , 274, 315, 324, 272Shohō-jissō369331MitsugoBukkyōMujō-seppōxix, 26, 58,108129–32,    ,

Chapter Fifty-four, Chapter Fifty-three, 155–66       Hōsshō 83,

Chapter Fifty-six, Chapter Fifty-five, 189–201253171–75, , 177301 SenmenDaraniMenju185179–84209–218,       , ,

Chapter Fifty-seven,

Chapter Fifty-eight, 244, 273, 281, 331Zazengi

Chapter Fifty-nine, 323, 343          Baike        225–26,

Chapter Sixty, Chapter Sixty-one, 229–39247–51, 273, 292, 308, 332, JuppōKenbutsu69, 125, 169,25, 206,245334,

       257–68              Hensan

Chapter Sixty-three, Chapter Sixty-two, Ganzei343152, 178,

Chapter Sixty-six, Chapter Sixty-five, Chapter Sixty-four, 343299269, 307, , 270, 275–80, 308, 334 ShunjūRyūginKajō 254105303–306285–90, 293–97,, 124,,

Chapter Sixty-seven, 308309–314, 319–22 , 324   Soshi-sarai-no-i Chapter Sixty-eight, Udonge

Chapter Sixty-nine, 219, 241, 242, 254, 300, 325–Hotsu-mujōshin10329,

Chapter Seventy-one, Chapter Seventy, 345349–57284, 365–, 331, 335–67 Hotsu-bodaishin42 Nyorai-zenshinZanmai-ō-zan-28,

Chapter Seventy-two, 371–74mai xvii, 85, 177, 225, 323, 344,San -, 346 Chapter Seventy-three (Vol. IV), jūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō

Chapter Seventy-five (Vol. IV), Chapter Seventy-four (Vol. IV), zanmaibōrin 31583, 325 331     221Jishō-Ten, 177,

Chapter Seventy-nine (Vol. IV), Chapter Seventy-eight (Vol. IV),Chapter Seventy-seven (Vol. IV), Chapter Seventy-six (Vol. IV), Hatsu-u24shugyō , 333 269299   Dai-AngoKokū

Chapter Eighty-one (Vol. IV), sendaba206     185, 254    Ō-saku-Sanji-

Chapter Eighty-four (Vol. IV), no-gō

ninety-five–chapter edition  xviiChapter Ninety (Vol. IV), Chapter Eighty-seven (Vol. IV), 177shōbutsu , 361361364, 369 Shizen-biku45, 362Kuyō-

Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon

twenty-eight–chapter edition  35twelve-chapter edition  45, 362

ShōdōkaShōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese. SeeGen daigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō125, 345 Shoku brocade  236, 244–45Shōko (216, 218, 222, see alsosee alsoSempuku Shōko)  215,223 Sichuan

Shōrinji, Shōrin Temple (Shoku district (Temple)  88, 93, 187, 233, 242, 374province)  244                                   see also Shao lin

Shujun (Shūitsu (Shōshitsuhō  374Shōshū Fukaku (57, 209, 219344see alsoGensha Shibi)  65, 67,, 345 Taiso Eka)  49,281

Shōtenzokuchōsee also

Sichuan province  126, 244Shūtō (Shūs (Shushan Guangren. Shun, Emperor  293, 294, 299Shuko, King  47Shukusō, Emperor  283319Jūshin)  5570, 120, 251, 255, 275, , (see also Kirin Sutrasee also24Kazan Buttō)  313, 314See Sozan Kōnin)  316, 317

ShuryōgonkyōShunjūsee also Bokushū Dōmyō; Jōshū see also323      Kyōgen Chikan)  304,

six sense objects  124, 192, 357, 364six kinds of consciousness, sense func-six non-Buddhist teachers  196, 206six elements. Śiva. Silk Road  58tions  124, 357, 364pāramitāSee Maheśvaras. SeeSee pāramitāelements, six(s), six six

six sense organs  19, 124, 172, 173, 192,six states of existence, rebirth  15, 151357, 363–64

sixteen elements of sociability (sixteen arhats. Six Strategies. See Rikutōbodhisattva, social relations, elementsSee arhats, sixteensee also of)  43

Sixth Patriarch (sixteen-foot golden body, of Buddha  284,90340, 103, 104, 154, 234, 331  (s) (, 344, see alsosee alsosee also363aggregates)  58,expedient means,Daikan Enō) skandha

skillful means (203–204

Snow Mountains (Small Vehicle  16, 75, 337methods)  41, 46, 237, 245see also Himalayas)

Sōkei sect  96Sōji  50, 52, 57  Sōkei (Sōkei Mountain, Sōkeizan  93, 106, 209,27587335, 88, 91, 96, 99, 214, 276  see also, see also343        Daie Sōkō)  74, 75, 78, 84Daikan Enō)  29, 30, 31,

Sōkō (Sokon  119Sōmitsu (see also

Song dynasty  20, 22, 43, 78, 89, 91, 93,Sōtō lineage, sect  87, 92, 99, 100, 104,Sōzan Honjaku  99, 105, 107, 305, 30810711578148229, 79, 80, , 116, 117, 118, 120, 144, 146,, , 194, 198, 209, 210, 215, 222,, 231, 232, 265, 280, 316      85 Shinzan Sōmitsu)  73,367

śramaṇa śrāvakaŚrāvastī  206, 273Sozan Kōnin  29, 30, 35Spahn, Mark  221, 333Spring and Autumn. See Shunjū196267, 206, 249–50, 253, , 350, 351, (see also monk)  8, 43, 164,332

(s)  xvii, 27, 153, 245, 262, 266,354

stage(s)  32, 76, 145, 314, 360, 361fourth, of a fifty-two  361śrāvaka. See fourth effect three clever and ten sacred  326, 361intermediate  360, 361 stupa(s)  58, 201, 213, 214, 220, 221,222

Stupa of the Seven Treasures  365,eight  213, 214, 220369–70341, 324, 336, 337, 338, 339, 340,, 342, 346, 365, 366, 369, See 370

50

Śūraṃgama-sūtra. See ShuryōgonkyōSupplementary Record of the Torch. SeeSun Moon Light  113, 124śūnyatāSuibi Mugaku  11, 165, 169, 253, 307Sumeru Peak (Sūgaku Mountains  374 succession (Śubhavyūharāja. Zokutōroku217, 109, 112, 130, 149, 163, 212, 216,, 218, 326, (see alsosee also see alsoemptiness)  24, 28357transmission)  29,King ResplendentMount Sumeru)  57

sutra(s)  15, 22, 24, 45, 58, 64, 70, 77, 97,106148189241265338370see also, 113, 114, 115, 139–44, 146, 147,, 150, 151, 152, 153, 171, 172, 187,, 192, 193, 197, 201, 203, 213, 218,, 242, 248, 259, 261, 262, 263, 264,, 270, 271, 325, 332, 333, 336, 337,, 339, 342, 362, 365, 366, 367, 369,, 372, 375Tripiṭaka)  46

Sutra of Questions and Answers betweenSutra of Past Deeds as a String of Pearls.Sutra of Maitreya’s Ascent and Birth inSutra of Auspicious Past Occurrences.Sutra (DaibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōMahābrahman and the Buddha. SeeSee YorakuhongyōkyōTuṣita Heaven. See MirokujōshōkyōSee Zuiōhongikyō

Sutra of the Flower of DharmaSutra of the Defeat of the Arhat. SeeLotus SutraShaku bukurakangyō)  189, 261    (see also Sutra of the Kalpa of Wisdom. See Ken gō -Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonder-ful Dharma345 kyō, 369       (see also Lotus Sutra)

Sūzan Mountain(s)  88, 210, 214, 233, 280Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified FormsSutra of the Wise and the Foolish. SeeSutra of the Pure Net Bodhisattva Pre-for Ordained MonksKengukyōcepts (see also Pure Net Sutra193, 195, )  199197

T

Taihei Mountain  313TaigunikkiTaihe Egon  317Taigen Fu  239, 24647

Taiso Eka (Taisō, Emperor  45Taikō, Minister  94, 101244arch; Shōshū Fukaku)  25, 57, 58, 84,, 135, 187, 209, 219, 242, 243,see also Eka; Second Patri-333

104

Tandō Bunjun  313, 317Taiyuan Fu. Taiyōzan  293Taiyō Kyōgen  293, 299, 245, 270, 281, See Taigen Fu

Tanka Shijun  35, 311, 315Tang dynasty  36, 45, 81, 105, 153, 156,167, 283

42

tasukiTathāgata (Tanshū district  313272232113gata)  xvii, 6, 7, 9, 15, 17, 26, 36, 39,, 62, 63, 64, 69, 88, 90, 102, 110,sash  194, 205, 152, 182, 189, 196, 210, 212, 213,, 353, 365, 366, 367, 370, , 288, 327, 328, 336, 338, 342, 351,, 233, 257, 258, 259, 260, 262, 264,see also Buddha; buddha-tathā-373

352

Tendō Mountain, Temple, Tendō zan (Tendai Mountain, Tendaizan  101, 282Tendai sect  10, 24, 108, 282Tendai Chigi  10, 108, 277, 282Tendō Sōgyoko  136Tennei Temple  312Tendō Nyojō  11, 27, 29, 30, 35, 70, 92,also229119204243291, 120, 126, 136, 144, 152, 165, 184,, 324, 328, , 209, 210, 215, 229, 235, 241, 242,, 244, 245, 265, 279, 283, 285, 288,, 292, 294, 295, 299, 308, 311, 315,, 241, 299, Mount Tendō333311)  119, 120, 193,see

317

                    246                   See “The-

Tenryū (Tennō Dōgo  185Tenshōkōtōroku Tenzo kyō kun“Theory of Instantaneousness.” “Theory of the Momentary Appearanceory of the Momentary Appearance andand Disappearance of the Universe,Disappearance of the Universe, The”see also Koshū Tenryū)  278, 28227 

Theravāda  46 The”  349, 360

Third Patriarch (Third Council  46see also Kanchi Sōsan) thirty-seven (auxiliary 213280, 214, 221, , 283   340 bodhi) methods

three kinds of illumination  171, 177Threefold Lotus Sutra, Thethree forms of conduct, behavior  xvi,thirty-two signs  266, 300350, 360   123, 369

three paths  144, 146three kinds of profundity  93, 105

three poisons  191, 204three pivots. three phrases  93, 105, 144See pivot(s), three

three seals  103

Three Treasures (three teachings  115, 116Dharma, and Sangha)  147, 192, 201,, 338, 340–41, 355, Seesee also Buddha,

337

three worlds, triple world  15, 17, 20, 26,three vehicles. 61350–67, 69, 70, 149, 172, 201, 340,, 351See            vehicle(s), three356

TōkiTōka-en Gardens  268Tōkei district (Tō, Emperor  293, 294, 299Tilaurakoṭ (Tiantong Rujing. Tianlong. 312332, 316Seesee alsoGodai ImpōTenryūsee alsoSeeKapilavastu)  220Tendō NyojōEastern Capital)

Tō Impō.

Tokki  117Tokusan Senkan  36, 54, 93, 124, 134,Tōsu Daidō (Tōsu Gisei  293, 299153, 166, see also331332 Jisai)  11, 165, 169,

304, 307,

Tōzan Ryōkai (Tōsuzan  5, 11, 165, 303, 307Touzi Datong. Touzi Yiqing. Tōzan Mountain, Temple  210, 317, 341,83159285312347, 85, 99, 100, 105, 107, 135, 144,, 163, 168, 169, 219, 255, 281,, 286, 287, 291, 308, 309–310,, 313, 314, 315, 316, SeeSeesee alsoTōsu GiseiTōsu DaidōGohon)  35, 73,347

Tōzan Shiken  347Tōzan sect  99 see also succession)  43,

98

transmission(s) (14849, 99, 101, 104, 130, 136, 141, 147,, 53, 54, 58, 78, 88, 89, 91, 92, 97,, 215, 219, 234, 243, 245, 261, 264,, 151, 152, 153, 160, 209, 210, 211,

296212, 300, 319, 325, 326, 327, 333 transmission(s) (authentic  29, 40, 51, 78, 88, 89, 91,92160201, 97, 99, 102, 116, 146, 147, 148,, 162, 171, 173, 179, 180, 181,, 213, 232, 234, 237, continued)      268

of the robe  74, 104, 210, 326face-to-face  90, 162, 209, 210–212,213, 214–215, 221, 222, 237

twenty-eight generations, transmissionstwelve divisions of the sutras, teachingTuṣita Heaven  355, 361, 36295(142see also, 183, , 152, 326  209patriarchs, twenty-eight)

U

uḍum baraUdayana, King  245U, Emperor  293, 294, 299232, 241, 242, 325, 327, flower(s)  89, 209, 219, 230,331

Ungan Donjō  83, 107, 168, 283, 285,Ungo Dōyō (Uji district  55291, 315, 286–see also219 87 Dōyō)  99, 107,

Universal Virtue (Ungozan  129, 130Universal Guide to the Standard Prac-tice of Zazen. See Fukanzazengi131, 135, see also Samanta-

Unmown lineage, sect  87, 92, 98, 105Unmon Bun’en  25, 54, 98, 105, 106, 107,144218bhadra)  261, 145, 146, 152, 215, 216, 217,, 222, 265, 312       152

Unmonkyōshinzenjikōroku

Upagupta  105Unmonzan  98(s) s)

utpalaUruvilvā (upāsikāupāsaka230(, (see also241see also((see alsosee alsolotus flower, blue)  23,Bodhgayā)  220laywoman)  340layman)  340

V

Vajragarbha (Vaiśravaṇa  361Vairocana  280, 283ury)  11See       see also Diamond Treas-

Vāsīputrīyas  105Vārāṇasī (Vappa.      see alsoBāṣpa Benares)  220 Vault of Great Brightness (Vasubandhu  364      see also

vehicle(s) (Vehicle; Small Vehicle)  15, 90Daikōmyōzō)  119see also Great Vehicle; One two  116, 263three  326

Vijñānavāda school (vijñāna. SeeVesāli  221Veṇuvana Park  195, 206school)  362, 364see alsoconsciousnessTripiṭaka)  46, 105see also Yogācāra

Vinaya (

Vulture Peak. vṛddhaVirūḍhaka  361Virūpākṣa  361Vipaśyin  89, 103, 135five versions of  95, 105Gṛdhrakūṭa(359see alsoSee mind, concentrated)Gṛdhrakūṭa; Mount

349,

W

water of the eight virtues  192, 204WanshizenjigorokuWanshi Shōgaku  30, 35, 83, 152, 311,Wanshi’s Eulogies of the Ancients. SeeWanshijukoWanshijuko315        152   269, 271, 315, 323

West, the  55, 319Way  77, 78, 87, 94, 106, 257, 341, 359Wei dynasty  88 Western Country (Western Capital (36, 156, 167 see alsosee alsoLuoyang)  31,India)  209,

Western Heavens (183213, 204, 309 see also India)  180,

wisdom (willow flower(s), tree(s), twig(s)  17, 18,wheel-turning kings  366Western philosophy  xv2028090152221, 194–202, 207, 235, 236, 237, 244,, 93, 94, 101, 104, 132, 141, 145,, , 163, 171, 185, 190, 203, 209,, 261, 357, 283see also prajñā359 )  4, 46, 70, 75,

eye(s) of  242, 295buddha-, of the Buddha, buddhas  91,125, 141, 270, 296, 344 Wisdom Accumulation  367untutored  141, 152, 171–72natural  141, 171–72

world(s)  4, 5, 13, 14, 15, 18, 24, 31, 32,3690110136180242275345, 42, 57, 61, 62, 64, 70, 73, 78, 88,, 94, 95, 96, 99, 100, 102, 107, 109,, 114, 116, 124, 125, 126, 134,, 140, 141, 142, 151, 163, 178,, 182, 189, 190, 230, 237, 241,, 247, 253, 257, 267, 270, 274,, 281, 312, 316, 326, 331, 338,, 353, 355, 360, 361, 372

of the Buddha, buddhas  32, 183, 254of action  61, 69, 331

eight troubled  350, 359Dharma, of the Dharma-nature  xvi,of desire  357, 361, 362, 364142, 174, 191, 232, 350 of matter  61, 69human  32, 40, 42, 99, 140, 158, 162,of feeling  61, 69external  6, 40, 69, 87, 165, 190230, 232, 237, 312, 355, 366 sahāobjective  14, 16, 24of non-matter  61, 69 of thinking  61, 69sentient, of sentient beings  24, 157secular  95, 133, 207247, 262, 263

three-thousand, three-thousandfoldthree, triple  15, 17, 20, 26, 61–67, 69,19070, 149, 172, 201, 340, 350, , 261, 338, 345, 353, 360, 351367

World-honored One(s) (of volition  61, 6915131212354  see also Buddha)

worldly  19, 26, 70, 313, 350, 355, 357, 89–90, 100, 101–102, 129, 130,, 132, 133, 134, 135, 182, 210,, 272, 323, 326, 327, 341, 353,, 373

Wuzu Fayan. Wu, Empress  153Wuji Liaopai. SeeSeeGoso HōenMusai Ryōha

X

Xuedou Chongxian. Xuansha Shibei. Xiangyan Zhixian. Xia dynasty  299SeeSee

Xuedou Zhijian. Xuefeng Yicun. SeeSeeSeppō GisonSeeSetchō ChikanGensha ShibiKyōgen ChikanSetchō Jūken

Y

yakṣaYakusan Igen  98, 107, 283, 291, 323, 343Yama, Yamarāja  148, 153, 362Yakusan Mountain  27, 280(s)  354 see also Mount

Yangshan Huiji.

Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda school  364yinYamashi Peak  67Yamashibu Peak (Yamashibu)  290, 297, 306See89Ōan DongeKyōzan Ejaku

Yingan Tanhua. and yang 5, 10, See

Yuezhou Qianfeng. Yoshida district  81, 102, 134, 150, 166,Yōshū  55Yuanzhi Daan. YorakuhongyōkyōYuanwu Keqin. Yōgi Hōe  273Yoho  47Yōka Genkaku  125, 345202, 215, 226, 238, 335, 342, 357, SeeSeeSee345Enchi DaianSeeEngo KokugonYakusan IgenEsshū Kenpō367

Yueshan Weiyan.

Yunyan Tansheng. Yunmen Wenyan. Yūjisan  55Yunju Daoying. SeeSeeSeeUngo DōyōUnmon Bun’enUngan Donjō

Z

zazen  xix, 11, 25, 26, 27, 28, 46, 83, 87,board  115, 124chair, platform  120, 124, 279104168222343, 120, 126, 135, 139, 142, 152,, 177, 192, 197, 201, 203, 205,, 225–26, 227, 244, 272, 292, 340,, 345, 346, 347, 359, 371, 374

Zen  57, 88, 91, 92, 153, 225, 296, 313kōanhall  11, 126, 205, 30783 Zen Assortment. See ZenruiZengen Chūkō  29, 32, 36Zen’enshingi“one-finger”  283mokushōsect(s)  88, 89–90, 91, 92, 97, 136masters  265meditation  88, 22683206, 361

Zhaozhou Congshen. Zhang  80, 121Zhantang Wenzhun. ZenruiZenshūjukorenjutsūshūZengetsu  25223       SeeSee316Tandō BunjunJōshū Jūshin, 317

Zhongzong. Zhou dynasty  105, 125, 245Zhekiang province  108, 241, 282, 291,Zhimen Guangzu. 292, 300, 315, See Chūsō317See Chimon Kōso

Zhuangzi  115, 121Zōitsuagongyō

Zuiganji  285, 295, 296Zuda. Zongchi. ZokutōrokuSeeSeeBi, Bizuda222Sōji45, 223, 246

ZuiōhongikyōZuigan Jōdo Zen-in Temple  295344

BDK English Tripiṭaka(First Series)

Abbreviations

                                                                                                                                                                           Eng.:Skt.:Ch.:Jp.:    Japanese    Published title   Chinese   Sanskrit

Title                                                                                                  Taishō No. Skt.   DīrghāgamaCh.   Chang ahan jing (長阿含經)                                                                 1 Skt.   MadhyamāgamaCh.   Zhong ahan jing (中阿含經)                                                                  26

Ch.   Dasheng bensheng xindi guan jing (大乘本生心地觀經)                     159

Ch.   Fosuo xing zan (Skt.   Buddhacarita 佛所行讃)                                                                                                                                                                             192

Ch.   Zabao zang jing (Eng.  The Storehouse of Sundry Valuables雜寶藏經)                                                                 (1994)                                                                                                            203

Ch.   Faju piyu jing (Eng.  The Scriptural Text: Verses of the Doctrine, with Parables法句譬喩經)                                                      (1999)                                                                                                            211

Skt.   Aṣṭasāhasrikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtraCh.   Xiaopin banruo boluomi jing (小品般若波羅蜜經)                              227

Ch.   Jingang banruo boluomi jing (Skt.   Vajracchedikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra金剛般若波羅蜜經)                              235

Ch.   Daluo jingang bukong zhenshi sanmoye jing                                     243Skt.   Adhyardhaśatikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra         (大樂金剛不空眞實三麼耶經) Ch.   Renwang banruo boluomi jing (Skt.   *Kāruṇikārājā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra仁王般若波羅蜜經)                           245

429

Ch.   Banruo boluomiduo xing jing (Skt.   Prajñāpāramitāhṛdaya-sūtra 般若波羅蜜多心經)                             251

Skt.   Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraCh.   Miaofa lianhua jing (Eng.  The Lotus Sutra (Revised Second Edition, 妙法蓮華經)                                                       2007)                                                                                                              262

Ch.   Wuliangyi jing (無量義經)                                                                   276 Ch.   Guan Puxian pusa xingfa jing (觀普賢菩薩行法經)                             277

Ch.   Dafangguang fo huayan jing (Skt.   Avataṃsaka-sūtra   大方廣佛華嚴經)                                  279

Skt.   Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanāda-sūtraCh.   Shengman shizihou yisheng defang bianfang guang jing                   353Eng.           (The Sutra of Queen Śrīmālā of the Lion’s Roar勝鬘師子吼一乘大方便方廣經)           (2004)

Skt.   SukhāvatīvyūhaEng.  Ch.   Wuliangshou jing (         Revised Second Edition, 2003)The Larger Sutra on Amitāyus無量壽經)                                                              (in The Three Pure Land Sutras,                                                                   360

Eng.  Skt.   *Amitāyurdhyāna-sūtraCh.   Guan wuliangshou fo jing (         (in The Sutra on Contemplation of AmitāyusThe Three Pure Land Sutras,觀無量壽佛經Revised Second Edition, 2003))                                          365 Eng.  Skt.   Sukhāvatīvyūha         Revised Second Edition, 2003)The Smaller Sutra on Amitāyus阿彌陀經)                                                                       (in The Three Pure Land Sutras,       366 Ch.   Amituo jing (

Ch.   Da banniepan jing (Skt.   Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra大般涅槃經)                                                          374

Ch.   Fochuibo niepan lüeshuo jiaojie jing (Eng.  The Bequeathed Teaching Sutra (in Apocryphal Scriptures,佛垂般涅槃略説教誡經2005))           389

Skt.   *Kṣitigarbhapraṇidhāna-sūtraCh.   Dizang pusa benyuan jing (地藏菩薩本願經)                                      412

Ch.   Banzhou sanmei jing (Skt.   Pratyutpanna-buddhasaṃmukhāvasthita-samādhi-sūtraEng.  The Pratyutpanna Samādhi Sutra般舟三昧經)(1998)                                                     418 Title                                                                                                  Taishō No.

Ch.   Yaoshi liuli guang rulai benyuan gongde jing                                     450Skt.   Bhaiṣajyaguru-vaiḍūrya-prabhāsa-pūrvapraṇidhāna-viśeṣavistara         (藥師琉璃光如來本願功徳經)

Ch.   Mile xiasheng chengfo jing (Skt.   *Maitreyavyākaraṇa 彌勒下生成佛經)                                    454

Skt.   *MañjuśrīparipṛcchāCh.   Wenshushili wen jing (文殊師利問經)                                                 468 Skt.   Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtraEng.  Ch.   Weimojie suoshuo jing   (The Vimalakīrti Sutra (2004)維摩詰所説經)                                             475

Ch.   Yueshangnü jing (Skt.   Candrottarādārikā-paripṛcchā月上女經)                                                                480

Ch.   Zuochan sanmei jing (坐禪三昧經)                                                     614 Ch.   Damoduoluo chan jing (達磨多羅禪經)                                               618

Skt.   Samādhirāja-candrapradīpa-sūtraCh.   Yuedeng sanmei jing (月燈三昧經)                                                     639 Ch.   Shoulengyan sanmei jing (Skt.   Śūraṅgamasamādhi-sūtraEng.  The Śūraṅgama Samādhi Sutra首楞嚴三昧經(1998) )                                           642

Skt.   Suvarṇaprabhāsa-sūtraCh.   Jinguang ming zuishengwang jing (金光明最勝王經)                         665

Skt.   Laṅkāvatāra-sūtraCh.   Dasheng rulengqie jing (入楞伽經)                                                     672

Eng.  Skt.   Saṃdhinirmocana-sūtraThe Scripture on the Explication of Underlying Meaning解深密經)                                                                  (2000)      676 Ch.   Jie shenmi jing (

Ch.   Yulanpen jing (Skt.   *Ullambana-sūtraThe Ullambana Sutra盂蘭盆經(in ) Apocryphal Scriptures,                                                                    2005)                                                                                                              685

Eng. 

Ch.   Sishierzhang jing (Eng.  The Sutra of Forty-two Sections四十二章經)                                                           (in Apocryphal Scriptures, 2005)      784 Ch.   Dafangguang yuanjue xiuduoluo liaoyi jing                                            842Eng.            (The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經) (in Apocryphal Scriptures, 2005)

Ch.   Da Biluzhena chengfo shenbian jiachi jing                                         848Eng.  Skt.   Mahāvairocanābhisambodhi-vikurvitādhiṣṭhāna-vaipulyasūtrendra-         (         rājanāma-dharmaparyāyaThe Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra大毘盧遮那成佛神變加持經)                     (2005)

Ch.   Jinggangding yiqie rulai zhenshi she dasheng xianzheng dajiaoSkt.   Sarvatathāgata-tattvasaṃgraha-mahāyānābhisamaya-mahākalparājaEng.           wang jing (The Adamantine Pinnacle Sutra金剛頂一切如來眞實攝大乘現證大教王經(in Two Esoteric Sutras,)                        2001)                     865

Skt.   Susiddhikara-mahātantra-sādhanopāyika-paṭalaEng.  Ch.   Suxidi jieluo jing (The Susiddhikara Sutra蘇悉地羯囉經(in Two Esoteric Sutras,)                                                        2001)                                                                                                              893

Skt.   *Mātaṅgī-sūtraCh.   Modengqie jing (摩登伽經)                                                               1300

Ch.   Mohe sengqi lü (Skt.   *Mahāsāṃghika-vinaya摩訶僧祇律)                                                            1425

Skt.   *Dharmaguptaka-vinayaCh.   Sifen lü (四分律)                                                                                1428

Pāli   SamantapāsādikāCh.   Shanjianlü piposha (善見律毘婆沙)                                                   1462 Ch.   Fanwang jing (Skt.   *Brahmajāla-sūtra梵網經)                                                                      1484

Skt.   *Upāsakaśīla-sūtraCh.   Youposaijie jing (Eng.  The Sutra on Upāsaka Precepts優婆塞戒經)                                                           (1994)                                                                                                          1488

Ch.   Miaofa lianhua jing youbotishe (Skt.   Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-upadeśa 妙法蓮華經憂波提舍)                     1519

Ch.   Shizha biposha lun (Skt.   *Daśabhūmika-vibhāṣā十住毘婆沙論)                                                   1521 Title                                                                                                  Taishō No.

Ch.   Fodijing lun (Skt.   *Buddhabhūmisūtra-śāstraEng.  The Interpretation of the Buddha Land佛地經論)                                                                     (2002)                                                                                                          1530

Skt.   Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaCh.   Apidamojushe lun (阿毘達磨倶舍論)                                                1558

Ch.   Zhonglun (Skt.   Madhyamaka-śāstra中論)                                                                                1564 Skt.   Yogācārabhūmi-śāstraCh.   Yüqie shidilun (瑜伽師地論)                                                             1579

Eng.  Ch.   Chengwei shi lun (         (in Demonstration of Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,成唯識論)                                                             1999)                                                                                                            1585

Skt.   TriṃśikāEng.  Ch.   Weishi sanshilun song (         (in The Thirty Verses on Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,唯識三十論頌)                                              1999)                                                                                                            1586

Eng.  Skt.   ViṃśatikāCh.   Weishi ershi lun (         (in The Treatise in Twenty Verses on Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,唯識二十論)                                                           1999)                                                                                                            1590

Ch.   She dasheng lun (

Eng.  Skt.   MahāyānasaṃgrahaThe Summary of the Great Vehicle攝大乘論)                                                              (Revised Second Edition, 2003) 1593

Ch.   Bian zhongbian lun (Skt.   Madhyāntavibhāga 辯中邊論)                                                         1600

Ch.   Dasheng zhuangyanjing lun (Skt.   Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkāra 大乘莊嚴經論)                                     1604 Ch.   Dasheng chengye lun (Skt.   Karmasiddhiprakaraṇa大乘成業論)                                                   1609

Skt.   Ratnagotravibhāga-mahāyānottaratantra-śāstraCh.   Jiujing yisheng baoxing lun (究竟一乘寳性論)                                  1611

Ch.   Yinming ruzheng li lun (Skt.   Nyāyapraveśa      因明入正理論)                                            1630 Ch.   Dasheng ji pusa xue lun (Skt.   Śikṣāsamuccaya 大乘集菩薩學論)                                       1636

Skt.   VajrasūcīCh.   Jingangzhen lun (金剛針論)                                                               1642

Ch.   Zhang suozhi lun (Eng.  The Treatise on the Elucidation of the Knowable彰所知論)                                                             (2004)                                                                                                          1645

Skt.   BodhicaryāvatāraCh.   Putixing jing   (菩提行經)                                                                  1662

Ch.   Jingangding yuqie zhongfa anouduoluo sanmiao sanputi xin lun    1665         (金剛頂瑜伽中發阿耨多羅三藐三菩提心論)

Ch.   Dasheng qixin lun (Skt.   *Mahāyānaśraddhotpāda-śāstraEng.  The Awakening of Faith大乘起信論(2005))                                                        1666

Pāli   MilindapañhaCh.   Naxian biqiu jing (那先比丘經)                                                         1670

Ch.   Shimoheyanlun (釋摩訶衍論)                                                            1688

Ch.   Banruo boluomiduo xin jing yuzan (Eng.           (A Comprehensive Commentary on the Heart SutraPrajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya-sūtra) (2001)般若波羅蜜多心經幽賛)           1710

Ch.   Miaofalianhua jing xuanyi (妙法蓮華經玄義)                                   1716 Ch.   Guan wuliangshou fo jing shu (觀無量壽佛經疏)                              1753 Ch.   Sanlun xuanyi (三論玄義)                                                                  1852 Ch.   Dasheng xuan lun (大乘玄論)                                                            1853 Ch.   Zhao lun (肇論)                                                                                  1858

Ch.   Huayan yisheng jiaoyi fenqi zhang (華嚴一乘教義分齊章)               1866

Ch.   Yuanren lun (原人論)                                                                         1886 Ch.   Mohe zhiguan (摩訶止觀)                                                                  1911

Ch.   Xiuxi zhiguan zuochan fayao (修習止觀坐禪法要)                           1915

Ch.   Tiantai sijiao yi (天台四教儀)                                                            1931 Ch.   Guoqing bai lu (國清百録)                                                                 1934

Ch.   Zhenzhou Linji Huizhao chanshi wulu (Eng.  The Recorded Sayings of Linji (in Three Chan Classics,鎭州臨濟慧照禪師語録1999))     1985 Ch.   Foguo Yuanwu chanshi biyan lu (Eng.  The Blue Cliff Record (1998) 佛果圜悟禪師碧巖録)                   2003

Ch.   Wumen guan (Eng.  Wumen’s Gate無門關(in Three Chan Classics,)                                                                       1999)                                                                                                             2005

Eng.  Ch.   Liuzu dashi fabao tan jing (The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch六祖大師法寶壇經(2000))                                2008

Ch.   Xinxin ming (Eng.  The Faith-Mind Maxim信心銘)                                                                        (in Three Chan Classics, 1999)                                                                    2010

Ch.   Huangboshan Duanji chanshi chuanxin fayao                    

Eng.           (Essentials of the Transmission of Mind黄檗山斷際禪師傳心法要)                                                                        (in Zen Texts, 2005)                                                                                    2012A

Ch.   Yongjia Zhengdao ge (永嘉證道歌)                                                   2014

Eng.  Ch.   Chixiu Baizhang qinggui (The Baizhang Zen Monastic Regulations勅修百丈清規)(2007)                                         2025

Ch.   Yibuzonglun lun (Skt.   SamayabhedoparacanacakraEng.  The Cycle of the Formation of the Schismatic Doctrines異部宗輪論)                                                          (2004)                                                                                                            2031

Eng.  Skt.   AśokāvadānaCh.   Ayuwang jing (The Biographical Scripture of King Aśoka阿育王經)                                                                  (1993)                                                                                                            2043

Ch.   Maming pusa zhuan (Eng.           (in The Life of Aśvaghoṣa BodhisattvaLives of Great Monks and Nuns,馬鳴菩薩傳)                                                     2002)                                                                                                             2046

Ch.   Longshu pusa zhuan (Eng.           (in The Life of Nāgārjuna BodhisattvaLives of Great Monks and Nuns,龍樹菩薩傳)                                                    2002)                                                                                                             2047

Ch.   Posoupandou fashi zhuan (Eng.           (in Biography of Dharma Master VasubandhuLives of Great Monks and Nuns,婆藪槃豆法師傳2002) )                                     2049

Ch.   Datang Daciensi Zanzang fashi zhuan (Eng.           Monastery of the Great Tang DynastyA Biography of the Tripiṭaka Master of the Great Ci’en(1995)大唐大慈恩寺三藏法師傳)   2053 Ch.   Gaoseng zhuan (高僧傳)                                                                    2059

Ch.   Biqiuni zhuan (Eng.           (in Biographies of Buddhist NunsLives of Great Monks and Nuns,比丘尼傳)                                                                  2002)                                                                                                             2063

Eng.  Ch.   Gaoseng Faxian zhuan (         (in The Journey of the Eminent Monk FaxianLives of Great Monks and Nuns,高僧法顯傳)2002)                                                 2085

Ch.   Datang xiyu ji (Eng.  The Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions大唐西域記)                                                              (1996)              2087

Ch.   Youfangjichao: Tangdaheshangdongzheng zhuan                      2089-(7)         (遊方記抄: 唐大和上東征傳)

Ch.   Hongming ji (弘明集)                                                                        2102 Ch.   Fayuan zhulin (法苑珠林)                                                                  2122

Ch.   Nanhai jigui neifa zhuan (Eng.  Buddhist Monastic Traditions of Southern Asia南海寄歸内法傳)                                      (2000)   2125

Ch.   Fanyu zaming (梵語雑名)                                                                  2135 Jp.     Shōmangyō gisho (勝鬘經義疏)                                                        2185 Jp.     Yuimakyō gisho (維摩經義疏)                                                           2186 Jp.     Hokke gisho (法華義疏)                                                                    2187 Jp.     Hannya shingyō hiken (般若心經秘鍵)                                             2203

Jp.     Daijō hossō kenjin shō (大乘法相研神章)                                         2309 Jp.     Kanjin kakumu shō (觀心覺夢鈔)                                                      2312

Eng.  Jp.     Risshū kōyō (The Essentials of the Vinaya Tradition律宗綱要)                                                                     (1995)                                                                                                            2348

Jp.     Tendai hokke shūgi shū (Eng.  The Collected Teachings of the Tendai Lotus School天台法華宗義集)                                        (1995)                                                                                                                       2366

Jp.     Kenkairon (顯戒論)                                                                           2376 Jp.     Sange gakushō shiki   (山家學生式)                                                  2377

Jp.     Hizōhōyaku (Eng.  The Precious Key to the Secret Treasury秘藏寶鑰)                                                                     (in Shingon Texts, 2004)   2426        TeachingsOn the Differences between the Exoteric and Esoteric(in Shingon Texts辨顯密二教論, 2004) )                                          2427

Eng.  Jp.     Sokushin jōbutsu gi (         (in The Meaning of Becoming a Buddha in This Very BodyShingon Texts, 2004)即身成佛義)                                                     2428

Jp.     Shōji jissōgi (Eng.  The Meanings of Sound, Sign, and Reality聲字實相義)                                                                 (in Shingon Texts, 2004) 2429 Jp.     Unjigi (Eng.  The Meanings of the Word Hūṃ吽字義)                                                                                  (in Shingon Texts, 2004) 2430 Eng.  Jp.     Gorin kuji myōhimitsu shaku (         and the Nine SyllablesThe Illuminating Secret Commentary on the Five Cakras(in Shingon Texts五輪九字明秘密釋, 2004) )                           2514

Jp.     Mitsugonin hotsuro sange mon (Eng.  The Mitsugonin Confession (in Shingon Texts,密嚴院發露懺悔文2004))                         2527

Eng.  Jp.     Kōzen gokoku ron (         (in A Treatise on Letting Zen Flourish to Protect the StateZen Texts, 2005)興禪護國論)                                                       2543

Eng.  Jp.     Fukan zazengi (         (in A Universal Recommendation for True ZazenZen Texts, 2005)普勧坐禪儀                                                                                   )                                                              2580

Eng.  Jp.     Shōbōgenzō (         Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury         Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye TreasuryShōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury正法眼藏)                                                                     (((Volume I, Volume II, Volume III, 2007)2008)2008)                               2582

Eng.  Jp.     Zazen yōjin ki (Advice on the Practice of Zazen坐禪用心記)                                                              (in Zen Texts, 2005)                                                                                      2586

Jp.     Senchaku hongan nenbutsu shū (Eng.           on the Nembutsu Chosen in the Original VowSenchaku Hongan Nembutsu Shū: A Collection of Passages選擇本願念佛集(1997))                            2608

Jp.     Kenjōdo shinjitsu kyōgyō shōmon rui (Eng.           EnlightenmentKyōgyōshinshō: On Teaching, Practice, Faith, and(2003)  顯淨土眞實教行証文類)       2646 Jp.     Tannishō (Eng.  Tannishō: Passages Deploring Deviations of Faith歎異抄)                                                                              (1996)      2661

Eng.  Jp.     Rennyo shōnin ofumi (Rennyo Shōnin Ofumi: The Letters of Rennyo蓮如上人御文)                                               (1996)                                                                                                            2668

Jp.     Ōjōyōshū (往生要集)                                                                         2682

Jp.     Risshō ankoku ron (Eng.           (in          of the Orthodox Teaching and the Peace of the NationRisshōankokuron or The Treatise on the EstablishmentTwo Nichiren Texts,立正安國論2003)                                              )                                                       2688

Eng.  Jp.     Kaimokushō (Kaimokushō or Liberation from Blindness開目抄)                                                                        (2000)                                                                                                            2689

Eng.  Jp.     Kanjin honzon shō (         by Introspecting Our Minds for the First Time at the         Beginning of the Fifth of the Five Five Hundred-year Ages         (in Kanjinhonzonshō or The Most Venerable One RevealedTwo Nichiren Texts,觀心本尊抄2003)                                                                             )                                                       2692

Eng.  Ch.   Fumu enzhong jing   (         (in The Sutra on the Profundity of Filial LoveApocryphal Scriptures,父母恩重經2005) )                                                    2887

Eng.  Jp.     Hasshūkōyō (The Essentials of the Eight Traditions八宗綱要)                                                      extracanonical(1994)

Jp.     Sangō shīki (三教指帰)                                                       extracanonical

Eng.  Jp.     Mappō tōmyō ki (The Candle of the Latter Dharma末法燈明記)                                           extracanonical(1994)

Jp.     Jūshichijō kenpō (十七條憲法)                                           extracanonical

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THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY SHOBOGENZO

VOLUME IV

dBET PDF Version All Rights Reserved© 2017

 

BDK English Tripiṭaka Series

 

THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY SHOBOGENZO

Volume IV

(Taishō Volume 82, Number 2582)

Translated from the Japanese by

Gudo Wafu NishijimaChodo Crossand

BDK America, Inc.2008

Copyright of the Original Edition © 1994–1999 Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross

Gudo Nishijima was born in Yokohama, Japan, in 1919, and graduated from Tokyo received until the master’s death in 1965. During this time he combined the daily University in 1946. In 1940 he first met Master Kōdō Sawaki, whose teaching he Shōbōgenzō with a career at the Japanese Ministry practice of zazen and study of the of Finance and at a securities financing company. In 1973 he became a priest under Nishijima became a consultant to the Ida Ryogokudo company, and in 1987 -the late Master Renpo Niwa, and in 1977 he received transmission of the Dharma from Master Niwa (who subsequently became abbot of Eiheiji). Shortly thereafter give instruction in zazen and lectures, in Japanese and in English, on Master Dōgen’slished the Ida Ryogokudo Zazen Dōjō in Ichikawa City near Tokyo. He continues to work in Tokyo and Osaka and at the Tokei-in Temple in Shizuoka Prefecture.

train as a teacher of the FM Alexander Technique. He formally received the Dharma1982and received the Buddhist precepts in May 1983. In 1994 he returned to England to in 1998 and in the following year established the Middle Way Re-education Centre, after graduating from Sheffield University, met Nishijima Roshi in June 1982,Chodo Cross was born in Birmingham, England, in 1959. He went to Japan in(www.the-middle-way.org).

Copyright © 2008 by Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai andBDK America, Inc.

Reprinted by permission of Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—in a retrieval system, or transcribed in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2008933465ISBN: 978-1-886439-38-2

Third Printing, 2016

Moraga, California 94556BDK America, Inc.1675Published by School Street

Printed in the United States of America

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Message on the Publication of the English Tripiṭaka

The Buddhist canon is said to contain eighty-four thousand different teachings. I believe that this is because the Buddha’s basic approach was to prescribe a different treatment for every spiritual ailment, much as a doctor prescribes a different medicine for every medical ailment. Thus his teachings were always appropriate for the particular suffering individual and for the time at which the teaching was given, and over the ages not one of his prescriptions has failed to relieve the suffering to which it was addressed.

Ever since the Buddha’s Great Demise over twenty-five hundred years ago, his message of wisdom and compassion has spread throughout the world. Yet no one has ever attempted to translate the entire Buddhist canon into English throughout the history of Japan. It is my greatest wish to see this done and to make the translations available to the many English-speaking people who have never had the opportunity to learn about the Buddha’s teachings.

Of course, it would be impossible to translate all of the Buddha’s eighty-fours thousand teachings in a few years. I have, therefore, had one hundred thirtynine of the scriptural texts in the prodigious Taishō edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon selected for inclusion in the First Series of this translation project.

It is in the nature of this undertaking that the results are bound to be criticized. Nonetheless, I am convinced that unless someone takes it upon himself or herself to initiate this project, it will never be done. At the same time, I hope that an improved, revised edition will appear in the future.

It is most gratifying that, thanks to the efforts of more than a hundred Buddhist scholars from the East and the West, this monumental project has finally gotten off the ground. May the rays of the Wisdom of the Compassionate One reach each and every person in the world.

                                                                     Founder of the English                                                                      UMATA Yehan

August 7, 1991                                                         Tripiṭaka Project

 

Editorial Foreword

In January 1982, Dr. NUMATA Yehan, the founder of Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai (Society for the Promotion of Buddhism), decided to begin the monumental task of translating the complete Taishō edition of the Chinese Tripiṭaka (Buddhist canon) into the English language. Under his leadership, a special preparatory committee was organized in April 1982. By July of the same year, the Translation Committee of the English Tripiṭaka was officially convened.

The initial Committee consisted of the following members: (late) HANAYAMA Shōyū (Chairperson), (late) BANDŌ Shōjun, ISHIGAMI Zennō, (late) KAMATA Shigeo, KANAOKA Shūyū, MAYEDA Sengaku, NARA Yasuaki, (late) SAYEKI UShinkō, (late) SRYŪZU Ryūshin, and YHIOIRI Ryōtatsu, TUYAMA Akira. Assistant members of the Committee AMARU Noriyoshi, (late) TAMURA Kwan sei, were as follows: KANAZAWA Atsushi, WATA NABE Shōgo, Rolf Giebel of New Zealand, and Rudy Smet of Belgium.

After holding planning meetings on a monthly basis, the Committee selected one hundred thirty-nine texts for the First Series of translations, an estimated one hundred printed volumes in all. The texts selected are not necessarily limited to those originally written in India but also include works written or composed in China and Japan. While the publication of the First Series proceeds, the texts for the Second Series will be selected from among the remaining works; this process will continue until all the texts, in Japanese as well as in Chinese, have been published.

Frankly speaking, it will take perhaps one hundred years or more to accomplish the English translation of the complete Chinese and Japanese texts, for they consist of thousands of works. Nevertheless, as Dr. NUMATA wished, it is the sincere hope of the Committee that this project will continue unto completion, even after all its present members have passed away.

ing his son, Mr. N Dr. NUMATA passed away on May 5, 1994, at the age of ninety-seven, entrust-UMATA Toshihide, with the continuation and completion of the

Translation Project. The Committee also lost its able and devoted Chairperson,

Editorial Foreword

these severe blows, the Committee elected me, then Vice President of Musashino Professor HANAYAMA Shōyū, on June 16, 1995, at the age of sixty-three. After

Women’s College, to be the Chair in October 1995. The Committee has renewed its determination to carry out the noble intention of Dr. NUMATA, under the leadership of Mr. NUMATA Toshihide.

ISHIGAMI The present members of the Committee are MZennō, ICHISHIMA Shōshin, KANAOKA Shūyū, NAYEDA Sengaku (Chairperson),ARA Yasuaki, TAMARU Noriyoshi, Kenneth K. Tanaka, URYŪZU Ryūshin, YUYAMA Akira, WATANABE Shōgo, and assistant member YONEZAWA Yoshiyasu.

The Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research was established in November 1984, in Berkeley, California, U.S.A., to assist in the publication of the BDK English Tripiṭaka First Series. The Publication Committee was organized at the Numata Center in December 1991. Since then the publication of all the volumes has been and will continue to be conducted under the supervision of this Committee in close cooperation with the Editorial Committee in Tokyo.

            M             Chairperson

Editorial Committee of 

AYEDA Sengaku

                             the BDK English Tripiṭaka

Publisher’s Foreword

On behalf of the Publication Committee, I am happy to present this contribution to the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series. The initial translation and editing of the Buddhist scripture found here were performed under the direction of the Editorial Committee in Tokyo, Japan, chaired by Professor Sengaku Mayeda, Professor Emeritus of Musashino University. The Publication Committee members then put this volume through a rigorous succession of editorial and bookmaking efforts.

Both the Editorial Committee in Tokyo and the Publication Committee in Berkeley are dedicated to the production of clear, readable English texts of the Buddhist canon. The members of both committees and associated staff work to honor the deep faith, spirit, and concern of the late Reverend Dr. Yehan Numata, who founded the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series in order to disseminate Buddhist teachings throughout the world.

The long-term goal of our project is the translation and publication of the one hundred-volume Taishō edition of the Chinese Buddhist canon, plus a few influential extracanonical Japanese Buddhist texts. The list of texts selected for the First Series of this translation project is given at the end of each volume.

As Chair of the Publication Committee, I am deeply honored to serve in the post formerly held by the late Dr. Philip B. Yampolsky, who was so good to me during his lifetime; the esteemed Dr. Kenneth K. Inada, who has had such a great impact on Buddhist studies in the United States; and the beloved late Dr. Francis H. Cook, a dear friend and colleague.

In conclusion, let me thank the members of the Publication Committee for the efforts they have undertaken in preparing this volume for publication: Senior Editor Marianne Dresser, Dr. Hudaya Kandahjaya, Dr. Eisho Nasu, Reverend Kiyoshi Yamashita, and Reverend Brian Nagata, President of the Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research.

                  Publication Committee                John R. McRae                Chairperson

 

Note on the BDK English Tripiṭaka SeriesReprint Edition

After due consideration, the Editorial Committee of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series chose to reprint the translation of Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō by Gudo Wafu Nishijima and  Chodo Cross (originally published under the title Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Books 1–4, by Wind-bell Publications, 1994–1999) in order to make more widely available this exemplary translation of this important text. Volumes I, II, and III of this edition of Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury were published in 2007 and 2008.

Aside from the minor stylistic changes and the romanization of all Chinese and Japanese characters in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series, this edition reproduces as closely as possible the original translation.

 

Contents

A Message on the Publication of the English Tripiṭaka

                                                                        NUMATA Yehan                          v Editorial Foreword                                         MAYEDA Sengaku                    vii Publisher’s Foreword                                     John R. McRae                        ix Note on the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series Reprint Edition                            xi

Translators’ Introduction                                Gudo Wafu Nishijima

                                                                        and Chodo Cross                    xv

Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury, Volume IV

Chapter Seventy-three. Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō: Thirty-seven               

    Elements of Bodhi                                                                                        3

Chapter Seventy-four. Tenbōrin: Turning the Dharma Wheel                       35 Chapter Seventy-five. Jishō-zanmai: Samādhi as Experience of the Self      41 Chapter Seventy-six. Dai-shugyō: Great Practice                                          57 Chapter Seventy-seven. Kokū: Space                                                             71 Chapter Seventy-eight. Hatsu-u: The Pātra                                                   79 Chapter Seventy-nine. Ango: The Retreat                                                      85 Chapter Eighty. Tashintsū: The Power to Know Others’ Minds                  117 Chapter Eighty-one. Ō-saku-sendaba: A King’s Seeking of Saindhava      131 Chapter Eighty-two. Ji-kuin-mon: Sentences to Be Shown in the

    Kitchen Hall                                                                                             141 Chapter Eighty-three. Shukke: Leaving Family Life                                    147 Chapter Eighty-four. Sanji-no-gō: Karma in Three Times                           155 Chapter Eighty-five. Shime: The Four Horses                                              169 Chapter Eighty-six. Shukke-kudoku: The Merit of Leaving Family Life     177 Chapter Eighty-seven. Kuyō-shobutsu: Serving Offerings to Buddhas       207 Chapter Eighty-eight. Kie-sanbō: Taking Refuge in the Three Treasures     235 Chapter Eighty-nine. Shinjin-inga: Deep Belief in Cause and Effect          251

Contents

Chapter Ninety. Shizen-biku: The Bhikṣu in the Fourth Dhyāna                 263

Chapter Ninety-one. Yui-butsu-yo-butsu: Buddhas Alone, Together

    with Buddhas                                                                                           289 Chapter Ninety-two. Shōji: Life and Death                                                  299 Chapter Ninety-three. Dōshin: The Will to the Truth                                   303

Chapter Ninety-four. Jukai: Receiving the Precepts                                    309

Chapter Ninety-five. Hachi-dainingaku: The Eight Truths of a Great

    Human Being                                                                                           317 Appendix I. Editions of the Shōbōgenzō                                                      325 Appendix II. Butsu-kōjō-no-ji: The Matter of the Ascendant State

    of Buddha                                                                                                 329

Appendix III. Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon: One Hundred and Eight Gates

    of Dharma Illumination                                                                           343 Appendix IV. Chinese Masters                                                                     359 Glossary of Sanskrit Terms                                                                           361 Bibliography                                                                                                 365 Index                                                                                                             373

A List of the Volumes of the BDK English Tripiṭaka (First Series)             405

Translators’ Introduction

Preface

by Gudo Wafu Nishijima

The Shōbōgenzō was written by Dōgen in the thirteenth century. I think that reading the Shōbōgenzō is the best way to come to an exact understanding of Buddhist theory, for Dōgen was outstanding in his ability to understand and explain Buddhism rationally.

Of course, Dōgen did not depart from traditional Buddhist thought. However at the same time, his thought as expressed in the Shōbōgenzō follows his own unique method of presentation. If we understand this method, the Shōbōgenzō would not be difficult to read. But unless we understand his method of thinking, it would be impossible for us to understand what Dōgen is trying to say in the Shōbōgenzō.

Buddhists revere the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Buddha means Gautama Buddha. Sangha means those people who pursue Gautama Buddha’s truth. Dharma means reality. Dōgen’s unique method of thought was his way of explaining the Dharma.

Basically, he looks at a problem from two sides, and then tries to synthesize the two viewpoints into a middle way. This method has similarities with the dialectic method in Western philosophy, particularly as used by Hegel and Marx. Hegel’s dialectic, however, is based on belief in spirit, and Marx’s dialectic is based on belief in matter. Dōgen, through the Buddhist dialectic, wants to lead us away from thoughts based on belief in spirit and matter.

Dōgen recognized the existence of something that is different from thought; that is, reality in action. Action is completely different from intellectual thought and completely different from the perceptions of our senses. So Dōgen’s method of thinking is based on action and, because of that, it has some unique characteristics.

Translator’s Introduction

First, Dōgen recognized that things we usually separate in our minds are, in action, one reality. To express this oneness of subject and object Dōgen says, for example:

If a human being, even for a single moment, manifests the Buddha’s posture in the three forms of conduct, while [that person] sits up straight in samādhi, the entire world of Dharma assumes the Buddha’s posture and the whole of space becomes the state of realization.

This sentence, taken from the Bendōwa chapter (Chapter One), is not illogical

but it reflects a new kind of logic.

Secondly, Dōgen recognized that in action, the only time that really exists is the moment of the present, and the only place that really exists is this place. So the present moment and this place—the here and now—are very important concepts in Dōgen’s philosophy of action.

The philosophy of action is not unique to Dōgen; this idea was also the center of Gautama Buddha’s thought. All the Buddhist patriarchs of ancient India and China relied upon this theory and realized Buddhism itself. They also recognized the oneness of reality, the importance of the present moment, and the importance of this place.

But explanations of reality are only explanations. In the Shōbōgenzō, after he had explained a problem on the basis of action, Dōgen wanted to point the reader into the realm of action itself. To do this, he sometimes used poems, he sometimes used old Buddhist stories that suggest reality, and he sometimes used symbolic expressions.

So the chapters of the Shōbōgenzō usually follow a four-phased pattern. First Dōgen picks up and outlines a Buddhist idea. In the second phase, he examines the idea very objectively or concretely, in order to defeat idealistic or intellectual interpretations of it. In the third phase, Dōgen’s expression becomes even more concrete, practical, and realistic, relying on the philosophy of action. And in the fourth phase, Dōgen tries to suggest reality with words. Ultimately, these trials are only trials. But we can feel something that can be called reality in his sincere trials when we reach the end of each chapter.

I think this four-phased pattern is related with the Four Noble Truths preached by Gautama Buddha in his first lecture. By realizing Dōgen’s method of thinking,

Translator’s Introduction

we can come to realize the true meaning of Gautama Buddha’s Four Noble Truths. This is why we persevere in studying the Shōbōgenzō.

Notes on the Translation by Chado Cross

Source Text

The source text for Chapters Seventy-three to Ninety-five is contained in volumes ten to twelve of Nishijima Roshi’s twelve-volume Gendaigo-yakushōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese). The Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō contains Dōgen’s original text, notes on the text, and the text rendered into modern Japanese. Reference numbers enclosed in brackets at the beginning of some paragraphs of this translation refer to corresponding page numbers in the Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō, and much of the material reproduced in the notes comes from the Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō.

The Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō is based upon the ninety-five–chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō, which was arranged in chronological order by Master Hangyō Kōzen sometime between 1688 and 1703. The ninety-five–chapter edition is the most comprehensive single edition, including important chapters such as Bendōwa (Chapter One, Vol. I) and Hokke-ten-hokke (Chapter Seventeen, Vol. I) that do not appear in other editions. Furthermore, it was the first edition to be printed with woodblocks, in the Bunka era (1804–1818), and so the content was fixed at that time. The original woodblocks are still preserved at Eiheiji, the temple in Fukui prefecture that Dōgen founded.

Sanskrit Terms

As a rule, Sanskrit words such as samādhi (the balanced state), prajñā (real wisdom), and bhikṣu (monk), which Dōgen reproduces phonetically with Chinese characters, read in Japanese as zanmai, hannya, and biku, have been retained in Sanskrit form.

In addition, some Chinese characters representing the meaning of Sanskrit terms that will already be familiar to readers (or which will become familiar in the course of reading the Shōbōgenzō) have been returned to Sanskrit. Examples are (“reality,” “law,” “method,” “things and phenomena”), usually translated as “Dharma” or “dharmas”; nyorai (“Thus-come”), always translated as “Tathāgata”; and shōmon (“voice-hearer”), always translated as “śrāvaka.”

Translator’s Introduction

The Glossary of Sanskrit Terms includes all Sanskrit terms appearing in this

volume not included in the Glossary of Sanskrit Terms in Volumes I–III.

Chinese Proper Nouns

In general Chinese proper nouns have been romanized according to their Japanese pronunciation—as Dōgen would have pronounced them for a Japanese audience. Thus, we have let the romanization of all names of Chinese masters follow the Japanese pronunciation, while also adding an appendix showing the Chinese romanization of Chinese masters’ names.

Chinese Text

Dōgen wrote the Shōbōgenzō in Japanese, that is to say, using a combination of Chinese characters (squared ideograms usually consisting of many strokes) and the Japanese phonetic alphabet which is more abbreviated. Chinese of course is written in Chinese characters only. Therefore when Dōgen quotes a passage, or borrows a phrase, from a Chinese text—as he very often does—it is readily apparent to the eye as a string of Chinese ideograms uninterrupted by Japanese squiggles. We attempted to mirror this effect, to some degree, by using italics for such passages and phrases. (Editorial Note: In this BDK English Tripiṭaka Series edition, all such passages appear in quote marks. Also, in adherence to the publishing guidelines of the BDK English Tripiṭaka Series, all Chinese characters have been omitted in this reprint edition. Interested readers may consult the original wind-bell Publications edition, Master Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Books 1– 4.)

The Meaning of Shōbōgenzō, “True Dharma-eye Treasury”

Shō means “right” or “true.” Hō, “law,” represents the Sanskrit “Dharma.” All of us belong to something that, prior to our naming it or thinking about it, is already there. And it already belongs to us. “Dharma” is one name for what is already there.

Hōgen, “Dharma-eye,” represents the direct experience of what is already there. Because the Dharma is prior to thinking, it must be directly experienced by a faculty that is other than thinking. Gen, “eye,” represents this direct experience that is other than thinking.

Shōbōgen, “true Dharma-eye,” therefore describes the right experience of

what is already there.

Translator’s Introduction

Zō, “storehouse” or “treasury,” suggests something that contains and preserves the right experience of what is already there. Thus, Nishijima Roshi has interpreted Shōbōgenzō, “true Dharma-eye treasury,” as an expression of zazen itself.

Any virtue that this translation has stems entirely from the profoundly philosophical mind, the imperturbable balance, and the irrepressible optimism and energy of Nishijima Roshi.

 

SHŌBŌGENZŌ

THE TRUE DHARMA-EYE TREASURY VOLUME IV by

Dōgen

 

[Chapter Seventy-three]

                               Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō                        

Thirty-seven Elements of Bodhi

Translator’s Note: Sanjūshichi-bon means “thirty-seven kinds.” Bodai represents the Sanskrit bodhi, which means “the truth,” and bunpō means “elements” or “methods.” So sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō means “thirty-seven elements of the truth.” There are two fundamental schools of Buddhism: the Hinayana (Small Vehicle) and the Mahayana (Great Vehicle). The thirty-seven methods are usually said to belong to Hinayana Buddhism, because they are discussed in the Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra, which is one of the primary texts of Hinayana Buddhism. In Japan, and especially among Maha yana Buddhist masters, it was very rare for Buddhist monks to discuss these teachings. But Master Dōgen has his own views on Mahayana and Hinayana. According to him, there exists only the Buddhism that Gautama Buddha taught. He thought that any distinctions between Mahayana and Hinayana are reflections of the different ages and cultures in which the two schools of Buddhism were taught, and he refused to discriminate between the two Buddhist streams. In this chapter Master Dōgen explains the thirty-seven elements of the truth with no division into Hinayana or Mahayana, but based upon the practice of zazen.

[3]  The reality1 of eternal buddhas is present; it is, namely, the teaching, practice, and experience of “the thirty-seven elements of bodhi.”2 The entanglement of ascending and descending through their classification is just the entangled state of reality, which we call “the buddhas” and which we call “the patriarchs.”

[4]  The Four Abodes of Mindfulness3

The first is the reflection that the body is not pure. The second is the reflection that feeling is suffering. The third is the reflection that mind is without constancy. The fourth is the reflection that dharmas are without self.

3

[5]  “The reflection that the body is not pure”: The individual bag of skin reflected as a body in the present is “the whole universe in ten directions”;4 because it is “the real body,”5 it is “the reflection that the body is not pure” springing up on the road of vivid action. If not for springing up, reflection would be impossible. It would be as if the body did not exist. Action itself would be impossible. The act of preaching would be impossible. The act of reflection would be impossible. But in fact the realization of realized reflection is already present: remember, it is the realized state of vivid springing up. What has been called “realized reflection” is everyday actions: sweeping the ground and sweeping the floor. Because we sweep the ground unaware “what number moon”6 it is, and sweep the ground and sweep the floor aware that “this is just the second moon,”7 the whole earth is as it is. Reflection on the body is the body’s reflection: it is not that, by means of the body’s reflection, something else reflects. Reflection itself, in the very moment of it, is the superlative having arrived. When body reflection is realized, mental reflection is not at all worth groping for and is not realized. Thus, [body-reflection] is diamond samādhi8 and śūraṃgama samādhi,9 both of which are the reflection that the body is not pure. In general, the principle of seeing the bright star in the middle of the night is expressed as “the reflection that the body is not pure.” It is not a question of relative purity and impurity. The actual body is not pure. This real body is not pure. In learning in practice like this, when demons become buddha, they utilize the demon to defeat the demon and to become buddha. When buddhas become buddha, they utilize buddha to aim

at buddha and to become buddha. When human beings become buddha, they utilize the human being to regulate the human being and to become buddha. We should investigate the truth that a way through exists in the utilization itself. It is like the method of washing a robe, for example: water is dirtied by the robe and the robe is permeated by the water. Whether we use this water and carry on washing or change this water and carry on washing, we are still using water, and still washing the robe. In washing it once and washing it a second time, if it does not look clean, do not linger in idle vacillation! When all the water is used up, we carry on with other water; [even] when the robe is clean, we carry on washing the robe.10 For water, we use many sorts of water: all sorts are suitable for washing a robe. We can investigate the truth that when water is impure, we know that there may be fish.11 As for robes, all

sorts of robes need washing. Through effort like this, the reality of washing the robe is realized; and, at the same time, we see what purity is. The point here is that to permeate the robe with water is not necessarily the original aim, and to dirty the water with the robe is not the original aim: it is in using dirty water to wash the robe that the original aim of washing the robe exists. There are also methods of washing the robe and of washing things, by using fire, wind, soil, water, and space. And there are methods of washing and cleaning earth, water, fire, wind, and space by using earth, water, fire, wind, and space. The point of the present “reflection that the body is not pure” is also like this. On this basis, the totality of “body,” the totality of “reflection,” and the totality of “not being pure” are just the kaṣāya to which a mother gives birth.12 If a kaṣāya is not the kaṣāya to which a mother gives birth, Buddhist patriarchs never use it—how could Śāṇavāsa be the only one? We should carefully apply our minds to this truth, learning it in practice and perfectly realizing it.

[10]          “The reflection that feeling is suffering”: Suffering is feeling. It is

neither one’s own nor from outside; it is not tangible, neither is it intangible. 245b It is the feeling of the living body, the suffering of the living body. It means sweet ripe melons being replaced by bitter13 gourds, which is bitter to the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, and bitter to the conscious mind, the unconscious mind, and so on. [This reflection] is mystical power and practice and experience, which are one step ascendant14—mystical power that springs out from the entire stem and springs out from the whole root. Thus, “It has been said that living beings suffer; at the same time, there are suffering living beings.”15 Living beings are beyond self and beyond others; “at the same time, there are suffering living beings”: in the end it is impossible to deceive others. Though sweet melons are totally sweet right through to their stems and bitter gourds are totally bitter right to the whole of their roots, suffering is not easily groped. We should ask ourselves: What is suffering?

[11]          “The reflection that mind is without constancy”: The eternal buddhaSōkei says, “That without constancy is the buddha-nature.”16 So non constancy, though [variously] understood by various beings, is always the buddhanature. Great Master Yōka Shinkaku says, “Actions are nonconstancy; all is empty. Just this is the Tathāgata’s great and round realization.”17 The present “reflection that the mind is nonconstancy” is itself the Tathāgata’s great and round realization, and it is the great and roundly realized Tathāgata. Mind, even if it intends not to reflect, follows the external world completely; therefore, where there is mind there is also reflection. In general, arrival at the supreme truth of bodhi, realization of the supreme right and balanced truth, is just “nonconstancy” and is “reflection of the mind.” The mind is not necessarily constant: because it goes far beyond the four lines18 and transcends the hundred negations,19 fences, walls, tiles, pebbles, and stones large and small are “the mind” itself, are “nonconstancy” itself, and are “reflection” itself.

[12]          “The reflection that dharmas are without self”: The long has a long Dharma body, and the short has a short Dharma body. Because they are a realized state of vigorous activity, they are without self. A dog is the Buddha nature as being without, and a dog is the buddha-nature as existence.20 All living beings are without the buddha-nature.21 All instances of buddha-nature are without living beings.22 All buddhas are without living beings. All buddhas

 are without buddhas. All instances of the buddha-nature are without the buddha-nature. All living beings are without living beings. Because it is like this, we learn all dharmas being without all dharmas as “the reflection that dharmas are without self.” Remember, it is a springing free from the whole body of self-entanglement.

[14]  Śākyamuni Buddha says, “All buddhas and bodhisattvas will rest

in this teaching forever, regarding it as a sacred womb.”

So all buddhas and bodhisattvas have regarded these four abodes of mind fulness as a sacred womb. Remember, they are the sacred womb of [bodhisattvas of] balanced awareness23 and the sacred womb of [bodhisattvas of] fine awareness.24 [The Buddha] has spoken of “all buddhas and bodhisattvas,” and so [the four abodes] may not stop at fine awareness. Even buddhas regard them as a sacred womb. And bodhisattvas who have sprung free from states prior to balanced awareness or beyond subtle awareness also regard these four abodes of mindfulness as a sacred womb. Truly, the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the buddhas and the patriarchs are nothing other than the four abodes of mindfulness.25

[15]  The Four Kinds of Right Restraint26 (Also called the four kinds of right exertion)

The first is to prevent bad that has not yet occurred. The second is to

cause to be extinguished bad that has already occurred. The third is to cause to occur good that has not yet occurred. The fourth is to promote the good that has already occurred.

[16]  “To prevent bad that has not yet occurred”: What is called bad does not always have established forms and grades; the term has been established land by land and sphere by sphere. Nevertheless, prevention of that which has not yet occurred is called the Buddha-Dharma, and we have received its authentic transmission. They say that in the understanding of non-Buddhists the prime Val self is seen as fundamental, but in the Buddha-Dharma we should not be like that. Now, let us inquire, at the time when “bad has not yet occurred,” where is it? To say that it will exist in the future is to be forever a non-Buddhist of nihilism.27 To say that the future becomes the present is 246a not an insistence of the Buddha-Dharma: the three times would have to be confused. If the three times were confused, all dharmas would be confused. If all dharmas were confused, real form would be confused. If real form were confused, buddhas alone, together with buddhas, would be confused. For this reason, we do not say that the future will, in future, become the present. Let us inquire further: what thing does “bad that has not yet occurred” describe? Who has known it or seen it? For it to be known and seen, there must be a time of its nonoccurrence and a time of something other than its nonoccurrence. In that case, it could not be called something that had not yet occurred. It would have to be called something that has already vanished. Without studying under non-Buddhists or śrāvakas and others of the Small Vehicle, we should learn in practice “the prevention of bad that has not yet occurred.” All the bad in the universe is called “bad that has not yet occurred,” and it is bad that does not appear. Nonappearance means “yester day preaching an established rule, today preaching an exception to the rule.”28

“To cause to be extinguished bad that has already occurred”:29 “Already occurring” means totally happening. Totally happening means half-happening. Half-hap penning means what is happening here and now. What is happening here and now is obstructed by happening itself; it has sprung free from the brains of happening. Causing this [bad] to be extinguished describes Devadatta’s living body entering hell, and Devadatta’s living body attaining affirmation;30 it describes a living body entering a donkey’s womb, and a living body becoming buddha.31 Grasping this principle, we should learn in practice what “causing extinction” means. Extinction means springing free from extinction and getting clear of it.

[19]          “To cause to occur good that has not yet occurred” is satisfaction with the features we had before our parents were born, is clarification prior to the sprouting of creation, and is understanding preceding Majestic Sound.

[20]          “To promote the good that has already occurred”: Remember, this does not speak of causing to occur the good that has already occurred; it is about pro mooting [good]. It is [the Buddha], having seen for himself the bright star, going on to make others see the bright star; it is eyes becoming the bright

star; it is “confusion being followed by thirty years of not lacking for salt and vinegar.”32 For example: because we are promoting [good], [good] is already happening, and so “the ravine being deep, the dipper’s handle is long,”33 and “only because we had it did he come.”34

[21]          The Four Bases of Mystical Ability35

The first is volition as a base of mystical ability, the second is mind as a base of mystical ability, the third is forward progression as a base of mystical ability, and the fourth is thinking as a base of mystical ability. [21] “Volition as a base of mystical ability” is the body-mind “aiming to become buddha,”36 it is “looking forward to the pleasure of a nap,”37 and it is “why I bow to you.”38 In sum, volition as a mystical basis is utterly beyond the purposes of a body and mind; it is “birds flying in the boundless sky” and “fish swimming in water that is clear to the bottom.”39

[22]          “Mind as a base of mystical ability” is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles; it is mountains, rivers, and the earth; it is individual instances of the triple world; it is the completely red bamboo and wood of a chair.40 Because all [mind] is able to be utilized, the mind of Buddhist patriarchs can exist, the mind of the common and the sacred can exist, the mind of grass and trees can exist, and the mind of fantastic apparitions can exist. All mind is mind as a base of the mystical.

[23]          “Forward progression41 as a base of mystical ability” is “being on top of a hundred-foot pole and stepping straight ahead.” Where is the top of a hundred-foot pole? They say that we cannot find it without going straight ahead. A step straight ahead is not to be denied, but “this place is the place where something ineffable exists”—explain it as going forward or explain it as going back.42 Just in the moment of “forward progression as a base of the mystical,” the whole universe in ten directions, following from that mystical base, arrives. Following from that mystical base, it has arrived.

[24]          “Thinking as a base of mystical ability is all the Buddhist patriarchs, their karmic consciousness43 unclear, having nothing upon which they can originally rely.”44 There is thinking by the body, there is thinking by the mind, there is thinking by consciousness, there is thinking by straw sandals, and there is thinking by the self that precedes the kalpa of emptiness.

These are also called the four bases of free will.45 They are a state without hesitation. Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Not yet moving and yet having arrived is called the base of free will.” In conclusion, then, sharpness is like the point of a needle, and squareness is like the side of a chisel.

[25]          The Five Root-forces46

The first is belief as a root, the second is diligence as a root, the third is mindfulness as a root, the fourth is balance as a root, and the fifth is wisdom as a root.

[25] “Belief as a root,” remember, is beyond self, beyond others, beyond

our own intention, beyond our own contrivance, beyond outside influence, 246c and beyond independently established criteria; thus “it has been transmitted intimately between east and west.”47 Belief demonstrated with the whole body is called belief. It follows inevitably from the condition of Buddhahood, “following circumstances completely”48 and following itself completely.49 Unless the condition of Buddhahood is present, the belief is not realized. For this reason it is said that “The great ocean of the Buddha-Dharma is entered by belief itself.”50 In sum, the place where the belief is realized is the place where Buddhist patriarchs are realized.

[27]   “Diligence as a root” is to have been concentrating on just sitting;it is to rest without being able to rest; it is to have got rest and still to be getting rest; it is “a terribly hard worker”;51 it is “one who does not work so hard”;52 it is a terribly hard not-hard-working first and second moon.53 Śākyamuni Buddha says, “I have constantly practiced diligence, and for this reason I have already realized anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.”54 This “constant practicing” is head-to-tail rightness, through the whole past, present, and future. “I constantly practice diligence” says “I have already realized bodhi.” Because “I have already realized the supreme truth of bodhi,” “I constantly practice diligence.” How else could it be “constant practice”? How else could “I have already realized” it? Commentary teachers and sutra teachers cannot see or hear this teaching; how much less could they have learned it in practice.

[28]   “Mindfulness as a root” is a withered tree as a mass of red flesh.55 We call a mass of red flesh “a withered tree,” and a withered tree is “mindfulness as a root.” We ourselves who are groping for the mark are mindfulness. There is mindfulness that exists in moments of owning one’s body,56 and there is mindfulness that exists in moments of having no mind.57 There is conscious mindfulness,58 and there is mindfulness in which there is no body.59 The very life-root of all the people on Earth is “mindfulness as a root.” The very life-root of all the buddhas in the ten directions is “mindfulness as a root.” There can be many people in one state of mindfulness and many states of mindful ness in one person. At the same time, there are people who have mindfulness and there are people who do not have mindfulness. People do not always have mindfulness, and mindfulness is not necessarily connected

with people. Even so, through the skillful maintenance of this “mindfulness as a root,” the virtue of perfect realization exists.

[29]   “Balance as a root” is keeping one’s eyebrows to oneself or “lifting up an eyebrow.”60 Thus, it is [both] “not being unclear about cause and effect” and “not falling subject to cause and effect”61—and consequently entering the womb of a donkey or entering the womb of a horse.62 It is like a rock enveloping a jewel: we cannot call it completely rock or completely jewel. It is like the ground bearing mountains: we cannot call it totally ground or totally mountains. At the same time, it springs out from the brain, and springs in.

[30]   “Wisdom as a root is not knowing of the existence of the buddhas of the three times” but “knowing the existence of cats and white oxen.”63 We should not say “Why is it so?” It is beyond expression. In the nostrils exist in-breath and out-breath. In a fist exist fingertips. A donkey maintains and relies upon a donkey, a well meets with a well,64 and, in conclusion, a root succeeds to a root.

[31]   The Five Powers65

The first is belief as a power, the second is diligence as a power, the

third is mindfulness as a power, the fourth is balance as a power, and the fifth is wisdom as a power.

[32]   “Belief as a power” is being duped by ourselves and having no place of escape; it is being called by others and having to turn the head; it is “from birth to old age, being just this”;66 it is tumbling over seven times and carrying on regardless; it is falling down eight times and gathering oneself together. Thus, belief is like a crystal. The transmission of Dharma and the transmission of the robe are called “belief.” It is the transmission of buddhas and the transmission of patriarchs.

[33]   “Diligence as a power is explaining what cannot be practiced and practicing what cannot be explained.”67 That being so, being able to explain one inch is nothing more than68 being able to explain one inch, and being able to practice one word is nothing more than being able to practice one word. Getting power in exertion itself 69 is “diligence as a power.”

[34]   “Mindfulness as a power” is a “great brute, pulling a person’s nostrils.”70 Thus, it is nostrils pulling a person, it is to throw away a jewel and get back a jewel,71 and it is to throw away a tile and get back a tile. Further, failure to throw it away means thirty strokes.72 Even if used by all people in the world, it will never be eroded.

[35]   “Balance as a power is like a child getting its mother,”73 or like a mother getting her child. Or it is like the child getting the child itself, or like the mother getting the mother herself. But it is neither the swapping of a 247b head and a face nor the buying of gold with gold. It is just a song growing gradually louder.

[36]   “Wisdom as a power” is of deep and long years, and is like a ferry coming to a crossing. For this reason, it was described in ancient times as “like a crossing getting a ferry.”74 The point is that a crossing is inevitably just the fact of the ferry. A crossing not being hindered by a crossing is called a ferry. Spring ice naturally melts ice itself.

[37]   Seven Limbs of the Balanced State of Truth75

The first is deciding among teachings as a limb of the truth, the second is diligence as a limb of the truth, the third is joy as a limb of the truth, the fourth is elimination as a limb of the truth, the fifth is detachment as a limb of the truth, the sixth is balance as a limb of the truth, and the seventh is mindfulness as a limb of the truth.

[38]   “Deciding among teachings as a limb of the truth” is “If there is a thousandth or a hundredth of a gap, the separation is as great as that between heaven and earth.”76 Thus, to arrive at the truth is neither difficult nor easy: all that is necessary is to decide for oneself.77

[38]          “Diligence as a limb of the truth” is never having plundered amarket.78 Both in buying oneself and in expending oneself, there is a definite price and there is recognition of worth. Though we seem to suppress ourselves and to promote others, a blow through the whole body does not break us. While we have not yet ceased expending the self on a word of total transformation,79 we meet a trader who buys the self as a totally transformed mind.80 “Donkey business is unfinished, but some horse business comes in.”81

[39]          “Joy as a limb of the truth” is the sincerity of a granny’s mind when blood is dripping. The thousand hands and eyes of Great Compassion!82 Leave them as they are, immensely busy. Plum flowers are peeping from the December83 snow. In the scenery of coming spring a great master is cold. Even so, he is full of life and belly laughter.

[40]          “Elimination84 as a limb of the truth” is, when being in oneself, not getting involved with oneself, and when being in the outside world, not getting in volved with the outside world. It is me having got it, you not having got it. It is ardently expressing ourselves and going among alien beings.

[41]          “Detachment as a limb of the truth” is “Though I have brought it, others do not accept it.”85 It is a Chinese person, even when barefoot, walking like a Chinese person. It is Persians from the southern seas wanting to get ivory.

[41]          “Balance as a limb of the truth” is, before the moment, preserving the eye that precedes the moment;86 it is blowing our own noses; and it is

grasping our own rope and leading ourselves. Having said that, it is also being able to graze a castrated water buffalo.87

[42]          “Mindfulness as a limb of the truth” is outdoor pillars walking in thesky. Thus, it is the mouth being like an acorn and the eyes being like eyebrows and at the same time it is to burn sandalwood in a sandalwood forest, and it is the roar of a lion in a lion’s den.88

[43]          The Eight Branches of the Right Path89

The first is right view as a branch of the path, the second is right thinking as a branch of the path, the third is right speech as a branch of the path, the fourth is right action as a branch of the path, the fifth is right livelihood as a branch of the path, the sixth is right effort as a branch of the path, the seventh is right mindfulness as a branch of the path, and the eighth is right balance as a branch of the path.

[44]          “Right view as a branch of the path” is the inside of the eyes containing the body. At the same time, even prior to the body we must have the eye that is prior to the body.90 Though the view has been grandly realized in the past, it is realized now as the real universe and is experienced immediately. In sum, those who do not put the body into the eyes are not Buddhist patriarchs.

[44]       “Right thinking91 as a branch of the path”: When [we] establish this thinking, the buddhas of the ten directions all appear.92 So the manifestation of the ten directions, and the manifestation of the buddhas, are just the time of the estab lishment of this concrete thinking.93 When we establish this concrete thinking we are beyond self and transcending the external world; at the same time, in the very moment of the present, on thinking concrete facts we go straight to Vārāṇasī.94 The place where the thinking exists is Vārāṇasī. An eternal buddha95 says, “I am thinking the concrete state of not thinking.” “How can the state of not thinking be thought?” “It is different from thinking.” This is right consideration, right thinking.96 To break a zafu is right thinking.

[45]       “Right speech as a branch of the path” is the mute self not beingmute. Mutes among [ordinary] people have never been able to express the truth. People in the mute state are not mutes: they do not aspire to be saints, and do not add some thing spiritual onto themselves. [Right speech] is mastery of the state in which the mouth is hung on the wall; it is mastery of the state in which all mouths are hung on all walls; it is all mouths being hung on all walls.97

[46]       “Right action as a branch of the path” is to leave family life98 and to practice the truth, it is to go into the mountains and to gain experience. Śākyamuni Buddha says, “The thirty-seven elements are the actions of a monk.” The actions of a monk99 are beyond the Great Vehicle and beyond 248a the Small Vehicle. There are buddha-monks, bodhisattva-monks, śrāvakamonks, and so on. None has succeeded to the right action of the Buddha Dharma, and none has received the authentic transmission of the great truth of the Buddha-Dharma, without leaving family life. Notwithstanding scant pursuit of the truth by laypeople as upāsakas and upāsikās,100 there is no past example of one arriving at the truth. When we arrive at the truth, we inevitably leave family life. How can people who are not able to leave family life succeed to the position of a buddha? Never the less, for the last two or three hundred years in the great kingdom of Song, people calling themselves priests of the Zen sect have habitually said, “Pursuit of the truth by a layman101 and pursuit of the truth by one who has left family life102 are just the same.” They are a tribe of people who have become dogs, for the sole purpose of making the filth and urine103 of laypeople into their food and drink. Sometimes they say to kings and their ministers, “The mind in conducting the myriad affairs of state104 is just the mind of patriarchs and buddhas, other than which there is no mind at all.” Kings and ministers, never having discerned right preaching and right Dharma, delightedly bestow on them gifts such as the titles of master.105 The monks who speak such words are Devadattas. In order that they might feed upon tears and spit, they produce childish and demented talk like this. They are deplorable. They are not the kindred of the Seven Buddhas. They are demons and animals. They are like this because they have never known learning the truth with body and mind, they do not learn in practice, they do not know leaving family life with body and mind, they are ignorant of rule by kings and ministers, and they have never seen the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs even in a dream. Layman Vimalakīrti106 met the time when the Buddha manifested himself in the world, but there was much Dharma that he left unexpressed and not a little learning that he failed to attain. Layman Hōun107 practiced in a succession of patriarchs’ orders, but he was not admitted into the inner sanctum of Yakusan and he could not equal Kōzei.108 He merely poached a reputation for learning in practice: the reality of learning in practice was not present in him. Others such as Ri

   Fuma109 and Yō Bunkō110 each felt that they had experienced satisfaction, but they never tasted dairy-cake, much less tasted picture-cake. How much less could they have eaten the gruel and rice111 of a Buddhist patriarch? They never possessed the pātra. It is pitiful that their whole life as a bag of skin

was in vain. I universally recommend heavenly beings, human beings, dragon beings, and all living beings, throughout the ten directions, longingly to venerate the distant Dharma of the Tathāgata, and without delay to leave family life and practice the truth, and thus to succeed to the position of a buddha and the position of a patriarch. Do not listen to the inadequate words of “Zen masters” and the like. Because they do not know the body and do not know the mind, they speak such words. That is to say, utterly lacking compassion for living beings, having no desire to preserve the Buddha-Dharma, and solely wishing to feed upon the urine and filth of laypeople, they have become evil hounds, and those dogs with human faces and dogs with human skin speak such words. Do not sit with them and do not speak with them. Do not abide with them. Their living bodies have already fallen into the state of animals. If monks had urine and filth in abundance, they would say that monks were superior. Because the urine and filth of monks are not enough for these animals, they speak such words. Among the writings of the more than five thousand scrolls,112 we find neither evidence nor any principle that the lay mind and the mind that leaves family life are the same. There is no such trace in more than two thousand years. The Buddhist patriarchs of fifty generations, and of forty ages and more,113 have never said so. Even to become a bhikṣu who breaks the precepts or who has no precepts, and who is without Dharma and without wisdom, may be better than possessing wisdom and keeping the precepts as a layperson. The reason is that a monk’s action is wisdom itself, realization itself, the truth itself, and the Dharma itself. Although laypeople may have good roots114 and virtues appropriate to their station, in the good roots and virtues of the body-mind they are scant. During the whole life of 248c the teaching, no one at all has attained the truth as a layperson. This is because lay life has never been a good place for learning the Buddha’s truth, and because the obstacles it presents are many. When we look into the bodies and minds of those who insist that a mind for state affairs and the mind of the ancestral masters are the same, they are never bodies and minds of the Buddha-Dharma: they may not have received the transmission of the Buddhist patriarchs’ skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. It is pitiful that, even while meeting the Buddha’s right Dharma, they have become animals. Because this is the way it is, the eternal buddha of Sōkei left his parent at once and went in search of a master. This is right action. Before he heard the Diamond Sutra

and established the mind, he lived in a family as a woodcutter. When he heard the Diamond Sutra and was influenced by the lingering fra grance115 of the Buddha-Dharma, he threw down his heavy burden and left family life. Remember, when the body-mind possesses the Buddha-Dharma it is impossible to remain in lay life. This has been so for all the Buddhist patriarchs. We can say that people who assert that it is unnecessary to leave family life commit a sin even heavier than the grave sins,116 and they are even more wicked than Devadatta. Knowing them to be worse than the group of six bhikṣus, the group of six nuns, the group of eighteen bhikṣus, and so on, do not converse with them. A lifetime is not long; there is no time to be spent conversing with such demons and animals. Furthermore, this human body, received as a result of the seeds of seeing and hearing the Buddha-Dharma in past ages, is like a tool of the universe: it is neither to be made into a demon nor to be aligned with demons. Remembering the profound benevolence of the Buddhist patriarchs, and preserving the goodness of the milk of Dharma, do not listen to the howling of the evil hounds, and neither sit with nor eat with the evil hounds. When the founding patriarch of the Sūzan Mountains,

the eternal buddha, left the Buddha’s kingdom of India far behind him and came from the west to the remote country of China, the right Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs was transmitted in his person. If he had not left family life and attained the truth, such a thing would not have been possible. Before the ancestral master came from the west, living beings, human and divine, in the Eastern Lands, had never seen or heard the right Dharma. So remember, the authentic transmission of the right Dharma is solely [due to] the merit of leaving family life. When Great Master Śākyamuni graciously relinquished his father’s throne, he declined the succession not because the position of a king has no value but because he wished to succeed to the most valuable position of all: the position of a buddha. The position of a buddha is just the position of one who has left family life; it is a position to which all the gods and human beings of the triple world bow their heads in reverence.117 It is a seat not shared by King Brahmā or by King Śakra. How much less could it be a seat shared by the human kings and dragon kings of lower worlds? It is the position of the supreme, right, and balanced truth. The position itself is able to preach Dharma to save the living, and to radiate brightness and manifest aus picious phenomena. All actions in this position of one who has left family life are

right action itself, they are actions to which the many buddhas and the Seven Buddhas have long been attached, and they are not perfectly realized except by buddhas alone, together with buddhas. People who have yet to leave family life should pay homage to and provide for those who have already left family life, they should bow down their heads in respect, and they should serve offerings by sacrificing body and life. Śākyamuni Buddha says, “To leave family life and receive the precepts is to be the seed of Buddha. It is to be a person who has already attained salvation.” So remember, salvation means leaving family life. Those who have not left family life are in a depressed state. We should feel sad for them. In general, it is impossible to enumerate the instances on which, during his lifetime of preaching, the Buddha has praised the merit of leaving family life; Śākyamuni preaches it wholeheartedly, and all the buddhas certify it. People who have left family life, even if they break the precepts and neglect training, can attain the truth. No layperson has ever attained the truth. When emperors do prostrations to monks and nuns, monks and nuns do not return the prostration. When gods 249b do prostrations to people who have left family life, the bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs never return the prostration. This is because the merit of leaving family life is preeminent. If they received the prostrations of bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs who have left family life, the palaces, radiance, and good fortune of the gods in heaven would collapse at once, and so [the custom] is like this. In sum, since the Buddha-Dharma spread to the east, while attainment of the truth by people who have left family life has been as [prevalent as] rice, flax, bamboo, and reeds, no one has attained the truth as a lay person. Once the Buddha-Dharma has reached a person’s eyes and ears, they urgently endeavor to leave family life. Clearly, the state of a layperson is not a place where the Buddha-Dharma abides. Those who say, on the contrary, that the body and mind in conducting state affairs is just the body-mind of the Buddhist patriarchs, have never seen and heard the Buddha-Dharma, they are sinners in darkest hell, they are stupid people who do not even see and hear their own words, and they are enemies of the nation. The reason they would like to establish the principle that a mind for state affairs and the mind of the Buddhist patriarchs are the same is that emperors—because the Buddha-Dharma is preeminent—are delighted at such an assertion. We should remember that the Buddha-Dharma is preeminent. It may happen that a mind in conducting state affairs is the

same as the mind of the Buddhist patriarchs; however, in the rare instance when the body-mind of the Buddhist patriarchs has become a body-mind conducting state affairs, it can never be the body and mind of conducting state affairs. “Zen masters” and the like who say that a mind for state affairs and the mind of Buddhist patriarchs are the same, are totally ignorant of how a mind actually works and how it is. How much less could they see, even in a dream, the mind of the Buddhist patriarchs. As a universal principle, [I recommend to] King Brahmā, King Śakra, human kings, dragon kings, demon kings, and every other kind of king: do not attach to the direct and indirect results of conduct in the triple world but soon leave home, receive the precepts, and practice the truth of the buddhas and the patriarchs, and this will be a cause of Buddhahood for vast eons. Do you not see that if Old Man Vimalakīrti had left family life, we would be able to meet with one more excellent than Vimalakīrti: that is, Vimalakīrti Bhikṣu. Today we are barely able to meet

[bhikṣus] like Subhūti,118 Śāriputra,119 Mañjuśrī, and Maitreya,120 but we never meet half a Vimalakīrti. How much less could we meet three, four, or five Vimalakīrtis? Without meeting or knowing three, four, or five Vimalakīrtis, we can never meet, know, or maintain and rely upon the state of a Vimalakīrti.121 Never having maintained and relied upon the state of a Vimalakīrti we do not meet Vimalakīrti as Buddha. If we do not meet Vimalakīrti as Buddha, then Vimalakīrti as Mañjuśrī, Vimalakīrti as Maitreya, Vimalakīrti as Subhūti,122 Vimalakīrti as Śāriputra, and so on can never be. How much less could there be Vimalakīrti as mountains, rivers, and the earth, or Vimalakīrti as grass, trees, tiles, and pebbles; wind, rain, water, and fire; past, present, and future; and so on. The reason that such brightness and virtues are not visible in Vimalakīrti is that he did not leave family life. If Vimalakīrti had left family life, such virtues would be present in him. “Zen masters” and the like at the time of the Tang and Song dynasties, never having arrived at this principle, have randomly cited Vimalakīrti, considering that what he did was right and saying that what he said was right. These cronies, pitifully, do not know the spoken teaching and are blind to the Buddha Dharma. Furthermore, many of them have gone so far as to consider and to say that the words of Vimalakīrti and of Śākyamuni are equal. Again, these have never known, or considered, the Buddha-Dharma, the patriarchs’ truth, or even Vimalakīrti himself. They say that Vimalakīrti’s silence in addressing bodhisattvas123 is the same as the Tathāgata’s use of silence to teach people. This is to be grossly ignorant of the Buddha-Dharma. We can say that they have no capacity for learning the truth. The speech of the Tathāgata is, of course, different from that of others, and his silence also can never be like that of other types. That being so, the total silence of the Tathāgata and the total silence of Vimalakīrti do not deserve even to be compared. When we 250a examine the ability of the cronies who have conceived that although the spoken teachings were different, the silences might have been alike, they do not deserve even to be seen as people in the vicinity of Buddha. It is sad that they have never experienced sounds and forms. How much less could they have experienced the brightness that springs from within sound and form? They do not even know that they should learn the silence in silence, and they do not even hear that it exists. In general, even among various types there are differences in movement and stillness; how could we say that Śākyamuni and miscellaneous types are the same, or discuss them as dissimilar? People who do not learn in practice in the inner sanctum of a Buddhist patriarch engage in such discussion. There again, many wrong people think, “Spoken teaching and active demeanor are insubstantial matters. The silent and unmoving state is the true reality.” Expressions like this also are not the Buddha Dharma. They are the speculations of people who have heard sutras and teachings of Brahmadeva, Īśvara,124 and the like. How could the Buddha Dharma be caught by move ment and stillness? In the Buddhist state of truth is there movement and stillness, or is there no movement and stillness? Do we contact movement and stillness, or are we contacted by movement and stillness? Painstakingly research it in practice. Practitioners of later ages who are present now, do not let up. When we look at the great kingdom of Song today, people who have learned in practice the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs appear to have become extinct; there are not [even] two or three of them. There are only people who believe that Vimalakīrti, being right, had total silence, and that we today who are not totally silent are inferior to Vimalakīrti. They utterly lack the vigorous road of the Buddha-Dharma. Likewise, there are only people who think that Vimalakīrti’s total silence is just the same as the World-honored One’s total silence. They utterly lack the light of clear discrimination. We can say that people who think and speak 250b like this have no experience at all of learning in practice to see and hear the Buddha-Dharma. Do not think that, just because they are people of the great kingdom of Song, they must be of the Buddha-Dharma. The reason may be easy to clarify: right action is the action of a monk. It is beyond the knowledge of commentary teachers and sutra teachers. The action of a monk means effort inside the cloud hall, prostrations inside the Buddha hall, washing the face inside the washroom,125 and so on. It means joining hands and bowing, burning incense, and boiling water. This is right action. It is not only to replace a tail with a head;126 it is to replace a head with a head; it is to replace the mind with the mind; it is to replace buddha with buddha; and it is to replace the truth with the truth.127 This is just “right action as a branch of the path.” If appreciation of the Buddha-Dharma is faulty, the eyebrows and whiskers fall down and out, and the face falls apart.

[62] “Right livelihood as a branch of the path” is early-morning gruel and noon rice,128 is to stay in a temple’s grounds and to let the soul play,129 and is to demonstrate it directly upon the round wooden chair.130 The less than twenty members of Old Jōshū’s order are the realization of right livelihood; the less than ten members of Yakusan’s order are the lifeblood of right livelihood; and the seven or eight members of Fun’yō’s131 order are the constant on which right livelihood hangs—because they are divorced from all forms of wrong livelihood. Śākyamuni Buddha says, “Śrāvakas have never attained right livelihood.” So the teaching, practice, and experience of a śrāvaka are never right livelihood. The flotsam of recent times, however, have said that we should not distinguish between śrāvakas and bodhisattvas. Contending that we should rely upon the dignified forms and the precepts of each of the two, they judge the dignified forms and behavior that are the rule for a bodhisattva of the Great Vehicle by the rules of a śrāvaka of the Small Vehicle. Śākyamuni Buddha says, “A śrāvaka’s keeping of the precepts is a bodhisattva’s violation of the precepts.” So the śrāvaka precepts that śrāvakas have considered to be keeping of the precepts, when viewed against the bodhisattva precepts, are all violations of the precepts. The other [prac250c tices]—balance and wisdom132—are also like this. Though such [precepts] as “Do not kill living things” are apparently the same in form for a śrāvaka and for a bodhisattva, there is necessarily a difference be tween them that is beyond the separation between heaven and earth. How much less could the principles authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch

to patriarch be the same as those of śrāvakas? There is not only right livelihood but also pure livelihood. In conclusion, just to learn in practice from a Buddhist patriarch may be right livelihood. Do not rely upon the views and opinions of commentary teachers and the like. Because “they have never attained right livelihood,” they are not truly living their own lives.

[65]       “Right effort as a branch of the path” is action that gouges out a whole body, and it is the fashioning of a human face in the gouging out of the whole body.133 It is to ride upside down around the Buddha hall, doing one lap, two laps, three, four, and five laps, so that nine times nine comes to eighty-two. It is repeatedly to repay [the benevolence of] others, thousands and tens of thousands of times; it is to turn the head in any direction of the cross, vertically or horizontally; it is to change the face vertically or horizontally, in any direction of the cross; it is to enter the [master’s] room and to go to the Dharma hall. It expresses “having met134 at Bōshutei Pavilion, having met on Usekirei Peak, having met in front of the monks’ hall,”135 and having met inside the Buddha hall—there being two mirrors136 and three kinds of reflection.

[66]       “Right mindfulness as a branch of the path” is the eighty- or ninety percent realization of the state of being duped by ourselves. To learn that wisdom occurs following from mindfulness is “leaving the father and running away.”137 To learn that wisdom occurs within mindfulness itself is to be fettered in the extreme. To say that being without mindfulness is right mindfulness is non-Buddhism. Neither should we see the animating soul of earth, water, fire, and wind as mindfulness. Upset states of mind, will, and consciousness are not called mind fulness. “You having got my skin, flesh, bones, and marrow”138 is just “right mindfulness as a branch of the path.”

[67]       “Right balance as a branch of the path” is to get free of Buddhist patriarchs and to get free of right balance. It is others being well able to discuss. It is to make nose holes139 by cutting out the top of the head. It is the twirling of an uḍumbara flower inside the right Dharma-eye treasury. It is the presence inside the uḍumbara flower of a hundred thousand faces of Mahākāśyapa breaking into a smile. Having used [this] state of vigorous activity for a long time, a wooden dipper is broken.140 Thus, [right balance] is six years of floundering in the wilderness141 and a night in which a flower 251a opens.142 It is, [when] “the holocaust at the end of a kalpa is blazing and the great-thousand world is being totally destroyed, just to follow circumstances.”143

[69] These thirty-seven elements of bodhi are the very eyes and nostrils, the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, and the hands, feet, and real features of the Buddhist Patriarch. We have been learning in practice, as the thirty-seven elements of bodhi, the Buddhist Patriarch’s whole person. At the same time, they are the realization of one thousand three hundred and sixty-nine realities,144 [each of] which is a constituent element of bodhi. We should sit them away and we should get free of them.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō                                     Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in Etsu-u,145 on the twenty-fourth day of the second lunar month in the second year of Kangen.146

Notes

1     Kōan. See Chapter Three (Vol. I), Genjō-kōan.

2     by the practice and experience of sitting in zazen—see Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,The original meaning of means “translation of the are constituent parts of dharmas that are as wings to Lotus Sutrabodhipakṣalit., “thirty-seven kinds of ((the balanced state of truth which is perfectly realized 3.290), the thirty-seven elements are rendered as from the Sanskrit is wing, side, or flank, so that bodhi”; i.e., saptatriṃśad-bodhipakṣa-dharma.dharmadharmaFukanzazengis (matters or practices) thats that aid the truth” (Theodia’s-dharma). In the Chinese sanjūshichi-bon-jodō-Hō, Threefold Lotus Sutra has: “thirty-seven kinds of aids to the Way”).

3     Shi-nen-jū.Master Dōgen, probably by a later editor) that the four are also called which also means the four abodes of mindfulness. In Theravāda Buddhism today, The source text contains a note in small characters (added possibly byshi-nen-jo, they are usually called the four foundations of mindfulness. In Sanskrit, the four are: abode of mindfulness; and 4) See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.“consciousness of,” or “mindfulness,” and nomena) as an abode of mindfulness. The Sanskrit 1) dharma-smṛtyupasthāna, dharmaupasthānacitta-smṛtyupasthāna,means “approaching” or “abode.”smṛti means “calling to mind,”s (real things and phe-vedanā-smṛtyu-mind as an pasthāna, kāya-smṛtyupasthāna,feelings as an abode of mindfulness; 3) the body as an abode of mindfulness; 2)

4     Jin-juppō-kai.

5     universe in the ten directions is the real human body.” See Chapter Fifty (Vol. III),Shinjitsu-tai. paragraph 222.Master Chōsha Keishin said jin-juppō-kai-shinjitsu-nin-tai: “The whole

Shohō-jissō,

6        Dai-iku-getsu, the words of Master Ungan Donjō, quoted in the Keitokudentōroku,

The master says, “You should know that there is one who does not work so hard.”chap. 14: While Master [Ungan] is sweeping, Isan says, “What a terribly hard worker!”Isan says, “In that case, the second moon is present.” The master stands the broom this, Gensha says, “That was just the second moon.”on end, and asks, “What number moon is this?” Isan bows and leaves. Hearing of 7 moon,” suggests divided consciousness.Sho-ze-dai-ni-getsu, the words of Master Gensha Shibi. Ibid. Dai-ni-getsu, “the second

8     a state of great stability. Kongō-jō (diamond samādhi), from the Sanskrit vajra-samādhi, means samādhi as

23

9     Shuryōgon-jōprogress. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms and also Chapter Seventy-four, (śūraṃgama samādhi) means samādhi as a state of valiant onwardTenbōrin, note 9.

10    Chinese text, with only the copulas (Sui-jin-kō-yō-sui nari. E-jō-kō-kan-e nari.nari) written in phonetic Japanese characters.This is in the style of a quotation from a a quotation from a Chinese source, 2) Master Dōgen’s own expression, 3) a combi-However, as no source has been traced, it is not clear whether these sentences are 1) Quotemarks have been used only when it is certain that Master Dōgen is quotingnation of both the above. There are many such instances of Chinese text in this chapter. directly from a Chinese source.

11    Sui-daku-chi-u-gyo;presence of something for them to eat. Source not traced; see note 10.that is to say, fish can only live in water that is tainted by the

12    Jōshō-gesa, “the kaṣāya born of a mother,” alludes to the legend that Master Śāṇavāsa,kaṣāya. See Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), the third patriarch in India, was born wearing the Kesa-kudoku, paragraph 74.

13    Ku, nigai, “bitter,” is also the character for “suffering.”

14    genzō,Ichijō no jinzū, i.e., a mystical power that has sprung up from the intellec tual sphereShinji-shōbōinto the area of reality. The words of Master Isan Reiyū quoted in the pt. 1, no. 61. See also Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Jinzū, paragraph 186.

15    The words of Master Kyōsei Dōfu, quoted in the Rentōeyo, chap. 24. 16 See Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō, paragraph 38.

17    1)is Quoted from the dai-en-gaku, or in other words, the great and whole state of truth. Shōdōka by Master Yōka Genkaku. “Great and round realization ”Kaku can mean been realized—as in the “Eight Truths of a Great Human Being”; see Chapter Ninety-Sanskrit  to perceive, to be aware, to realize, etc.; 2) a reflection or objective truth that has Hachi-dainingaku; “the supreme right and balanced state of truth” representing the3) the state of Buddhist truth or realization—as in the phrase five, mujō-shōtō-kaku,anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

18    Shi-ku means the four lines of a Buddhist verse, or gāthā.

19    Hyappi means the hundreds of negations of Buddhist philosophy.

20    instance he said 82Refers to Master Jōshū Jūshin’s two responses to the question “Does a dog have the and 85. mu: “It is without,” and in the second Busshō, paragraphs buddha-nature?” In the first instance he said u: “It exists.” See Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II),

21    Issai-shujo mu busshō, Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō,the words of Master Isan Reiyū discussed in detail in Chapter paragraph 66. Master Dōgen’s teaching in that chapter itself.is that all living beings, without anything covering them, are just the buddha-nature

22    An instance of the buddha-nature is nothing other than an instance of the buddha-nature.

23    through which a bodhisattva is supposed to pass on the road to Buddhahood. Tōkaku, “balanced state of truth” (see note 17), is the fifty-first of the fifty-two stages 24 Myōkaku, stage of a bodhisattva before becoming a buddha. elsewhere translated as “fine state of truth,” is the fifty-second and last

25       Nensmṛti “remembrance, thinking of or upon, calling to mind.” The rendering “mindfulness,” credited to T.W. Rhys Davids in his translations for the Pāli Text Society. In Nishijimawhich is now generally used by Buddhist teachers in the west for in this context suggests mindfulness in zazen and our daily life. The Sanskrit(Pāli: sati) is defined in Monier Williams’ Sanskrit-English Dictionarysmṛti and sati,asis

Roshi’s interpretation, “mindfulness” in zazen means consciousness of reality, which is centered on keeping the spine straight.

26       Shi-shō-dan,exertion. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.acters says that they are also called samyañc) means correct, true, right; from the Sanskrit catvāri samyakprahāṇāṇi.shi-shō-gon.prahāṇa The Sanskrit means 1) ceasing, giving up, or 2)The note in small char-samyak (in compounds for

27       Danmetsuken, expresses the viewpoint of materialistic determinism. See also Chapter Eighty-nine, Shinjin-inga.        lit., “view of extinction,” representing the Sanskrit uccheda-dṛṣṭi,

29 traced.an established rule, today preaching an exception to the rule,” also appears in Chapter Four (Vol. I), In other words. The expression Ikka-no-myōju,fushō,sakujitsu-setsu-jōhō, konnichi-setsu-fujōhō,“nonappearance,” describes the state at the moment of the paragraph 101, but the original source has not been “yesterday preaching

29    In the original text, the first two kinds of restraint are included in one paragraph.

30    Daibadatta Devadatta, one of the Buddha’s cousins, is said to have fallen into hell because become mitted the five grave sins. Nevertheless, in the twelfth chapter of the (“Devadatta”), the Buddha says, “Devadatta also, in future, after countless Lotus Sutra ages have passed, will be able to become a buddha.” (LS 2.208)

31    The Hokkuhiyukyō, chap. 1, contains the story of Śakra-devānām-indra entering the form, and entering the first stage of Buddhahood. womb of a donkey, then taking refuge in the Buddha, returning to his or her original

32    thirty years that followed confusion, I have never lacked for salt and vinegar.” See Master Baso Dōitsu, expressing satisfaction with his life as a monk, said, “In thechap. 9.

Keitokudentōroku,

33    (Kei-shin-shaku-hei-chō.Vol. II), Dōtoku, paragraph 201. “To promote” is See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 83, and Chapter Thirty-ninezō-chō, literally, “increase-long.” 34 Shi-i-u-sho-i-rai chap. 14. Master Yakusan’s intention was that Master Bodhidharma did not introduce already there. something new into China; he revealed to his Chinese disciples the Dharma that was are the words of Master Yakusan Igen quoted in the Keitokudentōroku,

35 chanda, and faculties forming the basis for the kinds of mystical powers described in Chapter Shi-jin-soku,pāda lit., “four mystical feet,” from the Sanskrit Jinzū,and 4) and Chapter Eighty, mīmāṃsā. The Sanskrit Tashintsū.ṛddhicatur-ṛddhipāda,In Sanskrit they are: 1)means mystical powerare four

Twenty-five (Vol. II), 2)

one out of four). See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. means a foot or a fourth part of something (the foot of a quadruped being citta, 3) vīrya, 36 To-sa-butsu. II), Zazenshin, Master Baso’s words, quoted for example in Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. paragraph 11. 37 III), To-sui-kai.Kajō, paragraph 101.The words of Master Sekitō Kisen, quoted in Chapter Sixty-four (Vol.

38    In-ga-rai-ji is the third line of a poem by Master Tendō Nyojō, also quoted in Chapter Kajō, paragraph 108. Sixty-four (Vol. III),

39    Alludes to a verse by Master Wanshi Shōgaku quoted in Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol.II), Zazenshin, paragraph 34.

40    The master’s ceremonial chair, used for precepts ceremonies etc., is bright red.

41    Sanskrit Shin, susu the compound vīrya.[mu] literally means to advance, progress, move forward. Here it represents shōjin, “diligence, effort, fortitude,” which in turn represents the

42    recorded in the Alludes to a conversation between Master Rinzai Gigen and Master Chinshū Fukehouse for a midday meal. [Rinzai] asks, “A hair swallows the vast ocean and a mustard Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 96: Fuke and Rinzai go to a patron’s function’ or should we see this as ‘reality as it is’?” [Fuke] duly overturns the dinner seed includes Mount Sumeru. Should we see this as ‘the mystical powers and wondrous

124.it is—explain it as coarse or explain it as fine.” Master Chinshū Fuke (a successor of table. [Rin]zai says, “Very coarse person!” [Fuke] says, “This concrete place is where fat laughing monk featured in the “Happy Buddha” statues. See also Chapter Twenty-Master Banzan Hōshaku, d. ca. 860) is some times identified as Hōtai, the original two (Vol. II), Busshō, paragraph 45; Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III), Senmen, paragraph

43    that is, concrete consciousness in the present. Gosshiki, “karmic consciousness,” means consciousness as the result of past behavior, 44 Master Isan Reiyū said, “All living beings, having only karmic consciousness, are unclear and have nothing upon which they can originally rely.” See pt. 2, no. 30.      Shinji-shōbōgenzō,

45    There is no paragraph break here in the original text.

46    III, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. The Sanskrit Gokonśraddhendriya,(“five root-forces”), from the Sanskrit indriya2) vīryendriya,has the connotation of inherent strength or force. See Volume3) smṛtindriya, 4)pañcendriyāṇi. samādhindriya, In Sanskrit they are: 1)and 5) prajñendriya.

47    the Great Saint of India,/Has been transmitted intimately between east and west.” The poem Sandōkai by Master Sekitō Kisen begins with the words, “The mind of

48    the outside world. The phrase is used, for example, by Master Daizui Hōshin (732–Zuitako in the is a traditional expression of a compliant attitude to all challenges posed byShinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 24. See note 143.

824)

49    Zuijiko, suggesting independence, is Master Dōgen’s variation.

50    mitopadeśa. Quotation from the Daichidoron, the Chinese translation of the Mahāprajñā

51    Tai-ku-ku-shō, the words of Master Isan Reiyū; see note 6. 52 Fu-ku-ku-sha, the words of Master Ungan Donjō. Ibid.

53 black and white. Tai-ku-fu-ku-ichigetsu-nigetsu suggests the state of real activity which is not always 54 Study”). LS 2.128–30.Lotus Sutra, Ju-gaku-mugaku-nin-ki (“Affirmation of Students and People Beyond

55    state of detachment—a temple’s zazen hall was sometimes called Koboku no shaku-niku-dan. Koboku,or “solidarity.” also integration—as for example in the compound tree hall.” Dan, “mass” or “group,” sometimes expresses not only aggregation but “withered tree,” suggests a person sitting in the danketsu, which means “unity” kobokudō, “withered

56    Ushin, “owning one’s body” or “being in the body,” means having consciousness of one’s real physical presence.

57    Mushin, “having no mind,” means being free of self-consciousness.

58    Ushin no nen, sourness of oneself in zazen. “mindfulness in which there is mind,” suggests, for example, con59 Mushin no nen, of seemingly effortless action. “mindfulness in which there is no body,” suggests the balanced state

60    Prasenajit. It is a symbol of positive behavior. See, for example, Chapter Fifty-nine Sakki-bimōVol. III), Baike, alludes to the story of the meeting between Master Piṇḍola and King paragraph 217.

(

61    subject to cause and effect,” express dialectically opposite views about causation. See the story of Master Hyakujō and the wild fox in Chapter Seventy-six, Fumai-inga, “not being unclear about cause and effect,” and furaku-inga,Dai-shugyō.“not falling 62 passage through successive states that we undergo even as Buddhists. Entering the womb of a donkey or horse represents the process of samsara, the cyclical

63    these words to Master Dōgen in response to a question about the buddha-nature.pt. 3, no. 93.) According to the Dōgen written by the thirteenth abbot of Eiheiji, Master Kenzei), Master Eisai saidthree times, but I know the existence of cats and white oxen.” (Master Nansen Fugan said, “I do not know about the existence of the buddhas of the Kenzeiki (Kenzei’s Record, a biography of Master Shinji-shōbōgenzō,

64    between subject and object as represented by a donkey looking into a well and the In the that in the state of wisdom, all things are as they are. The story is quoted in the notes well looking at the donkey. Master Dōgen extends the imagery of the story to suggest to Chapter Ten (Vol. I), Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Shoaku-makusa,pt. 2, no. 25, a conversation describes the mutual relation paragraph 11.

65 Goriki (“five powers”), from the Sanskrit pañca-balāni, are the five elements of the

The Sanskrit 1)Terms. previous list viewed as actual powers rather than root-faculties. In Sanskrit they are: śraddhā-bala,bala2)means power, might, vigor. See Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit vīrya-bala, 3) smṛti-bala, 4) samādhi-bala, and 5) prajñā-bala.

66    The words of Master Baso quoted in the Seventy-seven, Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Kokū, paragraph 139. A similar phrase is spoken by Master Seki tōpt. 3, no. 100: Master Goei Reimoku visits Seki- Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 4, and Chapter

I will leave.” Sekitō does not take any notice. Master [Reimoku] swings his sleeves Kisen in the turns his head. Sekitō says, “From birth to death it is just this! What is the use ofand sets off. He gets out as far as the three gates. [Sekitō] calls, “amenable to realization. tō’s order and asks, “If [you say] a word [that] is fitting, then I will stay; otherwise, you turning your head and changing your mind?” At this, the master becomes Ācārya!” The master

67    unable to practice and practice what I am unable to explain.” See also Chapter Thirty(The words of Master Tōzan Ryōkai, recorded in the is inferior to practicing one shaku Master Daiji Kanchū preaches to the assembly, “Being able to explain one Vol. II), ) is inferior to practicing one Gyōji, paragraph 159.sun (about an inch).” Tōzan says, “I explain what I am shaku (ten sun). Being able to explain one Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 77:joshaku(ten

68 Funyo. These characters (read in Japanese as gotoku nara zu) usually mean “is not

Dōgen’s intention here has been interpreted on the basis of the second usage. See note). But sometimes like,” “does not equal,” or “is inferior to” (as in Master Kanchū’s words in the preceding funyo (read in Japanese as Kūge,shika zu of sangai no sangai o genzuru) means “at best.” Master

ni shika zu, also discussion in Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III), “It is best to see the triple world as the triple world.”

69 exertion or effort.Riki-ri toku-ri. Riki, chikara includes the meaning of 1) power or ability, and 2) 70 length in Chapter Seventy-seven, Alludes to a story recorded in the Kokū,Shinji-shōbōgenzō,in which Master Shakkyō Ezō yanks the no sept. 3, no. 49, and discussed at of Master Seidō Chizō in order to explain the meaning of space.

71       which appears in the variation of the expression Hō-gyoku-in-gyoku, lit., “to throw away a jewel and pull in a jewel,” is Mas ter Dōgen’sKeitokudentōroku,hō-sen-in-gyoku, chap. 10: Jōshū says, “Tonight I have given “to throw away a tile and pull in a jewel,” away a tile to pull in a jewel, but instead I have drawn out a lump of clay.” See also steps forward and prostrates himself. Jōshū (not impressed) says, “Just before I threw the answer. Anyone who understands the question should come forward.” A monk Zazenshin, paragraph 20. Master Dōgen’s idea of

Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), mindfulness is a condition in which things are as they are.

72       If during the course of Buddhist training mindfulness arises, we should not attach to it. 73 Nyo-shi-toku-go-bo,sattva Medicine King”). See LS 3.200.from the Lotus Sutra, Yaku-ō-bosatsu-honji (“The Story of Bodhi-

74    Nyo-to-toku-sen. Ibid.

75    Shichi-tokakushi “seven limbs of (“seven limbs of the balanced state of truth”), also called simply bodhi,” from the Sanskrit dharmapravicaya-sambodh yaṅga, praśrabdhi-sambodh yaṅga,smṛti-sambodh yaṅga.sapta bodhyaṅgāni. TheSee5) means a limb of the body. the Sanskrit shichi-kakushi,Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. They are: 1) 2)upekṣā-sambodhyaṅga,Sanskrit prefix  vīrya-sambodhyaṅga,tō,bodhisam, which literally means equality, equivalence, balance. (see note 17). which expresses conjunction, union, integration, etc., is here samādhi-sambodhyaṅga, prīti-sambodhyaṅga,Shi, “branch,” represents the Sanskrit 4) Kakuaṅga, represents which resented by

76    Quoted from the poem begins, meihaku nari./Gōri mo sa are ba, tenchi harukani heda taru:Shidō-munan, yui-ken-kenjaku./Tada-zō-ai nakere ba, tōnen to shi teShinjinmei, by the Third Patriarch in China, Kanchi Sōsan. The “To arrive at the truth the simple state of just acting and caution against irresolution or indecision.be revealed./[But] if there is a thousandth or a hundredth of a gap, the separation willbe as great as that between heaven and earth.” These opening lines point us back tois not difficult: just avoid preference./Just when there is no hate and love, [all] will

77    Shidō fu nan-i, yui-yō-ji-kenjaku.line of the Shinjinmei. This is Master Dōgen’s variation on the opening 78 See Alludes to Master Gensha’s words “It is forbidden for anyone to plunder a market.”Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 38.

79       Ichitengo,Chapter Seventy-six, it appears for example in the story of Master Hyakujō and the wild fox quoted in“word(s) of transformation” or “a turning word,” is a traditional phrase; Dai-shugyō.

80       Ichitenshin is Master Dōgen’s variation.

81       Buddha-Dharma?” Master Reiun says, “Donkey business being unfinished, but horse business coming in.” See Master Chōkei Eryō asks Master Reiun Shigon, “Just what is the Great Intent of the Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 56.

82       Daihi, “Great Compassion,” represents the Sanskrit Mahākaruṇā, another name of Kannon. Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II),

83       means the twelfth lunar month, which was probably the coldest month. In Tokyo the coldest month in the modern calendar. today plum flowers usually first bloom around the beginning of February, which is

84       the Sanskrit tionaryJo, nozo defines [ku] means to clear away, be rid of, exclude, eliminate. However, it represents praśrabdhipassaddhi(Pāli: as “calmness, tranquility, repose, serenity,” and in its list(Sanskrit: passaddhi “cutting rough or heavy states to get a light, sharp, sambodhyaṅga). The Pāli Text Society’s ) it gives praśrskrit The of the seven See Glossaryabdhi-sambodhyaṅga.passadhiPāli-English Dic-as “tranquility.”

peaceful and serene state,” as one translation of the San of Sanskrit Terms. Bukkyo-jitensambo-jjahngagives jo kakushi,

85       From a verse by Master Tōzan Ryōkai recorded in the Rentōeyo, chap. 30. 86 Kisen [no] gan, “eyes that precede the moment,” suggests intuition.

87 Alludes to the words of Master Enchi Daian. See Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), paragraph 110.  Kajō, 88 Shishiku, “lion’s roar,” is a symbol of the Buddha’s preaching.

89       Hasshō-dōshi, from the Sanskrit āryāṣṭāṅga-mārga, the eightfold noble path preached by the Buddha in his first preaching after realizing the truth. A note in small characters ājīva, of Sanskrit Terms.6) samyag-vyāyāma,2) samyag-saṃkalpa,7)hasshōdō, samyak-smṛti,3) samyag-vāc,“noble eightfold path.” In Sanskrit they are:and 8) 4)samyak-samādhi. samyak-karmānta, See Glossary5) samyag-

1)says that they are also called  samyag-dṛṣṭi,

90       our physical actions even before we are conscious of them. See also note 86.Shinsen [no] gen, “the eye that precedes the body,” suggests the ability to regulate

91       English word “think,” including wishing and hoping. On the one hand means to ponder, reflect on, think over, and so the compound and reflective feeling. On the other hand, the Sanskrit Shō-shi-i. Shi, Omo seems to carry some sense of definite purpose; see Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.[u] covers a range of mental activities, perhaps even wider than the saṃkalpa, i, omonmi[ru] shi-i has a somewhat general which shi-i represents,

92       from a sutra, although the source has not been traced. Kono shi-i o nasu toki, juppō-butsu kai gen nari. This looks very much like a quotation

93       this my thought”—see, for example, LS 3.36. But Master Dōgen uses the characters “Establishment of this concrete thinking” is read as kono shi-i o nasu) would simply mean “to have this thought” or “makings a ze shi-i. In a sutra these char acters

(

ordinary think ing, and that this state should be our standard. Here to suggest that “right thinking” is the state in zazen, a state that is different from

94       a quotation from a sutra, but no source has been traced. In the year he attained the Vārāṇasī. The “Verse for Laying out the truth, the Buddha is said to have spent his first rainy season retreat at a deer park near ka-pi-ra, Jō-dō-ma-ka-da, Seppō-ha-ra-na. . . .Ze-ji o shi-i se ba, sunawachi Harana ni omomuku nari.Pātra(” recited at mealtimes begins: “The Buddha was born in Kapilavastu, Again this is in the style of Buddha symbolizes a place where the Buddha-Dharma is being preached. realized the truth in Magadha, preached the Dharma in Vārāṇasī. . . .”) So Vārāṇasī

95       elation. At the same time, has a more concrete feeling than etc.). Master Yakusan Igen which Master Dōgen used to express the secret of zazen (see Shiryō-ko-fushiryō-tei, fushiryō-tei ikan ga shiryō, hi-shiryō,Zazenshin; Chapter Fifty-eight [Vol. III], shi-i:the famous words of thinking or consid-Zazengi;

Chapter Twenty-seven [Vol. II], Shiryō as a compound generally means the same as ryō, hakai, omonmi[ru], which means to measure, fathom, or calculate,[ru].

96       Kore shō-shiryō, shō-shi-i nari. saw the two phrases as equivalent terms.The apposition seems to con firm that Master Dōgen

97       a collection of one hundred and twenty-five verses by Master Dōgen recorded at the Suggests the situation in the zazen hall. The following poem is number eighteen in Eiheikōroku: “The innate subtle wisdom is itself true reality./Why should

I hung my mouth on the wall./Awareness of sound arrived at this place and took away my vacancy.” we rely on Confucian commentaries and Buddhist texts?/Sitting upon the quiet floor, end of the

98       monk (using the term “monk” to include both male and female monastics). See Chapter Eighty-three, Shukke is literally “to leave home” or “to get out of a family”—that is, to become aShukke; Chapter Eighty-six, Shukke-kudoku.

99       means 1) sangha, and 2) monk.

100    Gonji nannyoUpāsaka originally meant “servant” or “follower.” See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit represents the Sanskrit upāsaka (layman) and upāsikā (laywoman).

Terms.

101    Zaike, literally, “one who resides at home” or “one who resides in a family.” 102 Shukke, i.e., a monk.

103 Shinyō,to the real needs of a monk. filth and urine, are used as concrete symbols of fame and profit that are surplus 104 Banki no shin. Ki is as in the compound kibi, which means niceties, subtleties, intricacies.

105  That is, the titles “Zen Master So-and-So” or “Great Master So-and-So.”

106  for example Chapter Six (Vol. I), Vimalakīrti is the subject of the Vimalakīrti SutraSoku-shin-ze-butsu,(Sanskrit: paragraph 129; Chapter Thirty-Vimalakīrtinirdeśa). See two (Vol. II), Juki, paragraph 56.

107  Layman Hōun (d. 808) first practiced in the order of Master Sekitō Kisen and eventually became a successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Quoted in Chapter Twenty-five(Vol. II), Jinzū, paragraph 194. See also Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, nos. 5, 88, 99.

108  Master Baso.

109  Ri Fuma (d. 1038) first practiced in the order of Master Kokuon Unso and became compiled the his successor. He later maintained a close association with Master Jimyō Soen. HeTenshōkōtōroku, one of the sequels to the Keitokudentōroku.

110  Also known as Layman Yōoku, a disciple of Master Kōe.

111  In temples in China at that time, “gruel and rice” meant breakfast and the midday meal.

112  listed five thousand and forty-eight fascicles of Buddhist sutras. Sutras. The Gosen-yo-jiku, Kaigenshakkyōroku,“five thousand and more scrolls,” suggests the whole treasury of the compiled in 730 by the monk Chishō (658–740),

113  Tendō Nyojō. Forty ages suggests the ages of the Seven Buddhas and the thirty-three patriarchs from Master Mahākāśyapa to Master Daikan Enō. Fifty generations suggests the fifty generations from Master Mahākāśyapa to Master

114  Zenkon, good conduct as the root of happiness. “roots of good,” representing the meaning of the Sanskrit kuśala-mūla, means 115 Kun means 1) the fragrance that remains after incense has been burned, and, by ex-tension, 2) the lingering effect of Buddhist practice under a true teacher. See also the notes on II), Zazenshin,kunzen,paragraph 28; and on Gabyō,“assuming the fragrance of paragraph 211.kunju, dhyāna,“instilling [of true wisdom], in Chapter” in Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol.

Forty (Vol. II),

116  Zōgyaku. Zō means to commit and gyaku stands for go-gyakuzai, “five grave sins,” namely, to kill one’s father, to kill one’s mother, to kill an arhat, to shed the Buddha’s blood, and to cause a schism in the sangha.

117  as the Chōdai-kugyō. Chōdaikaṣāya, upon the head (see Chapter Twelve [Vol. I], literally means humbly to receive some venerated object, suchKesa-kudoku). Here it suggests bowing at a buddha’s feet.

118  Kūshō, lit., “Born of Emptiness,” is a Chinese epithet of Subhūti, who, among theyatāten great disciples of the Buddha, was said to be foremost in understanding of (the state that is like emptiness).     śūn -

119  Also one of the ten great disciples. The list in full is Śāriputra, Maudgalyāyana, historical Buddha. Mahākāśyapa, Aniruddha, Subhūti, Pūrṇa, Kātyāyana, Upāli, Rāhula, and Ānanda.Subhūti and Śāriputra are cited as examples of monks who lived at the time of the 120 retinue in Mahayana sutras such as the Mañjuśrī and Maitreya are legendary bodhisattva-monks who appear in the Buddha’s Lotus Sutra. 121 Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III), See also the discussion of three or four concrete moons and one conceptual moon inTsuki, paragraph 10. 122 of the Sanskrit Zengen, lit., “well manifest” or “healthy in appearance,” approximates the meaning subhūti, which means well-being or welfare. 123 Buddha’s order based on the viewpoint of The Vimalakīrti Sutra relates how Vimalakīrti attempted to refute monks in the śūnyatā.

124  and the like” suggests Indian idealism. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.an epithet of Śiva, the god of destruction and regeneration in the Hindu triad of Brahmā Jizaiten, “God of Freedom” or “Almighty,” represents the Sanskrit Īśvara, which iscreator), Śiva, and Viṣṇu (preserver). “Sutras and teachings of Brahmadeva, Īśvara,

(

125  Koka, literally, “rear stand.” See Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III), Senmen.

126  I-tō-kan-bi, “replacing a tail with a head,” here suggests bringing one’s at tension back down to practical matters—for example, remembering the importance of eating and digesting meals. Elsewhere in the sensical behavior; see for example Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), Shōbōgenzō, i-to-kan-bi represents impractical or non-Shunjū, paragraph 127. 127 I-dō-kan-dō, “replacing the truth with the truth,” suggests the value system of a true Buddhist monk—one who pursues the balanced state of action just for its own sake. 128 A monk’s meals.

Sixty-eight (Vol. III),

129  means just sitting and dropping off body and mind. Becoming a buddha and becoming a patriarch is called playing with the soul. Putting on clothes and eating meals is called playing with the soul.”Rōzeikon, “letting the soul play” or “playing with the soul,” is explained in Chapter Udonge, paragraph 167, as follows: “Playing with the soul

130  preaching. Kyoku-boku-za, “round wooden chair,” means the chair used in a temple for formal

131  fourth-generation descendant of Master Rinzai. Master Fun’yō Zenshō (947–1024), successor of Master Shuzan Shōnen, and the

132  balance (Refers to samādhisangaku,), and wisdom “three practices,” from the Sanskrit (prajñā). See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.tisraḥ śikṣāḥ: precepts (śīla),

133  of Buddhist training. Cf. the words of Master Tendō Nyojō in Chapter Sixty-three In other words, right effort is effort that makes us more truly human in the process Vol. III), Ganzei, paragraph 88: “Gouging out Bodhidharma’s Eye, I make it into a mud ball and work it into a person.”(

134  Sōken-ryō, relation, here suggests union of subject and object. “having met each other.” Sō, which expresses a mutual or reciprocal 135 Bōshutei Pavilion and Usekirei Peak?” Gako runs back to the abbot’s quarters. Hofukuon Usekirei Peak, and I have met you in front of the monks’ hall.” Hofuku asks Gako,Seppō addresses the assembly, “I have met you at Bōshutei Pavilion, I have met you see also Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), “Let us forget for a while the front of the monks’ hall. What about the meetings at lowers his head and goes into the monks’ hall. See Kōmyō, paragraph 139.Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 91;

136 reality of the present moment. Right effort occurs in balanced consciousness of what “Two mirrors” suggests subject and object, their combination resulting in the undivided is happening both inside and outside, here and now. 137 Sha-fu-tōzei, picked up from the parable in Lotus Sutra, Shinge (“Belief and Understanding”). See LS 1.224.

138  The words of Master Bodhidharma expressing oneness between himself and each of four disciples. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Kattō, paragraph 90.

139  Biku, “nose holes,” i.e., nostrils, are a symbol of liveliness. Right balance is a lively from the here and now. State realized by ceasing the more sophisticated mental activities that take us away

143  become completely free from miscellaneous restrictive conditions. Boku-shaku-ha, “a wooden dipper is broken,” means that a Buddhist practitioner has 141 years of ascetic practice in pursuit of the truth. Rakusō-rokunen, lit., “falling [among] weeds six years,” alludes to the Bud dha’s six 142 Kakai-ichiya, on the night of his enlightenment, when he just sat in the lotus posture. “a flower opening one night,” suggests the Buddha’s experience [whether or not this place will be destroyed.” The master says, “It will be destroyed. “of a The monk says, “If that is so, should we just follow circumstances?” The master says,A monk asks Master Daizui Hōshin, “[They say that] when the holocaust at the end “We just follow circumstances.” (Vol. II], kalpaShinjin-gakudō,is blazing, the great-thousandfold world will be totally destroyed. I wonder paragraph 152.)Gotōegen, chap. 4; see also Chapter Thirty-seven

144  that comprises the thirty-seven elements is present in each constituent element.  Issen-sanbyaku-rokujū-ku-bon no koan-genjo. and sixty-nine is thirty-seven multiplied by thirty-seven—suggesting that the whole The number one thousand three hundred

145  Present-day Fukui prefecture.

146  1244.

[Chapter Seventy-four] Tenbōrin

Turning the Dharma Wheel

Translator’s Note: Ten means “turn,” means “Dharma” or the Buddha’s teaching, and rin means “wheel”—in Sanskrit, cakra. In ancient India a cakra was a wheel with pointed spokes, used as a weapon. The Buddha’s preaching was likened to the turning of a cakra, and thus tenbōrin, the turning of the Dharma wheel, refers to the preaching of Buddhism. In this chapter Master Dōgen explains the true meaning of preaching Buddhism. Before his explanation, he quotes the words of several masters on what happens when someone “realizes the truth and returns to the origin,” in order to illustrate the value of Buddhist scriptures written in China. Some people have insisted that only scriptures written in India qualify as being genuine “Buddhist scriptures,” and therefore the scriptures that were written in China do not expound true Buddhism. But Master Dōgen takes a wider view: he says that any scripture quoted by a true Buddhist master is a true Buddhist scripture, even if it was written outside of India. He insists that when a true Buddhist master quotes a scripture, that act confirms the scripture as a true Buddhist teaching. From this, Master Dōgen explains that the preaching of Buddhism can be done in all places and at all times, and these preachings thus have universal validity. At the same time, he asserts that to preach true Buddhism is to practice zazen throughout one’s life.

[71]  My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, in formal preaching in theDharma hall, quotes:

The World-honored One said, “When a person exhibits the truth and returns to the origin, space in the ten directions totally disappears.” The master comments: “This is just the preaching of the World-honored One, but everyone has been unable to avoid producing odd interpretations of

35

Shōbōgenzō Volume IV it. Tendō is not like that. When a person exhibits the truth and returns to the origin, a beggar boy breaks his almsbowl.”1

[72]  Master Hōen2 of Gosozan said, “When a person exhibits the truth

and returns to the origin, space in the ten directions is jostling.”3

[73]  Master Busshō Hōtai4 said, “When a person exhibits the truth and returns to the origin, space in the ten directions is just space in the ten directions.”5

[73] Zen Master Engo Kokugon6 of Kassan Mountain said, “When a person exhibits the truth and returns to the origin, space in the ten directions puts on flowers over brocade.”7

[73]          Daibutsu8 says, “When a person exhibits the truth and returns to the origin, space in the ten directions exhibits the truth and returns to the origin.”

[74]          The expression quoted now, that “When a person exhibits the truthand returns to the origin, space in the ten directions totally disappears,” is an expression in the Śūraṃgama-sūtra.9 This same phrase has been discussed by several Bud dhist patriarchs. Consequently, this phrase is truly the bones

251b and marrow of Buddhist patriarchs, and the eyes of Buddhist patriarchs. My intention in say ing so is as follows: Some insist that the ten-fascicle version of the Śūraṃgama-sūtra is a forged sutra10 while others insist that it is not a forged sutra. The two arguments have persisted from the distant past until today. There is the older translation11 and there is the new translation;12 the version that is doubted is [not these but] a translation produced during the Shinryū era.13 However, Master Goso [Hō]en, Master Busshō [Hō]tai, and my late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, have each quoted the above phrase already. So this phrase has already been turned in the Dharma wheel of Buddhist patriarchs; it is the Buddhist Patriarch’s Dharma wheel turning. Thus, this phrase has already turned Buddhist patriarchs and this phrase has already preached Buddhist patriarchs. By reason of being preached by Buddhist patriarchs and preaching Buddhist patriarchs, even if a sutra is forged, once Buddhist patriarchs have preached and quoted it, it is truly a sutra of buddhas and a sutra of patriarchs, and it is the intimately experienced Dharma wheel of the Buddhist Patriarch. Even tiles and pebbles, even yellow leaves, even an uḍumbara flower, and even a robe of golden brocade14 are, once picked up by Buddhist patriarchs, the Buddha’s Dharma wheel and the

36

Chapter Seventy-four

Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury. Remember, when living beings transcend their reali zation of the right state of truth, they are Buddhist patriarchs, they are the teachers and students of Buddhist patriarchs, and they are the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of Buddhist patriarchs. They no longer see as their brothers the living beings who were formerly their brothers, for Buddhist patriarchs are their brothers. In the same way, even if every sentence of the ten fascicles is forged, the present phrase is a transcendent phrase, a phrase of buddhas and a phrase of patriarchs—one that should never be classed with other sentences and other phrases. Although this phrase is a transcendent phrase, we should not imagine that every sentence in the whole volume is, in essence and form, a saying of the Buddha or the words of a patriarch; we should not see [every sentence] as the eye of learning in practice. There are many reasons not to compare the present phrase and other phrases; I would like to take up one among them. What has been called “turning the Dharma 251c wheel” is the behavior of Buddhist patriarchs. No Buddhist patriarch has ever gone without turning the Dharma wheel. In the real situation of turning the Dharma wheel [Buddhist patriarchs] use sound and form to get rid of sound and form; or they turn the Dharma wheel springing free of sound and form; or they turn the Dharma wheel scooping out the Eye; or they turn the Dharma wheel holding up a fist. This, at a place where nostrils are grasped or at a place where space is grasped,15 is the Dharma wheel naturally turning itself. To grasp the present phrase is, here and now, just to grasp the bright star, to grasp a nose, to grasp peach blossoms, or to grasp space: they are one. [To grasp the present phrase] is to grasp the Buddhist Patriarch and to grasp the Dharma wheel: they are one. This principle is definitely the turning of the Dharma wheel. Turning the Dharma wheel means striving to learn in practice throughout a life without leaving the temple grounds; it means requesting the benevolence of the teaching and pursuing the truth upon long platforms.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Tenbōrin

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     Etsu-u on the twenty-seventh day of the second                                     lunar month in the second year of Kangen.16

37

 

Notes

1     Nyojōoshōgoroku, pt. 2.

2     Master Goso Hōen (d. 1104), successor of Master Hakuun Shutan.

3     Hōenzenjigoroku,for the crunching of stones or gravel. It suggests a condition in which miscella neouspt. 1. Chikujaku-gatsujaku, “jostling,” is an onomato poeic expression mony.concrete things are jostling against each other, rather than an idealistic notion of har-

4     Master Busshō Hōtai (dates unknown), successor of Master Engo Kokugon. 5      Kataifutōroku, chap. 26.

6     Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Master Goso Hōen, and editor ofHekiganroku (Blue Cliff RecordShinjin-inga. ). See also Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), Shunjū;

Chapter Eighty-nine, the

7     Engokoroku, chap. 8.

8     Master Dōgen. Daibutsuji was the original name of the temple now known as Eiheiji,which Master Dōgen founded 1244. However, this chapter was preached at KippōTemple.

9     to be a translation of the Shuryōgonkyō.mitsuinshūshōryōgishobosatsumangyōshuryōgonkyō, “Śūraṃgama-sūtra of the Great-Buddha-Head Tathāgata’s Under standing of the Myriad Ways in which BodhisattvasSecretly Rely Upon Practice and Experience.”The long title of the Chinese text in question is Śūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśa,This work, completed in 705, purportedalthough its authenticity wasDaibucchōnyo rai doubted and it is no longer extant. The title of the original Sanskrit sutra meansSamādhi (state of balance in zazen) called

March’).” Addressed to Bodhisattva Dṛḍhamati, it praises onward progress. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.“Description of the             samādhiŚūraṃgama as a state of valiant(‘Heroic

10    lations of Sanskrit sutras.Gikyō, “forged sutras,” describes Chinese texts that falsely purported to be trans-

11    to the Kūyaku, Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary “older translation(s),” probably indicates Kumārajīva’s translation. According were produced but only Kumārajīva’s version is(JEBD), many Chinese translations of the extant. In general, Śūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśakūyaku, “older translations,” categorizes those Buddhist scriptures

39

Shōbōgenzō Volume IV

by the Indian monk Lokakṣema who came to China in 147 and is said to have translated the called Xuanzang (Jp. Genjō; 600–664). Translations done before Kumārajīva’s time are that were translated into Chinese between the time of Kumārajīva (344–413) andŚūraṃ gama samādhinirdeśakoyaku, “ancient translations.” Included in the latter category are translation in around 185.

12    Shin-yaku, “new translation(s),” generally means translations done by the Chinese six hundred and fifty-seven texts, he produced over thirteen hundred fascicles of monk Xuanzang who, in 629, set off to India via Central Asia and Afghani stan in order to obtain original Sanskrit texts. After returning in 645 with the manuscripts of Daitōsaiikiki, an extensive record of his Trav scriptures in Chinese and completed the els.

13    the translation of the in the first year of the Shinryū era, 705. See note 9.Refers to the Daibucchōnyoraimitsuinshūshōryōgishobosatsumangyōshuryōgonkyō,Śūraṃgama-sūtra that Hanshi Mittai is said to have completed

14    gikyōthe transmission between the Buddha and Master Mahākāśyapa. The story, which isThe phrases “uḍumbara flower” and “robe of golden brocade” allude to the story of Shōbōgenzō, comes from the Daibontenōmonbutsuketsu -), quoted many times in the

which is also suspected of being a forged sutra.(Sutra of Questions and Answers between Mahābrahman and the Buddha

15    space, and Master Shakkyō Ezō, who grasped Master Seidō Chizō’s nose. See Chapter Alludes to a story about Master Seidō Chizō, who grasped air when asked to explainKokū.

Seventy-seven, 16 1244.

40

[Chapter Seventy-five]

                                            Jishō-zanmai                                        

Samādhi as Experience of the Self

Translator’s Note: Ji means “self,” shō means “to experience,” and zanmai means “samādhi” or “the balanced state.” So jishō-zanmai means samādhi, as the state of self-experience. In this chapter Master Dōgen explains the meaning of jishō-zanmai, criticizing the wrong understanding of Master Daie Sōkō and his disciples. They understood jishō-zanmai as meaning an intellectual state referred to as “enlightenment,” a state that they made their utmost efforts to attain. Master Dōgen did not agree with this belief. In this chapter he strongly criticizes Master Daie Sōkō and explains the true meaning of jishō-zanmai.

[79]   What the buddhas and the patriarchs have authentically transmitted, from all the buddhas and the Seven Buddhas, is samādhi as the state of experiencing the self. It is what is called “sometimes to follow a good counselor, sometimes to follow the sutras.”1 This state is just the eyes of the Buddhist patriarchs. For this reason, the eternal buddha Sōkei asks a monk, “Do you rely upon practice and experience, or not?” The monk says, “It is not that there is no practice and experience, but to taint it is impossible.”2 So remember, untainted practice and experience is the Buddhist patriarchs themselves, and is the Buddhist patriarchs’ samādhi as a thunderclap, wind, and rolling thunder.

[80]   Just in the moment of “following a good counselor,”3 sometimes we see half of each other’s face, sometimes we see half of each other’s body, sometimes we see the whole of each other’s face, and sometimes we see the whole of each other’s body. There are instances of meeting in each other half of the self, and there are instances of meeting in each other half of the external world.4 We experience in each other the state in which the head of a god is covered with hair, and we experience in each other the state in which the face of a demon is topped by horns. We have the experience of following

41

circumstances5 while going among alien types, and we go on changing while living among like beings. In these situations we do not know how many thousand myriad times we throw away the body for the sake of the Dharma. And we do not know for how many koṭis of hundred kalpas we seek the Dharma for the sake of our own body. This is the vigorous activity of “following a good counselor”; and it is the actual condition of exploring the self and suiting the self. At the time of mutual realization in the wink of an eye, [this condition] possesses a smiling face; and on the occasion of prostration to attainment of the marrow, it cuts off an arm. In sum, from the time before and after the Seven Buddhas to beyond the time of the Sixth Patriarch the “good counselors” who have met themselves are not one and not two. And the “good counselors” who have met the external world are neither of the past nor of the present. In the moment of “following the sutras,” when we investigate the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the self and get free of the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the self, peach blossoms are seen protruding from the eyes themselves, and the sound of bamboo is heard thundering from the ears 252b themselves.

[82] In general, when we follow and practice “the sutras,” “the sutras” truly come forth. The meaning of “the sutras” is the whole universe in ten directions, mountains, rivers, and the earth, grass and trees, self and others; it is eating meals and putting on clothes, instantaneous movements and demeanors. When we pursue the truth following these texts, each of which is a sutra, countless thousand-myriad volumes of totally unprecedented sutras manifest themselves in reality and exist before us. They have lines of characters of affirmation that are conspicuous as they are; and their verses of characters of negation are unmistakably clear. When, becoming able to meet them, we muster the body-mind to learn in practice—therein using up long eons or making use of long eons—the destination that is thorough understanding6 inevitably exists. When we let go of body and mind in order to learn in practice—therein gouging out eternity7 or soaring beyond eternity— we inevitably realize the virtue of receiving and retaining [sutras]. The Sanskrit texts of India translated into Chinese books of Dharma now number not even five thousand fascicles.8 Among these there are [sutras of] the three vehicles, the five vehicles, the nine parts, and the twelve parts;9 and they are all sutras that we should follow and practice. Even if we intended to avoid follow ing them, it would be impossible. Thus they have sometimes become the Eye10 and have sometimes become “my marrow.”11 They are horns on the head being right and a tail being right.12 We receive this state from others and we impart this state to others; at the same time, it is just the lively springing out of eyes themselves, which gets free of self and others, and it is just the transmis sion of “my marrow” itself, which is liberated from self and others. Because eyes and “my marrow” are beyond self and beyond others, Buddhist patriarchs have authentically transmitted them from the past to the past, and Buddhist patriarchs pass them on from the present to the present. There are sutras as staffs that preach the length and preach the breadth,13 naturally breaking “emptiness” and breaking “existence.” There are sutras as fly whisks14 that cleanse snow and cleanse frost. There are one order and two orders of sutras as zazen. There are sutras as kaṣāyas with ten scrolls per volume. 252c These are guarded and maintained by the Buddhist patriarchs. Following sutras like these we perform practice and experience, and attain the truth. Causing to exist sometimes god faces and human faces, and sometimes sun faces and moon faces, the effort of “following the sutras” is realized. At the same time, all instances of following good counselors and of following the sutras are just to follow the self. A sutra is naturally a sutra of the self, and a good counselor is naturally a good counselor of the self. That being so, thorough exploration of good coun selors15 is thorough exploration of the self. To take up the hundred weeds is to take up the self. To take up the ten thousand trees is to take up the self. We learn in practice that the self is inevitably efforts like these. In this learning in practice, we get rid of the self, and we experience the self as exact accordance.16 For this reason, in the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, there are concrete tools for experiencing the self and realizing the self, [but] if we are not Buddhist patriarchs as rightful successors we do not receive their authentic transmission. There are concrete tools that have been received from rightful successor to rightful successor, [but] if we are other than the bones and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs we do not receive their authentic transmission.

[87] Because we learn in practice like this, during the transmission and reception to and from others, the transmission exists as “You have got my marrow” and “I transmit the right Dharma-eye treasury that I possess to Mahā kāśyapa.” Preaching is not necessarily connected with self and others.

Preaching for others is just preaching for the self. It is listening and preaching in which self and self experience the same state.17 One ear is listening and one ear is preaching, one tongue is preaching and one tongue is listening; and so on for eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind; for the sense organs, their consciousness, and their objects. Going further, there is experience and there is practice with one body and one mind: it is the ears themselves listening and preaching and the tongue itself listening and preaching. Yesterday we

were preaching to others an exception to the rule, but today we are preaching to ourselves an established rule.18 In this way the faces of the sun line up one after another and the faces of the moon line up one after another. To preach the Dharma and to practice the Dharma for the benefit of others is to hear the Dharma, to clarify the Dharma, and to experience the Dharma in our [whole] life at each mo ment.19 Even in this present life if we are sincere in preaching the Dharma to others, our own attainment of the Dharma is made easy. Or if we help and encourage other people to listen to the Dharma, our own learning of the Dharma receives good sustenance. We receive sustenance in our body and we receive sustenance in our mind. If we hinder others in listening to the Dharma, our own listening to the Dharma is hindered. To preach the Dharma and to listen to the Dharma with our [whole] body at each moment in our [whole] life at each moment is to hear the Dharma in every age, and is to listen again in the present age to the Dharma that was authentically transmitted to us in the past. We are born in the Dharma, and we die in the Dharma, and so, having received the authentic transmission of the Dharma while in the whole universe in ten directions, we listen to it in our [whole] life at each moment and practice it with our [whole] body at each moment. Because we can realize our [whole] life at each moment in the Dharma and make our [whole] body at each moment into the Dharma, we bring together both single molecules and the universal order and let them experience the Dharma. That being so, having heard a word in the east, we should preach it to a person on coming to the west. This is to use one self to make effort in listening and preaching as one act, and it is to practice and experience the eastern self and the western self as one self. In any event, we should be glad to, should hope to, and should resolve to bring the Buddha Dharma and the patriarchs’ truth close to our own body-mind, and to practice them. We should extend the practice from an hour to a day and from a year

 

to a lifetime. We should let the Buddha-Dharma play as our soul. This is called not passing any life in vain. Do not think, on the contrary, that because we are not yet clear we should not preach for other people. If we expect clarification, we will not achieve it even in countless kalpas. Even if we have clarified human buddhas, we should further clarify heavenly buddhas. Even if we have clarified the mind of mountains, we should further clarify the mind of waters. Even if we have clarified dharmas arisen from causes and conditions,20 we should further clarify dharmas that are beyond causes and conditions. Even if we have clarified the outer limits of a Buddhist patriarch, we should further clarify the ascendant state of a Buddhist patriarch. To intend to complete the clarification of these things in one generation, and thereafter to act for the benefit of others, is not diligent effort, is not to be a stout fellow, and is not learning in practice. In sum, as students of the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, from the time we learn in practice one method or one standard, we let our will to teach others rise to pierce the heavens. We thereby get free of self and others. Going further, if we exhaustively explore the self, we will already have exhaustively explored the external world. And if we exhaustively explore the external world, we will already have exhaustively explored the self. Unless received from a master, this Buddhist standard cannot be realized in bodily experience, even by the innately intelligent.21 If the innately intelligent never meet a master, they do not know that which is beyond innate intelligence, and do not know that which is neither innate nor intelligence. Even if they are innately intelligent, they cannot thereby know the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs. After they learn it, they can know it. To realize the self in bodily experience and to realize the external world in bodily experience is the great truth of the Buddhist patri archs. We should just utilize our own beginner’s state of learning in prac tice in order to experience communion with the beginner’s state of learning in practice of the external world. From the stage of the beginner onward, to continue experiencing together both the self and the external world is to be in touch with the ultimate state of communion. As we work on the self, so we should promote the work of the external world.22

[92] However, hearing the words “experience of the self,” “realization of the self,” and so on, crude people think that we need not receive the transmission from a teacher but should study by ourselves. This is a great mistake.

253b

253c

Those who wrongly conceive the thoughts and discriminations of subjective under standing, and who have no transmission from a master, are non-Buddhists of Indian naturalism. How could people who cannot discern this be people of the Buddha’s truth? [There are those,] moreover, [who] when they hear the words “experience of the self,” because they suppose it to be an accumulation of the five skandhas,23 equate it with Hinayana self-discipline.24 Many people who do not know the difference between the Great Vehicle and the Small Vehicle experience themselves as the descendants of Buddhist patriarchs, but what person of clear eyes could be deceived by them?

[93] In the Great Song era of Shōkō25 there is a certain Sōkō,26 “Zen Master Daie of Kinzan Mountain.” Originally he is a student of sutras and commentaries. While traveling from district to district, he becomes a follower of Zen Master Ri27 of Senshū and studies Unmon’s28 discussions of the ancients29 together with Setchō’s eulogies30 and discussions of the ancients. This is the beginning of his learning in practice. Not understanding the ways of Unmon, he eventually practices in the order of Master Tōzan [Dō]bi,31 but [Dō]bi in the end does not grant [that Sōkō entered] his inner sanctum. Master [Dō]bi is a Dharma child of Master Fuyō;32 we should never rank him with idle people seated in a back row. Zen Master [Sō]kō continues his learning in practice for rather a long time, but he is unable to grope for [Dō]bi’s skin, flesh, bones, and marrow; still less does he know even of the existence of eyes inside atoms. On one occasion, as soon as he hears that in the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs there is a method [to request] the certificate of succession by burning incense on the elbow,33 Sōkō eagerly requests the certificate of succession from Master [Dō]bi. But Master [Dō]bi does not allow it. Finally, he says, “If you want to succeed to the Dharma, do not be hasty.34 Just be diligent here and now. The Buddhist patriarchs’ transmission

254a     is not given at random. I do not begrudge you the transmission; it is simply that you are not yet equipped with eyes.”

Then Sōkō says, “Originally endowed with right eyes, I am experiencing the self 35 and realizing the self. How can you not give me the transmission?” Master [Dō]bi smiles and leaves it there.

Later, [Sōkō] practices in the order of Master Tandō [Bun]jun.36 One day, Tandō asks Sōkō, “Why are you missing half your nose today?”

Sōkō says, “I am a disciple in the order of Hōbō.”37

Tandō says, “Unreliable Zen priest.”38

While [Sō]kō is reading a sutra, Tandō asks, “What sutra are you read-

ing?”

Sōkō says, “The Diamond Sutra.

Tandō says, “This Dharma is even and balanced, without high and low.39 Why is Ungozan high and Hōbōzan low?”

Sōkō says, “This Dharma is even and balanced, without high and low.” Tandō says, “You have managed to become a real archpriest.”40

On another day, while Tandō is watching the ten [hell] kings41 being cleansed, he asks the veteran monk Sōkō, “What is the name of this eunuch?” [Sō]kō says, “His name is Ryō.”42

Tandō rubs his head and says, “Why is it that, though my name is Ryō,

I am without one of those hoods?”

[Sō]kō says, “The hood is missing, but the nostrils are very alike.” Tandō says, “Unreliable Zen priest.”

Tandō one day asks Sōkō, “Veteran monk Kō. You are able to understand at once the principles of my here-and-now Zen. If I let you explain it, you are able to explain it. If I let you experience it, you are able to experience it. If I let you conduct eulogies of the ancients, discussions of the ancients, informal talks,43 general preaching,44 and requests for the benefit of instruction,45 you are able to conduct them. But there is just one thing that is not

yet present in you. Do you know what it is, or not?”

Sō[kō] says, “What thing is not yet present?”

Tandō says, “You lack only this one kind of understanding: Aha!46 If you are without this one kind of understanding, when I preach to you in my quarters then you have Zen, but as soon as you leave my quarters you have lost it completely. When you are fully awake and thinking then you have Zen, but as soon as you fall asleep you have lost it completely. If you are like that, how can you deal with life and death?”

Sō[kō] says, “That is just Sōkō’s doubt.”

Several years later, Tandō falls sick. Sōkō asks, “A hundred years after the master, whom should Sōkō rely upon in order to complete the great matter?”

Tandō entrusts him as follows: “There is a man called Gon of Ha.47 I myself am not acquainted with him. Nevertheless, I am sure that if you meet 254b him, you will be able to accomplish the [great] matter. Once you have met him, do not visit another. Practice [za]zen when born again in a later age.”48

[98] When we examine this story, [it is clear that] Tandō does not sanction Sōkō at all. Sōkō tries again and again to become enlightened but in the end he lacks one thing, and he neither supplies the one thing nor gets free of the one thing. Previously, Master [Dō]bi has refused Sōkō the certificate of succession, and urged him by saying, “You have something that is not yet mature.” We must credit Master [Dō]bi with clarity in seeing a person’s makings. “That which is just Sōkō’s doubt” he does not penetrate, does not get free of, does not break open, and does not doubt as the great doubt. He has no state hindered by doubt. Heedlessly to have requested the certificate of succession is a rash attitude in learning in practice, an extreme lack of will to the truth, and an utmost lack of veneration of the ancients.49 We must say that he is without profound insight and without the makings of the truth. He is an extreme case of negligence in practice. Through greed for fame and love of profit, he wants to break into the inner sanctum of the Buddhist patriarchs. It is pitiful that he is ignorant of the Buddhist patriarchs’ words. He does not understand that veneration of the ancients is just experience of the self, and he neither hears nor learns that to scour the bequeathed teachings of myriad generations50 is realization of the self. As a result, he has wrongness like this and he has self-delusion like this. Because he is like this, in the lineage of Zen Master Sōkō there is not one true nose ring,51 or even half of one, but there are many whose basis is unreal. Failure to understand the Buddha-Dharma and failure to not understand the Buddha-Dharma is like this. Monks of the present must painstakingly learn in practice. Do not be negligent and proud.

[100]       Sōkō, according to Tandō’s assignment, after Tandō’s passingjoins the order of Zen Master Engo at Tennei Temple in the capital. Engo one day ascends the seat of formal preaching.52 Sōkō experiences a mystical realization, and he reports his realization to Engo. [En]go

254c says, “Not yet. Although the disciple’s state is like that, you have never clarified the great Dharma.” On another day, in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, Engo quotes Master Goso Hōen’s words53 on phrases of existence and phrases of nonexistence.54 Sōkō, on hearing these words, attains the state of great peace and joy in the Dharma. Again

he expresses his understanding to Engo. Engo laughs and says, “I wonder whether I deceived you?”55

[101]       This is the story of how Zen Master Sōkō latterly practices underEngo. In Engo’s order he is assigned the post of chief clerk,56 but no definite attainment is visible in him either before or after that time. In his own informal preaching and formal preaching57 he does not describe attainment. Remember, although chroniclers have said that he realized a mystical realization and have recorded that he attained the state of great peace and joy in the Dharma, he experienced no such thing. Do not think him important. He is a student of learning in practice, nothing more. Zen Master Engo is an eternal buddha, and the most venerable person throughout the ten directions. Not since Ōbaku58 has there been a venerable patriarch like Engo. He is an eternal buddha who might be rare even in other worlds, but there are few people or gods who know it; the sahā kingdom is a pitiful place. Now, when we refer to the Dharma preaching of the eternal buddha Engo and examine the veteran monk Sōkō, it is apparent that [Sōkō] has never had wisdom that could match the master’s, he has never had the same wisdom as the master, and much less has he ever realized, even in a dream, wisdom that surpassed the master’s. So remember, Zen Master Sōkō is not equal to his master’s virtue reduced by half. He merely relates to others lines from the Flower Adornment, Śūraṃgama, and other sutras, reciting them from memory; he has never had the bones and marrow of a Buddhist patriarch. In Sōkō’s thoughts, the viewpoint retained by great and small hermits59—those merely led by the spirits that inhabit grass and trees—is the Buddha-Dharma. If he imagined this [viewpoint] to be the Buddha-Dharma, clearly, he has never mastered the great truth 255a of the Buddhist patriarchs. After Engo he does not travel to other districts and does not visit other good counselors but randomly leads monks in practice as the master of a big temple. The words he has left behind never reach the periphery of the great Dharma. Nevertheless, those who do not know think that Zen Master Sōkō is not abashed even next to the ancients. Those who see and who know have decisively conc luded that he is not enlightened. In the end, not having clarified the great Dharma, he is only babbling in vain. It is thus evident that Master [Dō]bi of Tōzan Mountain, being clear in his insight into the future, was certainly not wrong. Students of Zen Master Sōkō, even those of later ages, have never stopped resenting Master [Dō]bi. But Master

[Dō]bi only refuses to sanction [Sōkō]. Master [Tandō Bun]jun’s refusals are more severe than [the refusal] of [Dō]bi, who finds fault with [Sōkō] during each encounter. Yet [Sōkō’s students] do not resent Master [Bun]jun. As how stupid should we see the people of the present and the past who have hated [Master Dōbi]? In general, although many in the great kingdom of Song call themselves the descendants of the Buddhist Patriarch, few have studied the truth, and so there are few who teach the truth. This point is also evidenced by the above episode. It was like this even in the Shōkō era.60 The present is incompa rably worse than that age. Now people have become leaders of monks without knowing what the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs might even be like. Remember, in the authentic transmission of the certificate

255b of succession from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch, in India in the west and in China in the east, the lineage from Seigenzan61 is the authentic transmission. From the lineage of Seigenzan, the authentic transmission naturally passed to Tōzan, without ever being known by others of the ten directions. All those who know it are the descendants of Tōzan, and they impart themselves to monks through voice and word. Throughout his life Zen Master Sōkō has never understood the phrases “experience of the self” and “realization of the self.” How much less could he have penetrated other realities? And how much less could any later student following Zen Veteran Sōkō have understood the words “experience of the self”? In conclusion, expressions of the self and expressions of the external world expressed by Buddhist patriarchs inevitably include a Buddhist patriarch’s body-mind and a Buddhist patriarch’s eyes. Because they are a Buddhist patriarch’s bones and marrow, they are be yond ordinary people’s attainment of the skin.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Jishō-zanmai

                                    Preached to the assembly at Kippō Temple in                                     Etsu-u on the twenty-ninth day of the second                                     lunar month in the second year of Kangen.62

Notes

1 Waku-ju-chishiki, waku-ju-kyogansee, for example, Chapter Ten (Vol. I), Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III), (Vol. I), Kokyō, paragraph 129; Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II),Bukkyō ,is a commonly recurring phrase in the paragraph 21, etc. Shoaku-makusa, paragraph 6; Chapter Twenty Juki, paragraph 35;Shōbōgenzō: 2 (Hensan.This conversation between the Sixth Patriarch (Master Daikan Enō) and Master Nan-gaku Ejō is recorded in the Vol. I), Senjō; Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), Shinji-shōbōgenzō, Inmo;pt. 2, no. 1. See also Chapter Seven Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III),

3 Chishiki friend, a friend in virtue; that is, a good counselor who exemplifies the zazen life and helps and inspires others to live the zazen life. stands for zenchishiki, from the Sanskrit kalyāṇamitra, which means a good 4 Ta means the other or others, that which is outside, that which is external to the self, the external world.

5     Tapetal.” In these phrases Zuitarai, that has continued to the present and is as in the preceding note. A variation of the traditional phrase rai, lit., “coming” or “having come,” suggests an experience Ko, lit., “going” or “having gone,” is emphatic. zuitako, “following circumstances

6     Tsūri means to be thoroughly versed in the sutras. See Chapter Fifty-two (Vol. III), Bukkyō.

7     Chinchōsetsumu, appears in Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I), literally means “the first slight showing of a sign.” The expression also paragraph 173; and Chapter Sixty-three (Vol. III), Sansuigyō; Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II), Ganzei, paragraph 80,Muchūwhere it suggests the genesis of the universe (“the sprouting of creation”). Here itsug gests the time since the genesis of the universe, that is, eternity. 8 Hanman-jiku,bon-bodai-bunpō, literally, “half a myriad scrolls.” Cf. Chapter Seventy-three, note 112.  Sanjūshichi-

9     See Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), Bukkyō.

10    Ganzei, that is, the view of Gautama Buddha. See Chapter Sixty-three (Vol. III), Ganzei.

11    III), Gozui,Kattō.that is, the practical state of Master Bodhidharma. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol.

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12    lit., “head-right, tail-right,” i.e., “head-to-tail rightness” or “the state that is right from Zukaku-shō nari, bijō-shō nari, a variation of the familiar expression zushin-bishin, beginning to end.”

13    Ōsetsu-jūsetsu, without restriction in any direction. lit., “vertically preach and horizontally preach,” means to preach

14    Hossu, a ceremonial fly whisk.

15    Hensan chishiki refers to the custom of monks in China of traveling around to visitHensan. different teachers. See Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III),

16    Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), Jiko o shōkai suru. Shōkai means to experience the state that is exactly the same asShisho; the state of Gautama Buddha. See for example Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), Sesshin-sesshō.

17    ob jective self that preaches or manifests itself in the external world, become one undi-In other words, the subjective self that receives stimuli through the senses, and the vided whole.

18    setsu-fujōhō,Master Dōgen’s variation of the Chinese expression “yesterday preaching an established rule, today preaching an exception Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,sakujitsu-setsu-jōhō, konnichi-paragraph to the rule.” See Chapter Seventy-three, 16, note 28.

19    shin,each moment,” appears several times in this paragraph, along with the words Shō-shō. Shō“body-body,” or “whole body at each moment.” means life, birth, or appearance. Shō-shō, “life-life,” or “whole life atshin-

20    Innen-shōhō means real entities that arise from direct or indirect causes.

21    Shōchi, “the innately intelligent,” are discussed in Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II), Daigo, paragraph 217.

22    By enjoying zazen, for example, we make our circumstances vigorous.

23    saṃskāra,Go-un (“five mental conformation; and skandhas”), viz., paragraph 216, note 44.rūpa,vijñāna,matter; consciousness. See Chapter Seventyvedana, feeling; saṃjñā, thought;

(Vol. III), Hotsu-bodaishin,

24 Jichō. The Daichidoron notes the following threefold division of the eightfold noble

2)dom”: right view, right thinking, right effort. Path: 1) “self-discipline/keeping of precepts”: right speech, right action, right livelihood; “self-purification/Zen practice”: right mindfulness, right balance; 3) “self-control/wis-

25    1131–1162.

26    (Master Daie Sōkō (1088–1163), nominally a successor of Master Engo Kokugon. Heis regarded as the originator of “Daie’s Right Dharma-eye Treasurykōan). His posthumous title is Zen Master Fugaku.Zen.” His works include the Daie-shōbōgenzō

27    Master Myōkyō Shōri (dates unknown).

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Chapter Seventy-five

28    Master Unmon Bun’en (864–949), successor of Master Seppō Gison; regarded asthe foun der of the Unmon sect, but see Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III), Butsudō.

29    Nenko means comments on the words and deeds of past masters.

30    by Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135).later formed the basis for the popular commentary Juko,1052; successor of Master Chimon Kōso in the Unmon lineage) selected a hundred verses praising the words and deeds of past masters. Master Setchō Jūken (980–Keitokudentōroku, adding comments or eulogies to each. This work Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record) stories from the

31    Master Tōzan Dōbi (dates unknown), successor of Master Fuyō Dōkai.

32    patriarch in Master Dōgen’s lineage. See, for example, Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I),Master Fuyō Dōkai (1043–1118), successor of Master Tosu Gisei, and the forty-fifth Sansuigyō; Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso; Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajō.

33    Bikō, burning incense on the elbow or on the arm, was apparently an ancient custom incense was burned not directly on the skin but in a censer suspended by a hook from performed when praying to gods or Buddha, or as an ascetic practice. In later ages, the arm.

34    used only for two short linking phrases. Up to here the sentences of this paragraph are constructed using phonetic alphabet, indicating that Master Dōgen was paraphrasing from the Chinese. Hiragana, the Japanese hiragana

From here the paragraph contains sentences of Chinese characters only, with

35    usage, however, Jishō. In the chapter title ji may have been meant as an adverb “by myself,” and ji, “self,” is the object of shō, “to experience.” In Sōkō’sshō may have jishō [su] meant “I am realizing enlightenment by myself.” been meant to indicate the experience of so-called enlightenment, so that

36    Master Tandō Bunjun (1060–1115), a successor of Master Shinjō Kokubun. Alsoquoted in Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), Shunjū.

37    Hōbō was the name of the mountain on which Master Tandō had his order, and so it own state.is another name for Master Tandō himself. Sōkō did not accept responsibility for his

38    editor), and by extension, 2) “unreliable.” a senior monk.Zusanthe Sanskrit [no] zenna. Zusanupādhyāya, means 1) lit., “edited by To Moku” (a notori ously unreliable teacher or preceptor. Na stands for Oshō is used as an honor ific term foroshō, which in turn represents

39    Ze-hō-byōdō, mu-u-kōge is a direct quotation from the Diamond Sutra.

40    “Archpriest” is zasu-nu. Zasu means the master of a temple of a lineage of intellectual Hekiganroku or “fellow.” It denotes lack of respect. understands Buddhism only intellectually. (study, and at the same time, in writings of the Rinzai sect such as the Blue Cliff Record), the title is used ironically to describe a zazen practitioner who Nu, yatsu means “slave,” “man servant,”

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41    images. Jūō, ten hell kings mentioned in the Jūōkyō (Ten Kings Sutra), are colorful guardian

42    seemed more common than Sōkō expected a Buddhist master to be, and so Sōkō saw Ryō was Master Tandō’s name before he became a monk. Master Tandō probably a similarity between Master Tandō and the vulgar image of a hell king.

43    Shōsan, and answers, usually done in the master’s quarters. Examples of lit., “small participation,” means unscheduled informal instruction or questions Shohō-jissō, shōsan are the preach-paragraphing of Master Gensha Shibi quoted in Chapter Fifty (Vol. III), 240nine,, and that of Master Tendō Nyojō quoted at the beginning of Chapter Seventy Ango.

44    poem in Chapter Fifty (Vol. III), lectures, not necessarily in the Dharma hall and not necessarily scheduled in advance. Fusetsuin the Dharma hall.” An example of Fusetsu, is less conversational than lit., “general preaching,” means informal preaching or general day-to-dayShohō-jissō,shōsanfusetsu but not as formal as is Master Tendō’s recital of the cuckoo paragraph 234.jōdō, “formal preaching

45    Shin-ekirequest to Master Ungan to impart to him the Eye in Chapter Sixty-three (Vol. III),Ganzei, paragraph 83.means a formal request for personal instruction. An example is Master Tōzan’s

46    Ka is an exclamation made on realizing a truth.

47    “a son of Ha country.” Gon Hasu is a nickname of Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Mas-ter Goso Hōen, and editor of the Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record). Hasu is literally

48    Sōkō’s disciple Dōken.The information in this paragraph is contained in the War Chest of the School of Zen Master Daie Fugaku), which was edited by Master Daiefugakuzenjishū monbuko

(

49    practice based on reverence of traditional standards. See also Chapter Seven (Vol. I),Keiko, Senjō, paragraph 144.lit., “consideration of the past” or “emulation of the ancients,” means daily

50    Bandai o shōryō suru. Bandairead extensively” or “to scour written sources.” elations of Buddhist ancestors. shōryōmeans “ten thousand genera tions,” i.e., many past gen-Shō literally means to traverse water and is often used in a literary context, meaning “toryō means to hunt, but as a compound

51    Habi alludes to the ring used to lead a water buffalo by the nose. It means a person of self-control.

52    Shinzo,[Dharma] hall. “lit., “ascending the seat,” is synonymous with jōdō, lit., “going up to the 53 Master Goso Hōen (d. 1104), successor of Master Hakuun Shutan. Quoted in Chapter Seventy-four, Tenbōrin.

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54    237.whereby the philosopher considers phrases of 1) existence, 2) nonexistence, 3) both, Uku muku is a reference to the four-phased system elucidated by Master Nāgārjuna,Ō-saku-sendaba, paragraph and 4) neither. See, for example, Chapter Eighty-one,

55    These two stories are recorded in the Zen Master Daie).       Daiezenjitōmei (Inscriptions on the Stupa of

56    Shoki,shoki, supervisor of the Buddha hall; and clerk assisting the head monk; one of the six assistant officers in a large Buddhist temple: chiyoku,zōsu, librarian; bath supervisor. shika, guest supervisor’s, head monk; chidden,

57    Fusetsu-shinzo. See notes 44 and 52.

60    Master Ōbaku Kiun (d. between 855 and 859), successor of Master Hyakujō Ekai. 59 Daishō no inrin.in, hermits.” “great hermits,” and hermits who lived in the forests and mountains The Chinese called hermits who concealed themselves in towns 1131–1162.

61    Dōgen esteemed very highly: Master Nan’yō Echū, Master Nangaku Ejō, and Master revered especially highly in the Rinzai sect. Master Seigen Gyōshi’s line of succession Master Daikan Enō, the Sixth Patriarch in China, had three disciples who MasterSeigen Gyōshi. Master Nangaku Ejō’s successor was Master Baso Dōitsu, who is passed to Master Sekitō Kisen, then to Master Yakusan Igen, to Master Ungan Donjō,and to Master Tōzan Ryōkai. Master Dōgen himself belongs to this lineage.

62    1244.

 

[Chapter Seventy-six] Dai-shugyō

Great Practice

Translator’s Note: Dai means “great,” and shugyō means “practice.” So dai-shugyō means “great practice.” There is a famous Chinese story about Master Hyakujō Ekai and a wild fox; the story concerns the relation between Buddhist practice and the law of cause and effect. This relation is explained in two ways, each totally at odds with the other. The first explanation says that someone of great practice “does not fall into cause and effect”; in other words, it denies the influence of cause and effect upon someone of great practice. The other explanation says “do not be unclear about cause and effect”; in other words, it affirms the influence of cause and effect upon someone of great practice. But Master Dōgen considered the difference between these two explanations to be only a matter of intellectual thought, and that the situation in reality had no such dichotomy. He explained that someone of great practice transcends both the negation and the affirmation of the law of cause and effect, by acting here and now in the real world.

[107] When Zen Master Daichi1 of Hyakujōzan in Kōshū2 (successor is generally present. He always listens to the Dharma along with theof Baso, called Ekai in his lifetime) gives informal instruction, an old man monks, and when the assembly retires, the old man also retires. Then unexpectedly one day he does not leave. The master eventually asks him, “What person is this, standing before me?”

The old man answers, “I am not a person. In the past age of Kāśyapa Buddha,3 I used to live [as master] on this mountain.4 Once a practitioner asked me, ‘Do even people in the state of great practice fall into cause and effect, or not?’ I answered, ‘They do not fall into cause and effect.’5 Since then I have fallen into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives. Now I beg you, Master, to say for me a word

57

of transformation.6 I long to be rid of the body of a wild fox.” Then he

asks, “Do even people in the state of great practice fall into cause and effect, or not?”

The master says, “Do not be unclear about cause and effect.”7

At these words the old man immediately realizes the great realization. He does prostrations and says, “I am already rid of the body of a wild fox, and would like to remain on the mountain behind this temple. Dare I ask the master to perform for me a monk’s funeral ceremony?”

The master orders the supervising monk8 to strike the block9 and to tell the assembly, “After the meal, we will see off a deceased monk.”

All the monks discuss this among themselves, saying, “The whole community is at ease and there is no sick person in the nirvana hall.10 What is the reason for this?”

After the meal, the master is seen leading the monks to the foot of a rock on the mountain behind the temple, and picking out a dead fox with a stick. They cremate it according to the formal method. In the evening the master gives formal preaching in the Dharma hall and discusses the preceding episode.

Ōbaku11 then asks, “The man in the past gave a mistaken answer as a word of transformation, and fell into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives. If he had not made any mistake at any moment, what would he have become?”

The master says, “Step up here. I will tell you.”

Ōbaku finally steps up and gives the master a slap. The master claps his hands and laughs, and says, “You have just expressed that a foreigner’s12 beard is red, but it is also a fact that a red-beard is a foreigner.”13

[110] The kōan14 realized just now is “great practice” itself. As the old man says, “Hyakujō Mountain in Kōshū” exists in the past age of Kāśyapa Buddha, and “Hyakujō Mountain in Kōshū” exists in the present age of Śākyamuni Buddha. This is a real “word of transformation.” Even so, the Hyakujō Mountain of the past age of Kāśyapa Buddha and the Hyakujō Mountain of the present age of Śākyamuni Buddha are not one. Neither are they different. They are not three and three before, and not three and three after.15 The Hyakujō Mountain of the past has not become the Hyakujō Mountain of the present. The present Hyakujō Mountain was not formerly the Hyakujō Mountain of Kāśyapa Buddha’s time. Even so: there is the [old man’s] pronouncement16 that “I used to live on this mountain”; the [old man’s] teaching for the practitioner is akin to the teaching of the present Hyakujō for the old man; and the question that “once a practitio ner asked” is akin to the question that the old man asks now. “When doing one thing, it is impossible to do another; if we neglect the first move, we will be floored at the second.”17 The practitioner of the past asks, “Do even people in the state of great practice on the Hyakujō Mountain of the past fall into cause and effect, or not?” This question should certainly not be understood easily or in haste. The reason [I say so] is that for the first time since the Buddha-Dharma spread east during the Later Han era of Eihei,18 and since the ancestral master came from the 256a west during the Liang era of Futsu,19 due to the words of the old wild fox, we hear the question of the practitioner of the past. It had never existed previously. So we can say that it is rarely heard. When we have groped for and grasped “great practice,” it is just great “cause and effect”20 itself. Because this cause and effect is always the round fulfillment of causes and the complete fulfillment of effects, it has never accommodated discussion of falling or not falling and has never accommodated words of being unclear or not being unclear. If “They do not fall into cause and effect” is a mistake, “Do not be unclear about cause and effect” might also be a mistake. Even when mistakes are put in their place as mistakes, there is falling into the body of a wild fox, and there is getting free of the body of a wild fox. There is also a principle whereby “They do not fall into cause and effect,” though a mistake in the age of Kāśyapa Buddha is not a mistake in the age of Śākyamuni Buddha. Though in the present age of Śākyamuni Buddha “Do not be unclear about cause and effect” gets rid of the body of a wild fox, in the age of Kāśyapa Buddha a different principle may be real ized. In the old man’s words “Since then I have fallen into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives,” what is this “falling into the body of a wild fox”? It is not that a wild fox which existed already lures in the former Hyakujō. And it is impossible for the former Hyakujō originally to be a wild fox. The assertion that the soul of the former Hyakujō leaves him and forces itself into the skin of a wild fox is non-Buddhism; and a wild fox cannot come up and suddenly swallow the former Hyakujō. If we say that the former Hyakujō subsequently changes into a wild fox, he must first get rid of the body of the former Hyakujō, so that he may then fall into the body of a wild fox. A [master of] Hyakujō Mountain can never be replaced by the body of a wild fox! How could “cause and effect” be like that? “Cause and effect” is neither inherent21 nor initiated:22 “cause and effect” never idly waits for a person. Even if the response “They do not fall into cause and effect” is wrong,

[the respondent] may not always fall into the body of a wild fox. If falling into the body of a wild fox were the inevitable karmic result of mistakenly answering a practitioner’s question, then the Rinzais and Tokusans of recent times, together with their followers, would have fallen into how many thousands and tens of thousands of wild foxes? Aside from them, the unreliable old veterans of the last two or three hundred years would be countless wild foxes. Yet none are heard to have fallen into [the bodies of] wild foxes. So many [wild foxes] would be more than enough to see and hear. You may say that they have not made [such a] mistake, but in fact there have been very many outlandish and confused answers much worse than “They do not fall into cause and effect.” Those who cannot even be placed on the periphery of the Bud dha-Dharma are indeed many. We should know them with the Eye of learning in practice—unless equipped with the Eye, we cannot tell them apart. In con collusion, we should never say that as a result of answering badly [a person] becomes the body of a wild fox, or that as a result of answering well [a person] does not become the body of a wild fox. This story does not say what the state is like after getting rid of the body of a wild fox, but presumably, wrapped in a bag of skin, there might be a pearl.

[115] Contrary to this view, people who have never seen and heard the Buddha-Dharma say: “When we have completely got free of a wild fox, we return to the essential ocean of original enlightenment.23 As a result of delusion, we fall into the life of a wild fox for a while, but when we realize the great enlightenment we discard the body of a wild fox and return to the original essence.” This is the non-Buddhist theory of returning to the original self; it is not the Buddha-Dharma at all. If we say that a wild fox is not the original essence and that there is no original enlightenment in a wild fox, that is not the Buddha-Dharma. If we say that when we realize the great enlightenment we have departed from and discarded the body of a wild fox, then it would not be the wild fox’s great enlightenment, and we would make the wild fox 256c serve no purpose. We should never say so.24 [The story] says that by virtue of a word of transformation from the present Hyakujō, the wild fox that the past Hyakujō has been for five hundred lives suddenly gets free of a wild fox. We should clarify this principle. If we assert that, “When a bystander speaks a word of transformation, a bystander frees others from the body of a wild fox,” then the mountains, the rivers, and the earth have been speaking countless words of transformation since the past, and those many words of transformation have been repeated again and again. But in the past [the old man] has not got free of the body of a wild fox. He gets free of the body of a wild fox under a word of transformation from the present Hyakujō. This [assertion] casts deadly doubt upon the ancestor.25 And if we assert that, “The mountains, rivers and the earth have never spoken words of transformation,” then the present Hyakujō might ultimately lack the means to open his mouth.26 Furthermore, many past masters through the ages have vied to assert that the expressions “not falling into” and “not being unclear about” [cause and effect] are equally valid. But if they have never attained bodily experience of “not falling into” and “not being unclear about” [cause and effect] within the stream of those very words, they consequently neither experience the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of falling into the body of a wild fox, nor experience the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of getting rid of the body of a wild fox. If the head is not right, the tail is never right. In the old man’s words “Since then I have fallen into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives,” just what is the subject that falls and just what is the object that is fallen into? In the very moment of falling into the body of a wild fox, what form and grades does the universe that has continued from the past have in the present? Why should the series of words “do not fall into cause and effect” result in “five hundred” repetitions? As for the one pelt of skin that is now “at the foot of a rock on the mountain behind the temple,” from what concrete place should we think that it has been able to come? To say “They do not fall into cause and effect” is to fall into the body of a wild fox, and to hear “Do not be unclear about cause and effect” is to get free of the body of a wild fox. Even though there are instances of falling in and getting free, they are just the “cause and effect” of the wild fox.27 Nevertheless, since ancient times people 257a have said: “Because ‘they do not fall into cause and effect’ is an expression that seems to refute cause and effect, [the speaker] falls down.” This assertion is without reason; it is the assertion of people who are in the dark. Even if the former Hyakujō has occasion to say “They do not fall into cause and effect,” he has the state in which it is impossible for the “great practice” to delude others, and it is impossible for him to refute cause and effect. Alternatively it is said, “The meaning of ‘do not be unclear about cause and effect,’ in other words, not being ignorant of cause and effect, is that because ‘great practice’ is transcendent cause and effect’ itself, it gets rid of the body of a wild fox.” Truly, this is eighty- or ninety-percent realization of the eyes of learning in practice. At the same time: In the time of Kāśyapa Buddha, [We] have lived on this mountain. In the time of Śākyamuni Buddha, [We] are living on this mountain.

Former body and present body,

The faces of the sun and the faces of the moon, Shut out the ghost of a wild fox, And manifest the ghost of a wild fox.

How could a wild fox know its life for five hundred lives? When someone says that a wild fox knows five hundred lives by using a wild fox’s intelligence, then the wild fox-intelligence has not yet completely known the facts of one life, and a life has not yet rammed into a wild fox’s skin. When a wild fox unfailingly knows its falling down, in each of five hundred lives, then reality is realized.28 It does not completely know the whole of one life: there are instances of knowing and there are instances of not knowing. Given that body and knowing do not arise and pass together, it is impossible to count five hundred lives. If it is impossible to count [five hundred lives], the words “five hundred lives” might be a fabrication. If someone says that [a wild fox] knows by using intelligence other than a wild fox’s intelligence, then it is not the knowing of a wild fox. What person could know these [five hundred lives] on a wild fox’s behalf? Without any road of clear understanding through knowing and not knowing, we cannot speak of “falling into the body of a wild fox,” and if there is no falling into the body of a wild fox, there can be

 

no “getting free of the body of a wild fox.” If there is neither falling in nor getting free, there can be no “former Hyakujō.” If there is no former Hyakujō, there can be no “present Hyakujō”—which cannot be conceded at random. We should research in detail like this. Utilizing this reasoning, we should test and defeat all the fallacies that have been heard again and again throughout the Liang, Zhen, Sui, Tang, and Song dynasties29 The old non-man, moreover, says to the present Hyakujō, “Please perform for me the funeral ceremony for a deceased monk.” These words should not be like that. Since Hyakujō’s time countless good counselors have not doubted, or been surprised at, these words. The point is this: how could a dead fox be a deceased monk, without having taken the precepts, without experience of summer retreats,30 without the dignified forms, and without the principles of a monk? If any such being may undergo at random the funeral ceremony for a deceased monk, all dead people who have never left family life, whoever they are, would have to be accorded the rites of a deceased monk. A dead upāsaka or upāsikā,31 if a request were forthcoming, would have to be accorded the rites of a deceased monk, as was the dead fox. When we look for such an example, there is none and we hear of none. No such ceremony has been authentically transmitted in Buddhism; even if we wanted to perform it, we would not be able to do so. The words [quoted] now that “Hya kujō cremates it according to the formal method” are not beyond doubt; it is possible that they are a mistake. Remember, there are set procedures for all the rites of a deceased monk, from efforts on entering the nirvana hall to pursuit of the truth on arriving at the bodhi garden,32 and they are not done at random. Even if a dead wild fox from the foot of a rock claims to be the former Hyakujō, how could the conduct of a full monk33 be present in it? How could it have the bones and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs? Who will testify that it is the former Hyakujō? Do not despise and belittle the Dharma standards of the Buddhist patriarchs by idly accepting the transmogrification of the ghost of a wild fox as true. As the descendants of Buddhist patriarchs, attach weight to the Dharma standards of the Buddhist patriarchs. Never follow a request as Hyakujō does. It is hard to meet even one matter or one method; do not be influenced by secular vulgarity, and do not be led by human sentiment. In this country of Japan, the forms of buddhas and the forms of patriarchs have been hard indeed to meet and hard indeed to hear. Now that, on rare occasions, we are able to hear

them and able to see them, we should revere them more profoundly than the pearl in the topknot.34 Unhappy people are not profound in religious conviction. It is pitiful. It is generally because they have never recognized the relative weight of things, and because they are without the wisdom of five hundred years and without the wisdom of a thousand years. Nevertheless, we should urge ourselves on and encourage others. Having been able to receive an authentic tradition from the Buddhist patriarchs—even if it is only one prostration and even if it is only one instance of upright sitting—we should profoundly feel great happiness and should rejoice in the great good fortune of having met what is difficult to meet. People who lack this mind, even if they meet the appearance in the world of a thousand buddhas, will not possess a single virtue, and will not be able to obtain a single benefit. They will just be non-Buddhists who idly attach themselves to the Buddha Dharma. They may seem, in their mouths, to be learning the Buddha-Dharma, but real evidence of preaching the Buddha-Dharma can never be present in their mouths. In sum, if some person who has yet to become a monk—be it a king or a minister, be it Brahmadeva or Śakra-devānām-indra—comes asking for the rites of a deceased monk, never allow it. Tell them to come back when they have left family life, received the precepts, and become a full monk. People who are attached to conduct and its rewards in the triple world and who do not aspire to a noble position as one of the Three Treasures may come bringing a thousand dead skinbags to defile and to breach the rites

of a deceased monk, but it would only be a most severe violation, and it would not produce any merit. If they wish to establish favorable relations with the merit of the Buddha-Dharma, they should promptly leave family life and receive the precepts, in accordance with the Buddha-Dharma, and become full monks.

[124] “In the evening the present Hyakujō gives formal preaching in the Dharma hall and discusses the preceding episode.” The principle of this discussion is extremely dubious. What kind of discussion might they have? He seems to say that the old man, having already completed the process of five hundred lives, gets rid of his former body. Should the five hundred lives mentioned now be counted as in the human world? Should they be counted as in the state of a wild fox? Should they be counted as in the Buddha’s truth? Furthermore, how could the eyes of an old wild fox glimpse Hyakujō? Those who are glimpsed by a wild fox may be the ghosts of wild foxes. Those who are glimpsed by Hyakujō are Buddhist patriarchs.35 For this reason, Zen Master Koboku Hōjō36 eulogizes [Hyakujō] as follows:

Hyakujō has intimately experienced meetings with a wild fox;

Questioned37 by it, he is greatly ruffled.38 Now I dare ask all you practitioners,

Have you completely spat out a fox’s drivel39 or not?

Thus, “a wild fox” is the Eye of “Hyakujō’s intimate experience.” “To have spat out a fox’s drivel,” even in a half measure, is to be sticking out the wide and long tongue40 and speaking for others a word of transformation. At the very moment of so doing, we get free of the body of a wild fox, get free of the body of Hyakujō, get free of the body of an old non-man, and get free of the body of the whole universe.

[126] Ōbaku then asks, “The man in the past gave a mistaken answer as a word of transformation, and fell into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives. If he had not made any mistake at any moment, what would he have become?” This question is the realization of the words of the Buddhist patriarchs. Among the venerable patriarchs in the lineage from Nangaku41 there is none like Ōbaku, either before him or after him. Nevertheless, the old man never says “I answered the practitioner mistakenly,” and Hyakujō never says “He had answered mis takenly.” Why does Ōbaku now casually say “The man in the past gave a mistaken answer as a word of transformation”? If he says [Hyakujō] might be saying that the cause was the mistake, then Ōbaku has not grasped the great intent of Hyakujō. It is as if Ōbaku has never investigated the mistaken answers, and the answers beyond mistakes, that Buddhist patriarchs express. We should learn in practice that in this particular episode the past Hyakujō does not men tion a mistaken answer and the present Hyakujō does not mention a mistaken answer. Rather, using five hundred skins of wild foxes, each three inches thick, [the past Hyakujō] “has experienced life on this mountain,”42 and for the benefit of practitioners he expresses it. Because the skin of a wild fox has pointed hairs in the liberated state, the present Hyakujō exists as one stinking skin bag, which, when we fathom it, is half a wild fox skin in the process of getting free. There is falling down and getting free that “at every moment is beyond mistakes,”43 and there is “cause and effect” that at every moment speaks words for others. They are the evident “great practice” itself. If Ōbaku were now to come and ask “If he had not made any mistake at any moment, what would he have become?” I would say, “He would still have fallen down into the body of a wild fox.” If Ōbaku asked, “Why is it so?” I would say further, “You ghost of a wild fox!” Even then, it would not be a matter of mistakes or no mistakes. Do not concede that Ōbaku’s question is a proper question! If Ōbaku asked again, “What would he have become?” I would say, “Are you able to grope the skin of the face, or not?” I would say further, “Have you got free of the body of a wild fox yet, or not?” I would say further, “Would you reply to that practitioner ‘They do not fall into cause and effect’ or not?” But Hyakujō’s words “Step up here and I will tell you” already include the expression “What will [he] become is just this!” Ōbaku steps up, having forgotten the past and oblivious of the future. His giving Hyakujō a slap is countless transmogrifications of a wild fox. “Hyakujō claps his hands and laughs, and says, ‘You have just expressed that a foreigner’s beard is red, but it is also a fact that a red-beard is a foreigner.’” This expression is not the boldness of spirit that belongs to one hundred percent perfection;44 it is barely “eighty or ninety percent of realization.”45 As a rule, even when we acknowledge eighty- or ninety-percent

258c realization there is not yet eighty- or ninety-percent realization, and when we acknowledge one hundred percent perfection there is nothing left of eighty or ninety-percent realization. That being so, I would like to say:

Hyakujō’s expression pervades all directions, Yet he still has not left the wild fox’s den.

Ōbaku’s heels are touching the ground,

Yet he seems to be stuck on the path of a praying mantis.46

In a slap and a clap,

There is one, not two.

Red-beards are foreigners and foreigners’ beards are red.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Dai-shugyō

                                    Preached to the assembly at old Kippō Temple                                     in Etsu-u on the ninth day of the third lunar                                     month in the second year of Kangen.47

Notes

1 a later editor. Zen Master Daichi is his posthumous title. The small text may have been added by 2 A district in Kiangsi province in southeast China.

3     Buddha means the eternal past. Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the seven ancient buddhas. So the time of Kāśyapa

4     Jūsan, lit., “to be in residence on a mountain,” means to be a temple master. 5  Furaku-inga, i.e., not falling subject to karmic retribution.

6         Ichitengohas the power to serve as a turning point in one’s life. See also Chapter Sixty-one(Vol. III), means a word that, when spoken and heard just at the right time and place,Kenbutsu, paragraph 26.

7         Chapter Eighty-nine, of opposing views on causation. See in particular Chapter Eighty-four, Fumai-inga ,phrases furaku-inga,i.e., believing without ambiguity in the law of cause and effect. The “not falling into cause and effect,” and Shōbōgenzōfumai-inga,as paradigms Sanji-no-gō;“not being unclear about cause and effect,” are used throughout the

Shinjin-inga; Chapter Ninety, Shizen-biku.

8         Inō, supervisor of monks in the zazen hall; one of the six main officers of a temple.

9         Byaku-tsui means to beat the top of an octagonal wooden pillar with a small wooden block in order to call the monks together.

10       Nehandō (“nirvana hall”), a name for the temple infirmary.

11       Master Ōbaku Kiun (d. between 855–859), successor of Master Hyakujō.

12       Kocor responding to modern-day Kazakhstan and Russia. originally indicated a person from a region to the northwest of China, broadly 13 Eighty-nine, Tenshōkōtōroku,Shinjin-inga. chap. 8; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 2. Also quoted in Chapter

14    Buddha-Dharma.(new official Chinese law was displayed. In Buddhism it came to mean 1) the concrete manifestation of  the Dharma, that is reality or the universe itself, as in Chapter ThreeKōan,Vol. I), short for Genjō-kōan;kōfu antoku, and, 2) a story that manifests the universal principles of the was originally the name given to a board on which a

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15    example the differences in the mountain in different seasons: white in winter, greenZen sansan, go sansan, “three and three before, three and three after,” suggests for here and now is beyond any accumulation of past impressions. See also Chapter in spring, blue in summer, yellow and red in autumn, etc. The real Hyakujō Mountain Tsuki, paragraph 3; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 27.

Forty-two (Vol. III),

16    Kōan in this case may be interpreted as “something to be pondered on.”

17    as a conclusion to the foregoing discussion of relations between the primary.These words of Master Kenpō, quoted from chap. 23 of the Rentōeyo, may be seen reality here and now—and secondary matters such as what happened in the past.

18    58lated into Chinese.–75 C.E. This is said to have been the time when the first Sanskrit sutras were trans-

19    520–526.

20    but also reality itself as cause and effect in momentary operation.Inga, “cause and effect,” expresses in the Shōbōgenzō not only the law of causation

21    Hon-u, literally, “originally existing.” Cf. note 23, hongaku. 22 Shiki. Cf. note 23, shikaku.

23    Hongaku. Honto represent the Sanskrit or enlightenment. In the Tendai sect the concepts and shikaku, “initiated enlightenment,” represent opposing views of the buddha-means “original” or “inherent.” bodhi, which means a buddha’s state of intuitive wisdom, Kakuhongaku,is the Chinese character used “inherent enlightenment,” nature. It is said that this opposition set up a conflict in Master Dōgen’s mind during his teenage years as a monk in the Tendai sect. The conflict was finally resolved when Master Tendō Nyojō recommended Master Dōgen to “just sit.”

24    Master Dōgen also affirms the state of a wild fox—as he says in Chapter Three (Vol.I), Genjō-kōan, for example, buddhas are those who have realized delusion.

25    then they are casting aspersions on Master Hyakujō’s real state as a buddha. “The ancestor” (the present Master Hyakujō) is a buddha; his words are the voice of nature. If they think that his words have some special mystical power to transform,

26    change, then Master Hyakujō would be powerless. Hyakujō’s action was consciousIn other words, if the state of natural balance did not have in itself the power to effect human inter vention, and at the same time it was natural.

27    fox, the fox’s real life.Yako no inga means not only “the karma of the wild fox” but the reality of the wild

28    Kōan-genjō suru. See notes 14 and 16.

29    That is, since Master Bodhidharma’s coming from India during the Liang dynastyuntil the time of Master Dōgen’s preaching during the Song dynasty.

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30    monk. Traditionally, the years a person has been a monk are counted by the numberer nashi, lit., “without summer year-ends”; in other words, without years as a of summer retreats passed.

31    Buddhist layman or laywoman.

32    Bodai, “bodhi garden,” means the temple cemetery.

33    Daisō means a full monk as opposed to a novice.

34    Alludes to an analogy in Lotus Sutra, Anrakugyō (“Peaceful and Joyful Practice”) it./This sutra is honored/As supreme among all sutras. . . .” See LS 2.276.chapter: “It is like the king releasing from his topknot/The bright pearl, and giving

35    Master Dōgen says that only a buddha can see a buddha. Suggests affirmation of Master Hyakujō; in Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Kenbutsu,

36    Master Koboku Hōjō (d. 1150), a successor of Master Fuyō Dōkai.

37    Sanshō means to visit a master and ask for the teaching.

38    Because the question “Do even people in the state of great practice fall into cause and ef fect?” is impossible to answer with words alone.

39    something with no value; nonsense. Zen, yodare, as in the English “drivel,” includes both the meaning of saliva and of

40    the Buddha. See also Chapter Nine (Vol. I), Kōchō-zetsu, “wide and long tongue,” is one of the thirty-two distinguishing marks ofKeisei-sanshiki, paragraph 210.

41    to Master Baso Dōitsu (704–788) to Master Hyakujō Ekai (749–814) to Master ŌbakuNangaku-ka no sonshuku means the lineage through Master Nangaku Ejō (677–744)

Kiun (d. ca. 855). Master Ōbaku was succeeded by Master Rinzai Gigen (d. 867),founder of the Rinzai sect. 42 See note 4.Sō-jū-shi-zan, translated in the story as “I used to live [as master] on this mount ain.” 43 moment. . . .”Tenten-fusaku, translated in the story as “If he had not made any mistake at any

44    zazengi: shōten no shiiki,Jūjō no shiiki: an ironic expression; perfection does not exist in reality. Cf. “the zeal that pierces the sky.”  Fukan-

45    Ungan Donjō. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Hakkujō, words spoken by Master Dōgo Enchi in praise of an expression by Mast Kannon, note 29; Shinji-shōbōgenzō,er pt. 2, no. 5.

46    whether Master Ōbaku might still be worrying about making mistakes.The path of a praying mantis suggests a hesitant attitude—Master Dōgen praisedMaster Ōbaku’s practical standpoint (“heels touching the ground”), but he wondered

47    1244.

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[Chapter Seventy-seven]

Kokū

Space

Translator’s Note: Ko means “vacant” or “void,” and means “air,” “space,” or “emptiness.” So kokū means “space.” Space and time have been fundamental concepts in philosophy since ancient times and in science too; even in ancient India people frequently discussed the nature of space and time. And this tradition influenced Buddhism, so the nature of space and time became a very important subject in Buddhism in India. The topic also passed to Buddhism in China, and so there are many stories of Chinese Buddhist masters discussing space and time. In this chapter Master Dōgen discusses space. He first quotes a discussion about space between Master Shakkyō Ezō and Master Seidō Chizō. Then he gives his own explanation, quoting a poem by Master Tendō Nyojō, a discussion between Master Baso Dōitsu and a monk called Seizan Ryō, and the words of Master Vasumitra. [131] Because “this place is where something ineffable exists,”1 it is through the realization of these words that Buddhist patriarchs are caused to be. And because the realization of these words of Buddhist patriarchs passes naturally from rightful successor to rightful successor, the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, realized as “a whole body,”2 are “hanging in space.”3 This space is beyond such categories as the twenty kinds of space.4 In general, how could space be limited to only twenty kinds of space? There are eighty-four thousand kinds of space, and there may be countless more besides.

[133] Zen Master Shakkyō Ezō5 of Bushū6 asks Zen Master Seidō

Chizō,7 “Do you understand how to grasp space?” Seidō says, “I understand how to grasp it.” The master says, “How do you grasp it?” Seidō clutches at space with his hand.

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The master says, “You do not understand how to grasp space.” Seidō says, “How do you grasp it, brother?”8

The master grabs Seidō’s nostrils and pulls them.

Groaning with pain, Seidō says, “It is very brutal to yank a person’s

nostrils, but I have directly been able to get free.”

The master says, “Directly grabbing hold like this, you should

have got it from the beginning.”9

[134] Shakkyō’s words “Do you understand how to grasp space?” ask “Are you too ‘the thoroughly realized body as hands and eyes’?”10 Seidō says, “I understand how to grasp it.” Space is one unadulterated mass, which,

259a once touched is then tainted.11 Since being tainted, “space has fallen to the ground.”12 Shakkyō’s words “How do you grasp it?” mean “Even if you call it ‘as it is,’13 you have changed it already.” And although it is like this, in changing with it the thus-gone14 exists. “Seidō clutches at space with his hand”: this is merely understanding of how to ride a tiger’s head; it is not yet understanding of how to grab the tiger’s tail. Shakkyō says, “You do not understand how to grasp space.” Not only has Seidō failed to understand how to grasp it; he has never realized space even in a dream. And although he is like this, [Shakkyō] does not want to describe for him that which is profound and eternal. Seidō’s words “How do you grasp it, brother?” mean “Say a word or half yourself, venerable elder! Do not rely so totally on me.” Shakkyō grabs Seidō’s nostrils and pulls them. Now, let us learn in practice that Shakkyō has put his body into Seidō’s nostrils. From the other side, realization is present of the words that “nostrils pull in Shakkyō.” And although it is like this, space is a unity, and it is jostling.15 Seidō groans with pain and says, “It is very brutal to yank a person’s nostrils, but I have directly been able to get free.” Previously he has thought about meeting another, but suddenly he has been able to meet himself. At the same time, to taint the self is not permissible:16 the self must be practiced.

[136] Shakkyō says, “Directly grabbing hold like this, you should have got it from the beginning.” I do not deny that “grabbing hold by the state like this has got it from the beginning.” However, because there is neither grasping in which Shakkyō and Shakkyō each extend a hand together, nor grasping in which space and space each extend a hand together, [Shakkyō] is not yet relying upon his own exertion. In general, the universe has no gaps

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to accommodate “space,” but this particular story has long been resounding through space like thunder. Since the time of Shakkyō and Seidō, though the practitioners who have called themselves masters of the five sects17 are many, those who have seen, heard, or fathomed space are few. Before and after Shakkyō and Seidō, several individuals have aspired to play with space, but few have put their hands on it. Shakkyō has attained some grasp of space. Seidō does not glimpse space. Daibutsu18 would like to tell Shakkyō the following: “Before, when you grabbed Seidō’s nostrils, if you wanted to grasp space, you should have grabbed the nostrils of yourself, Shakkyō, and you should have understood how to grasp the fingertips with the fingertips.” Even so, Shakkyō does know a bit about the dignified behavior of grasping space. Even a good player at grasping space needs to research the interior and exterior of space, needs to research the deadening and vitalization of space, and needs to know the lightness and weight of space. We should maintain and rely upon [the teaching] that the effort in pursuit of the truth, the establishment of the mind, the practice and experience, and the assertions and questions of buddhas and of patriarchs are just the grasping of space.

[138] My late master, Tendō Nyojō, the eternal buddha, says: “The whole

body like a mouth, hanging in space.”19

Clearly, the whole body of space20 is suspended in space.

[139] Archpriest Ryō21 of Seizan Mountain in Kōshū once goes to practice in Baso’s order.22 Patriarch [Baso] asks him, “What sutra do you lecture on?”

The master replies, “The Heart Sutra.”23

The patriarch says, “With what do you lecture?”

The master says, “I lecture with mind.”24

The patriarch says, “[They say] mind is like a leading actor, the will is like a supporting actor, and the six kinds of consciousness are the accompanying cast: how are these able to lecture on the sutra?”

The master says, “If mind is unable to give the lecture, space is

hardly able to give the lecture, is it?”

The patriarch says, “Space itself is indeed able to give the lecture.” The master swings his sleeves25 and retires. The patriarch calls to him, “Archpriest!” The master turns his head.

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The patriarch says, “From birth to old age, it is just this.”

At this the master gains insight. Eventually he conceals himself on Seizan Mountain and nothing more is heard of him.26

[140] Thus, every Buddhist patriarch is a sutra lecturer. And sutra lecturing is inevitably in space. Without space, it is impossible to lecture on even a single sutra. Whether lectures are delivered on the mind as a sutra27 or delivered on the body as a sutra, they are always delivered through the

medium of space. Thinking is realized, and not thinking is realized, through the medium of space. The development of tutored wisdom and the development of untutored wisdom, the development of innate intelligence and the development of learned intelligence: each is in space. The act of becoming a buddha and the act of becoming a patriarch, likewise, must be in space. [141] The seventh patriarch, Venerable Vasumitra,28 says: “The mind29 is the same as the concrete world of space, and it reveals the reality that is coterminous with space. When we are able to experience space, there is no right and nothing wrong.”30

The mutual encounter and mutual realization in the moment of the present between a person facing a wall and the wall facing the person; the mind as fences and walls; and the mind as a withered tree: these are just “the concrete world of space.” To those who can be saved by this body, [buddhas] manifest at once this body and preach for them the Dharma;31 this is “to reveal the reality that is coterminous with space.” To those who can be saved by another body, [buddhas] manifest at once another body and preach for them the Dharma; this is “to reveal the reality that is coterminous with space.” Being used by the twelve hours, and being in control of the twelve hours, are both “the time when we are able to experience space.” A big stone being big and a small stone being small32 is “no right and nothing wrong.” We solely investigate for the present, as the right Dharma-eye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, space like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kokū

                                    Preached to the assembly at Daibutsuji33 in                                     Etsu-u on the sixth day of the third lunar month                                     in the third year of Kangen.34

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Notes

1     shōbōgenzō, paragraph 23.See, for example, the conversation between Masters Rinzai and Fuke in the pt. 1, no. 96. The story is recorded in notes to Chapter Fifty-six (Vol.paragraph 124; Chapter Seventy-three, Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,Shinji-

III), Senmen,

2     wind-bell poem. See paragraph 138.Konshin seru, “integrated into a body,” alludes to the first line of Master Tendō Nyojō’s

3     the true state of all things in the universe as entities existing in space. Ka-kokū, “hanging in space,” also alludes to the wind-bell in the poem. It de scribes

4     the Nijukkū,Daihannyakyō“inner space”; 2) kūkū,“twenty kinds of space” or “twenty kinds of emptiness,” are enumerated in“space as space”; 5) (the Chinese version of the gaikū, “external space”; 3) daikū, “universal space,” etc. The twenty are gen-śūnyatā;Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtranaigaikū,viz., shōhō-kai-kū,“space inside and out-“all things) as 1)

the total emptiness of the universe in the ten directions is “universal emptiness of all internal and external entities is “the emptiness of therefore empty: this is “internal and external side”; 4) are transient, devoid of self, and therefore empty: this is “internal six sense objects are transient, devoid of self, and therefore empty: this is “external rally cited in connection with the doctrine of and phenomena are totally empty.” Thus the sutra explains that 1) the six sense organsnaikū, ”; 3) the sense organs and their objects are transient, devoid of self, andśūnyatā”; 4) nonattachment to theśūnyatāśūnyatāśūnyatāitself”; 5)”; 2) the”; etc. śūnyatā

See also the men to the twenty aspects of Shōdōka: nijukkū-mon gen jaku sezu,śūnyatā.”                     “We are originally without attach-

5     Master Shakkyō Ezō (dates unknown), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. He was for-hut while hunting a deer.merly a hunter. It is said that he became a monk when he came upon Master Baso’s

6     A district of Jiangxi province in southeast China.

7     Master Baso’s order when he was eight years old, and received the complete twoMaster Seidō Chizō (735–814), also a successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. He entered hundred and fifty precepts at age twenty-five.

8     Suhin, lit., “master-elder brother,” a term of respect for a senior monk. 9 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 6; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 3, no. 49.

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10    II), Tsūshin-ze-shugen.Kannon. The words of Master Dōgo Enchi; see Chapter Thirty-three (Vol.

11    A Chinese expression for which no source has been traced. The sentence suggests mild criticism of Seidō for tainting space with intellectual understanding.

12    appear in the preaching of Master Jōshū Jūshin; see Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. II),Kokū rakuchi, paragraph 113. Having chided Master Seidō for tainting space, Master“space falls to the ground,” means abstract space collapses. The words

Hakujushi,Dōgen recognizes the practical necessity of some times tainting space with human intellectual understanding.

13    Nyo-nyo. Nyo means “as is” or “what is as it is”; i.e., reality.

14    Nyoko means “thus-gone” or “reality passing”—in this compound nyoko expresses nyocan be understood can be understood as an adverb, “thus,” or as a noun, “reality.” Either way, tary reality. Similarly as “thus-come” or as “arrived at reality.”nyorai, which represents the Sanskrit tathāgata,

15    Alludes to the words of Master Goso Hōen. See Chapter Seventy-four, paragraph 72.    Tenbōrin,

16    Jiko words “practice and experience is not nonexistent, but to taint it is not permissible.”[o] zenna [seba]pt. 2, no. 1. See also Chapter Seven (Vol. I),  sunawaInmo. [chi] futoku alludes to Master Nangaku Ejō’s famous Senjō; Chapter

Shinji-shōbōgenzō, Twenty-nine (Vol. II),

17    Forty-nine (Vol. III), Goke (“five sects”): the Hōgen, Igyō, Sōtō, Unmon, and Rinzai sects. See ChapterButsudō.

18    Master Dōgen. See note 33.

19    Konshin Kuchi quoted in Chapter Two (Vol. I), [ni] ni[te] kokū [Maka-hannya-haramitsu,ni] ka[ku]. This is the first line of the wind-bell poem paragraph 78: “Whole body like a mouth, hanging in space;/Not asking if the wind is east, west, south, or north,/Forall others equally, it chatters prajñā:/Chin Ten Ton Ryan Chin Ten Ton.

20    Kokū no konshin, “the whole body of space” or “the whole body as space.”

21    Archpriest Seizan Ryō (dates unknown). Za-shu, “archpriest,” is a title for the master used with irony to criticize a practitioner’s state as too intellectual. See, for example, of a temple belonging to sect in which zazen is not practiced. So the title is sometimesJishō-zanmai, paragraph 93.

Chapter Seventy-five,

22    Master Baso Dōitsu (704–788), successor of Master Nangaku Ejō.

23    Two (Vol. I), Shingyō, the Heart Sutra of Mahāprajñāpāramitā,Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra. the short sutra that represents the See Chapter heart of the six hundred volumes of the Maka-hannya-haramitsu.

24    Shin—as in shingyō—means the mind or the heart.

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25    rice cakes to Master Tokusan. See Chapter Eighteen (Vol. I), A gesture of mild contempt—as also used by the old woman who wouldn’t sell her Shin-fukatoku.

26    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 8; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 4. 27 Shingyō. See note 23.

28    of Master Micchaka, Master Vasumitra would wander aimlessly around the town Vasumitra was born at the end of the first century He became the successor of the sixth patriarch in India, Master Micchaka (see Chapter Fifteen [Vol. I], Busso). Legend says that in his youth, before becoming the disciple C.E. in Gandhāra in northern India. drinking from a flask of liquor.

29    balanced state of action.Shin here means not “mind” in general but “[buddha-]mind”; i.e., the mind in the

30    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 1.

31    Alludes to Lotus Sutra, Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon (“The Universal Gate of Bodhisattva Regarded of the Sounds of the World”). See LS 3.252.

32    is a big stone being big and a small stone being small.”See also Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Hensan, paragraph 66: “Thorough exploration

33    he changed the name of the temple to Eiheiji, “Temple of Eternal Peace.”Daibutsuji, literally, “Temple of the Great Buddha.” This was the first chapter of the preached at Daibutsuji, which Master Dōgen founded in 1244. In 1246

Shōbōgenzō 34 1245.

 

[Chapter Seventy-eight] Hatsu-u

The Pātra

Translator’s Note: Hatsu is a phonetic rendering of the Sanskrit pātra, and u means bowl. In India, Buddhist monks ate their meals from a large alms bowl called a pātra, and the tradition was passed to Buddhist monks in China. In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains the importance of the pātra, which has traditionally been highly revered as a symbol of Buddhist life.

[145] From upward of the Seven Buddhas the authentic transmission has passed to the Seven Buddhas; from inside the Seven Buddhas the authentic transmission has passed to the Seven Buddhas; from the totality of the Seven Buddhas the authentic transmission has passed to the totality of the Seven Buddhas; and from the Seven Buddhas the authentic transmission has passed down the twenty-eight generations. The twenty-eighth ancestral master, Founding Patriarch Bodhidharma, enters China himself and passes the authentic transmission to the Second Patriarch, Great Master Taiso Shōshū Fukaku;1 and, transmitted through six generations, [the transmission] reaches Sōkei.2 260a The total fifty-one transmissions3 of east and west are just the right Dharmaeye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, and the kaṣāya and the pātra. Past buddhas have maintained each as the authentic transmission of past buddhas. In this way, [each] has been authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch. At the same time, the skins and flesh, the bones and marrow, the fists, and the eyes who learn the state of Buddhist patriarchs in practice, have each their own expression: some learn in practice that the pātra is the body-mind of Buddhist patriarchs; some learn in practice that the pātra is the alms bowl of Buddhist patriarchs; some learn in practice that the pātra is the eyes of Buddhist patriarchs; some learn in practice that the pātra is the brightness of Buddhist patriarchs; some learn in practice that the pātra is the real substance of Buddhist patriarchs; some learn in practice

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that the parts is the Buddhist patriarchs’ right Dharma-eye treasury and fine mind of nirvana; some learn in practice that the pātra is a place in which Buddhist patriarchs transform themselves; and some learn in practice that Buddhist patriarchs are the rim and base of the pātra. The principle of learning in practice of each such group has its own standing as an expression of the truth. At the same time, there is learning in practice in a further ascendant state.

[147] My late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, on the day he takes up residence on Tendō, in the first year of the Great Song era of Hōgyō,4 says in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, “I remember the following: A monk asks Hyakujō,5 ‘What is a miracle?’ Hyakujō says, ‘Sitting alone on Great and Mighty Peak.’6 Monks, do not be disturbed. Let the fellow kill himself by sitting7 for a while. If someone today were suddenly to ask, ‘Venerable [Nyo]jō, what is a miracle?’ I would only say to them, ‘What miracle could there be?’ Finally, what else? The pātra of Jōji8 having passed to Tendō, I eat meals.”9

[149] Remember, a miracle should be done for a miraculous person,

and for a miracle a miraculous tool should be used. Such are miraculous moments. Thus, the place where miracles have been realized is the miraculous pātra. Therefore to call upon the Four Quarter Kings10 to guard [the pātra] and upon dragon kings11 to protect [the pātra] is a profound standard of the Buddha’s truth. And for this reason we offer up [the pātra] to Buddhist patriarchs, and [the pātra] is entrusted down to us through Buddhist patriarchs. People who do not learn in practice in the inner sanctum of Buddhist patriarchs say, “The Buddha’s kaṣāya is silk, is cotton, is made from fabric of transformed thread.” They say, “The Buddha’s pātra is stone, is tile, is iron.” They speak like this because they are not yet equipped with eyes of learning in practice. The Buddha’s kaṣāya is the Buddha’s kaṣāya. There must never be any view about silk or cotton. Views about silk, cotton, and so on are outmoded views. The Buddha’s pātra is the Buddha’s pātra. We must never call it stone and tile, and never call it iron and wood. In general, the Buddha’s pātra is not man-made,12 it is beyond arising and passing, it neither leaves nor comes, it is without merits and faults, it does not embrace new and old, and it is not connected with past and present. The robes and bowls of Buddhist patriarchs, even if created through the collection of clouds and water, are beyond the

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restrictions and hindrances13 of clouds and water. Even if created through the collection of grass and trees, they are beyond the restrictions and hindrances of grass and trees. The point is this: water, being composed of real dharmas, is water, and clouds, being composed of real dharmas, are clouds. Being composed of clouds, they are clouds. Being composed of water, it is water. With regard to the pātra: “only of real dharmas is the pātra composed”;14 only of the pātra are real dharmas composed; only of integrated mind is the pātra composed; only of space is the pātra composed; and only of the pātra is the pātra composed. The pātra is restricted by the pātra and tainted by the pātra. The pātra that monks15 today have received and retained is just the pātra offered up by the Four Quarter Kings.16 If not offered up by the Four Quarter Kings, the pātra could not be manifest before us here and 260c now.17 The pātra that has now been authentically transmitted through all directions by Buddhist patriarchs who have received the Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury is the pātra in the state that is liberated from past and present. That being so, the pātra here and now has broken with a glance outmoded views of it held by men of iron, it is not influenced by evaluation of it as a piece of timber, and it has transcended the sound and form of tiles and pebbles—while not restricting lively appreciation of it as a rock or a jewel. Do not call it a bit of tile, and do not call it a chunk of wood. We have realized it in experience like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Hatsu-u

                                    Preached to the assembly at Daibutsu Temple                                     in Etsu-u on the twelfth day of the third lunar                                     month in the third year of Kangen.18

 

Notes

1     Master Taiso Eka, the Second Patriarch in China. Great Master Shōshū Fukaku is hisposthumous title.

2     That is, Master Daikan Enō on Sōkeizan, the Sixth Patriarch in China.

3     From Master Mahākāśyapa to Master Dōgen.

4     1225.

5     Master Hyakujō Ekai (749–814), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu.

6     temple. Daiyūhō (“Great and Mighty Peak”) means Hyakujōzan, the site of Master Hyakujō’s

7     Zasatsu, when it is difficult to sit. lit., “to kill [oneself] by sitting,” means to keep on practicing zazen even 8 Master Tendō Nyojō was the abbot of Jōji Temple when he received the invitation to become the master of Tendō Temple.

9     Also quoted in Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), Kajō, paragraph 102.

10    Shi-tenno ,four gods under the god Indra who inhabit the lowest of the six heavens in the world lit., “four heavenly kings,” from the Sanskrit catvāro mahā-rājikāḥ, are Sumeru. See also Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), of desire, each guarding one of the four quarters of the area surrounding Mount Hotsu-bodaishin, paragraph 207.

11    Ryū-that guards Buddhism. In ceremonies such as that at the beginning of the summer Ango,retreat, dragons are called upon to protect the Dharma. See Chapter Seventy-nine,(paragraph 175.“dragon king”) represents the Sanskrit nāgarāja, a mythical serpent-like being

12    Zōsa, lit., “made by building,” from the Sanskrit saṃskṛta. Kobusshin, See Volume I, Glossary paragraph 65. of Sanskrit Terms, and also Chapter Forty-four (Vol. III),

13    Rarō, characters appear in the silk nets and bamboo cages used in China to catch birds and fish. The same Fukanzazengi.

14    Tada shūhōa line in the s is this body composed.” Master Dōgen discusses the line at length in Chapter[Yuimagyō: tada shūhōo] mot[teKai-in-zanmai.] hatsu-u [o] gōjō[o] mot[su][. This sentence borrows its structure from te] ko[no] mi [o] gōjō [su], “Only of real dharma Thirty-one (Vol. II),

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15    less life, monks. Unsui, lit., “clouds and water,” in this case means those who live the free and home16 That is, the pātra offered by the Four Quarter Kings to the Buddha.

17    traditional value and meaning.The pātra is more than an ordinary bowl; in addition to its practical function, it has

18    1245.

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[Chapter Seventy-nine]

Ango

The Retreat

Translator’s Note:An means “peaceful” and go means “reside.” The word ango refers to the ninety-day summer retreat. In India, the rainy season lasts for about three months in the summer. Buddhists in ancient India used this time for intensive practice of zazen, and this period was called varsika in Sanskrit. The tradition was passed to China, and when Master Dōgen went to China he experienced the concentrated practice of zazen for three months in the summer. He felt it his mission to introduce this tradition to Japan. [153] My late master, Tendō Nyojō, the eternal buddha, says in informal

preaching1 at the beginning of a summer retreat, Stacking our bones upright on the flat earth, [We each] dig a cave in space.

Directly we pass through the gate of dualism, And grasp hold of a black lacquered tub.2

This being so, [“Those who] have got this ring through the nose,3/Still inevitably eat meals and stretch out the legs to sleep,/And have been at just this place for thirty years.”4 Because we are like this already, we waste no time in putting tools in place. One such tool is the ninety-day summer retreat. It is the brains and the real features of the buddhas and the patriarchs, and it has been directly experienced by their skin, flesh, bones, and marrow. Picking up the eyeballs and the brains of Buddhist patriarchs, we have made them into the days and months of the ninety-day summer retreat. One summer retreat is just another name for buddhas and patriarchs. The summer retreat, start to finish, is Buddhist patriarchs themselves. Beyond this there is no additional inch of soil and no great earth. A real summer retreat5 is neither new nor old, it is beyond coming and beyond going. Its dimensions are the

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dimensions of a fist, and its characteristics are the characteristics of a ring

through the nose. At the same time, because we begin the summer retreat, it comes, having blocked out space, and no ten directions are left over. And because we finish the retreat, it goes, tearing the whole earth asunder, and no inch of soil remains. For this reason, when the reality of the start of the summer retreat is realized, it seems to come; and when the restrictions of the end of the summer retreat are broken, it seems to go. Even though it is like this, the fact is only that some adherents to the state of direct experience are each coming into contact with the start and the finish. For thousands of miles there is not an inch of grass!6 Give me back the money I paid for the ninety days of meals!

[156] Master Ōryū Shishin7 says, “Having trod the way of a mountain monk for thirty-odd years, I see ninety days as a summer. To add a day is impossible. To subtract a day is impossible.”8

So the insight glimpsed by the eyes of thirty-odd years as a wayfarer is simply that ninety days make one summer retreat. If we consider adding a day, the ninety days will come back vying with each other.9 If we consider subtracting a day, the ninety days come back vying with each other.10 We must never spring free from the cave of ninety days. [The real meaning of] this springing free is, using the cave of ninety days as hands and feet, to engage only in springing itself. “To see ninety days as a summer” is a tool of our lineage;11 at the same time, because the Buddhist Patriarch did not personally decide it by himself, [the tradition] has been authentically received by buddhas and by patriarchs, rightful successor to rightful successor, until today. Therefore, to meet a summer retreat is to meet the buddhas and the patriarchs. To meet a summer retreat is to realize buddha12 and to realize the state of a patriarch. The summer retreat has long since become a Buddhist patriarch. In this “Ninety days makes a summer,” though the measurement of time is a cerebral measurement, it is beyond only one kalpa or ten kalpas,

and beyond only a hundred thousand countless kalpas. Other times are used up by the hundreds of thousands of countless kalpas. The ninety days command the use of the hundreds of thousands of countless kalpas; therefore, though the hundreds of thousands of countless kalpas realize buddha when they meet the ninety days, the ninety days are not always connected with kalpas. This being so, we should learn in practice that “Ninety days makes

a summer” is just a measurement of the Eye. The retreat as body and mind is also like this. The fact that the summer retreat commands the use of the state of vigorous activity, and the fact that the summer retreat has sprung free from the state of vigorous activity, have their origins13 and have their bases;14 even so, [the summer retreat] has not come here from another place and another time, and it does not originate from just this place and just this time. When we grasp their origins the ninety days come at once. When we grope for their basis the ninety days come at once. The common and the sacred have seen these [ninety days] as their caves and as their very lives, but [the ninety days] have far Tran scended the states of the common and the sacred. [The ninety days] are beyond thinking discrimination, they are beyond non-thinking discrimination, and they are not confined to the state beyond thinking and non-thinking.

[160] The World-honored One preached the Dharma to an assembly in the country of Magadha.15 Then, wanting to begin a ninety-day summer retreat,16 he said to Ānanda,17 “To the great disciples, and to gods and human beings of the four classes,18 I am constantly preaching the Dharma, but they do not have reverence or admiration for it. I shall now go inside the Indra-ṣaila-guhā19 chambers, and practice a ninety day summer sitting. If someone should appear and ask to hear the Dharma, you should preach the following to them in my place: ‘All dharmas are beyond appearance. All dharmas are beyond disappearance.’” Having spoken, he closed the chambers and sat.20

Since then two thousand one hundred and ninety-four years have already passed. (It is now the third year of the Japanese era of Kangen.21) Descendants who do not enter the inner sanctum have often seen [the Buddha’s] closing himself away in the chambers in Magadha as evidence of his preaching without words. Wrong groups today solely think as follows: “The Buddha’s intention in closing the chambers and doing a summer sitting is that to rely upon preaching with words is not completely real, but is an expedient means. The 261c ultimate truth is the cutting of speech and the disappearance of the intellectual function. For this reason, to be without words and without intellect may fit the ultimate truth. To have words and to have images in the mind is different from the truth. For this reason, during the ninety-day summer sitting in closed chambers, [the Buddha] cut himself off from human traces.” The assertions of these people have insulted the World-honored One’s Buddhist intention. If we discuss the cutting of speech and the disappearance of the intellectual function, all livelihoods and industries are the cutting of speech and the disappearance of the intellectual function—“the cutting of speech” meaning all speech, and “the disappearance of the intellectual function” meaning all intellectual functions.22 Furthermore, this story is not originally for the purpose of venerat ing the state without words. The thoroughly realized body solely [drags through] mud and [stays in] the water, and goes into weeds, never shirking to preach the Dharma and to save people, and never shirking to turn the Dharma and to salvage things. If people who call themselves [the Buddha’s] descendants say, “The ninety-day summer sitting is the absence of verbal preaching,” I would like to tell them, “Give the ninety-day summer sitting back to me!” [The Buddha] directs Ānanda to preach on his behalf, saying, “You should preach the following in my place: ‘All dharmas are beyond appearance. All dharmas are beyond disappearance.’” We should not vacantly pass over this behavior of the Buddha. In sum, how could we see his closing the chambers and practicing a summer sitting as being without words and not preaching? Suppose, for the present, that at this time Ānanda were to address the World-honored One as follows: “How should I preach that ‘All dharmas are beyond appearance, and all dharmas are beyond disappearance’? Even if I preach like this, what must I do?” So saying, he would listen to the World honored One’s words. In general, the present instance of the Buddha’s behavior is itself the philosophy of supreme meaning,23 and the philosophy of the supreme state of being without,24 which preach the Dharma and turn the Dharma. We should never see it as evidence of preaching without words. If we see it as preaching without words, the situation may be described as “It is pitiful that the three-foot Dragon Spring Sword is idly hanging on the wall

262a of the To household as a weaving shuttle.”25 In conclusion, the ninety-day summer sitting is the eternal turning of the Dharma wheel, and it is eternal Buddhist patriarchs themselves. In the present story, there are the words “Then, wanting to begin a ninety-day summer [retreat]. . . .” Remember, that which is unavoidably practiced is ninety days of sitting in a summer retreat. Those who shirk it are non-Buddhists. In general, while the World-honored One is in the world, he sometimes practices the ninety-day retreat in Trāyastriṃśa Heaven, and he sometimes practices the retreat together with five hundred bhikṣus within quiet chambers on Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa.26 Through the five lands of India, without discussing a [particular] place, when the time comes they retire for the ninety-day summer retreat, and the ninety-day retreat is practiced. It is practiced by the Buddhist patriarchs of the present as the single most important matter. It is the supreme truth of practice and experience. Though the winter retreat is mentioned in the Pure Net Sutra,27 its method has not been transmitted. Only the method of the ninety-day summer retreat has been transmitted, and the authentic transmission is immediately present in its fifty-first generation.28

[165] The Shingi says,29 “Itinerant practitioners who wish to go to a dwelling place to begin the summer retreat should arrive half a month in advance. It is important that the service of tea, and personal salutations,30 should not be rushed.”

“Half a month in advance” means in the last ten days of the third lunar month. So we should arrive during the third lunar month. From the first day of the fourth lunar month onward, bhikṣus do not go out. The doors of reception rooms for [monks of] many districts, and of temples’ lodging facilities, are all closed. Thus, from the first day of the fourth lunar month, all monks will be securely installed31 in the temple building, or will have moved into a hut.32 (In other cases it is traditional to be securely installed in the house of a layperson.) This is the behavior of Buddhist patriarchs, which we should venerate and should practice. Every fist and nostril, taking residence in a temple, will have hung his or her staff at the place of the retreat. Nevertheless, demons say, “The viewpoint of the Great Vehicle may be the essential thing. The summer retreat is a convention of the śrāvaka. We should not necessarily practice it.” People who speak like this have never seen or heard the Buddha- 262b Dharma. The truth of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi is just the ninety days of sitting in the summer retreat. Even if there are pinnacles of the Great Vehicle and of the Small Vehicle,33 they are the branches, leaves, flowers, and fruits of the ninety-day retreat. Preparations are first performed after breakfast on the third day of the fourth lunar month. Before hand, however, from the first day of the fourth lunar month, the supervising monk34 prepares boards showing the number of years since participants received the precepts. After breakfast on the third day of the fourth lunar month, [the supervising monk] hangs the years-since-precepts boards in front of the common quarters;35 that is, outside the window which is to the left of the front entrance.36 The dormitory windows are all latticed. [The supervising monk] hangs these [boards] after breakfast and puts them away after the bell at the end of practice.37 [The supervising monk] hangs them from the third to the fifth, the time for putting them away and the time for hanging them up remaining the same. There is a convention for writing the board. It is written not according to [the rank of] main officer38 or assistant officer,39 but just according to years since taking the precepts. Those who have been assistant officers or main officers at other temples are each written as head monk, as prior, [and so on]. For those who have served in several posts, the most important post held should be written. Someone who has been the abbot of a temple is written as So-and-So Seidō.40 If a person has served as the abbot of a small temple but this is not known by the monks, that person will often hide the fact and not use the title. There are also examples of a Seidō, if a member of the master’s order, not bearing the title Seidō but being written as Ācārya41 So-and-So.42 There are many excellent examples of [such veteran monks] reposing in the attendant monks’ quarters.43 There are also past precedents of [such veteran monks themselves] serving as attendants for [the master’s] robes and pātra, or serving as attendants for the burning of incense. Any other post is [assigned to a veteran monk] according to the master’s instruction. If a disciple of another master has come to [a retreat at] a big temple, even if [that disciple] has served as the

262c abbot of a small temple, it is a reliable example and a fragrant trace for [that disciple] to ask only for [a title] such as head monk, clerk, chief officer, or prior. The pratyekabuddhavihāra44 will laugh at someone using a title earned while serving in a minor post in a small temple. A person of good sense who has been an abbot but only of a small temple will hide the fact and not use the title.

[169] The form of the board is as follows:

So-and-So Mountain Temple in So-and-So district of So-and-So country is having a summer retreat this summer. Years passed since taking the precepts, for the whole sangha, are as follows.

The Venerable Kauṇḍinya45 Abbot

Received the precepts in the first year of Kenpō:46

              Ācārya So-and-So                    Librarian So-and-So               Ācārya So-and-So                    Ācārya So-and-So

Received the precepts in the second year of Kenpō:

              Seidō So-and-So                       Supervising Monk So-and-So               Head Monk So-and-So             Guest Supervisor So-and-So

              Ācārya So-and-So                    Bath Manager So-and-So Received the precepts in the first year of Genryaku:47

              Work Leader So-and-So           Attendant Monk So-and-So               Head Monk So-and-So             Head Monk So-and-So

              Donations Chief 48 So-and-So   Ācārya So-and-So

              Chief Cook So-and-So             Infirmary Chief 49 So-and-So

Received the precepts in the third year of Kenryaku:

              Clerk So-and-So                       Ācārya So-and-So

              Seidō So-and-So                       Head Monk So-and-So

              Ācārya So-and-So                    Ācārya So-and-So

The preceding50 is presented with respect. If there are any mistakes, please point them out. Written with respect.

The third day of the fourth lunar month in such-and-such year; Supervising Bhikṣu So-and-So. Written with respect.

[172] We write like this. We write on white paper, and write in the standard noncorrosive style.51 We do not use the cursive style, the ancient squared style,52 and so on. To hang [the boards], we attach tapes of about the width of two grains of rice to the top of the paper boards, which we then hang. [They hang] straight down, like bamboo blinds. After the end of practice on the fifth day 263a of the fourth lunar month, they are put away for the last time. The eighth day of the fourth lunar month is the Buddha’s birthday celebration.

[172]       After the midday meal on the thirteenth day of the fourth lunar month, monks of the common quarters, in their own dormitory, have tea and cakes and recite sutras. The dormitory chief53 conducts matters. The provision of hot water and the burning of incense are all the responsibility of the dormitory chief. The dormitory chief is positioned at the back of the common quarters.

The dormitory head monk is positioned to the left of the dormitory’s sacred monk image.54 But it is the dormitory chief who steps forward to burn incense and to conduct the ceremony. The head monks, main officers, and so on do not attend this reciting of sutras; only the monks of the dormitory perform it. After breakfast on the fifteenth, the supervising monk, having prepared in advance one board showing years since precepts, hangs it on the east wall which is the front of the monks’ hall.55 [The supervising monk] hangs it above the front hall, that is, in the interval [between the pillars] to the south of the front entrance.56

[173]       The Shingi says, “The supervising monk puts up in advance the years-since-precepts board, and serves before it offerings of incense and flowers (putting it up in front of the monks’ hall).”57

[174]       After the midday meal on the fourteenth day of the fourth lunarmonth, a mindful recitation board58 is hung in front of the monks’ hall. Mindful recitation boards are also hung in front of the other temple buildings. In the evening, a main officer prepares the local deities hall59 with incense and flowers, setting them before the shrine tablet. The monks gather together to perform the mindful recitation. The method of the mindful recitation is as follows. After all the monks have assembled, first the abbot burns incense. Next the main officers and assistant officers burn incense. [The method] is similar to the method of burning incense during the bathing of the buddha [image].60 Next, the supervising monk steps up from his or her place and goes to the front, first bows with joined hands61 to the abbot, then bows with joined hands to the local deities hall, and then facing north, that is, facing the local deities hall, [the supervising monk] conducts the mindful recitation. [175] The words are as follows:

We secretly reflect that a fragrant wind is fanning the countryside, and the God of Summer62 is governing all directions. It is the morning on which the Dharma King forbids travel. This is the day on which Śākyamuni’s disciples preserve their life. I have gathered together the assembly so that we may pay sincere respects to the sacred shrine, and recite

263b the vast names of myriad virtue, directing the merit to the true rulers of all the temple buildings. Our prayer is that, with their protection, we will be able to accomplish the retreat. I respectfully request the venerable assembly to recite:

Perfectly pure Dharma body,63 Vairocana Buddha,64

Roundly satisfied physical body,65 Vairocana Buddha. The body of thousands of hundred-koṭis of transformations,     Śākyamuni Buddha.

The One who will descend and be born in future,     Venerable Buddha Maitreya,66

All buddhas in the ten directions in the three times.

Great Saint Mañjuśrī Bodhisattva. Great Saint Universal Virtue Bodhisattva.67

Great Compassionate Regarder of the Sounds of the World68     Bodhisattva.

Many venerable bodhisattva mahāsattvas. The mahāprajñāpāramitā.69

The merit of the mindful recitation we totally direct to the dragons and gods of the land who protect and preserve the right Dharma. Bowing, we pray that divine brightness will help us manifest gainful achievements, and that the state of pure joy will flourish and eternally confer unselfish happiness. Once again, I request the venerable assembly to recite, “All buddhas in the ten directions in the three times. Many venerable bodhisattva mahāsattvas. The mahāprajñāpāramitā.”70

[178] Then, when the drum sounds, the monks go at once to their seats for cakes and tea in the cloud hall.71 The cakes and tea are the responsibility of the kitchen hall officers.72 The monks go to the hall, they walk around the hall in order, and when they get to their own places,73 they face the front74 and sit. One of the main officers conducts the Dharma functions, that is, he or she performs the burning of incense and so on. The Shingi says, “Originally, the chief officer should conduct matters, but if necessary, the supervising monk takes [the chief officer’s] place.” Before the mindful recitation a notice should be copied and presented to the head monk. A main officer, wearing the kaṣāya and carrying the prostration cloth, greets the head monk and presents the notice to the head monk, having in some cases performed two offers to spread the cloth and three prostrations.75 The head monk returns the prostrations. [These prostrations] should be the same as the prostrations of the main officer. The notice is carried [to the head monk] in a box, in which a wrapping cloth has been spread, by a novice. The head monk welcomes and sees off the main officer.

263c             [179] The form of the notice:

The kitchen hall officers, this evening

Will serve tea and cakes in the Cloud Hall, especially for

The Head Monk

And all the monks. We humbly inform you of this

celebration of the start of the retreat, and we respectfully hope That all the monks will kindly bestow upon us, Their illuminating presence.

The fourteenth day of the fourth lunar month in the third year of Kangen,

The bhikṣus of the kitchen hall, So-and-So and the others, Expressed with respect.

[180] The name of the senior main officer is written. After presenting the notice to the head monk, [the main officer] asks the novice to paste up [the notice] in front of the cloud hall; it is pasted to the left76 of the hall’s front entrance. On the outside wall to the south77 of the front entrance there is a board on which the notice is pasted—this board is lacquered. There is an envelope. The envelope is aligned with the right edge78 of the board and fastened with a bamboo peg. So the envelope too is pasted up on one side. This board is made according to a formal method. The writing is in characters about half-an-inch79 square; they are not written large. The writing on the front of the envelope is as follows:

An invitation to the Head Monk and all the monks

The bhikṣus of the kitchen hall, So-and-So and the others, Enclosed with respect.

After the tea and cakes, the board is put away.

[182] Before breakfast on the fifteenth, the main officers, the assistant officers and [the abbot’s] disciples and Dharma relatives80 first go into the abbot’s quarters to perform personal salutations. If, on the previous day, the abbot has waived personal salutations, they should not visit the abbot’s quarters at all. “To have waived personal salutations” means to have pasted on the east side of the entrance to the abbot’s quarters a notice on which the abbot has written either a verse or some Dharma words. Sometimes [the notice] is pasted up in front of the cloud hall as well.

[182] After ascending the seat of formal preaching on the fifteenth, the

abbot comes down from the Dharma seat81 and stands in front of the steps. 264a [The abbot] stands on the north end of the prostration mat,82 facing south. The main officers approach and perform two offers and three bows. After the first offer they say:

Now that we are in retreat and forbidden to travel, we are able to serve [you] towel and flask. We hope that, with the assistance and protection of the Master’s Dharma power, there will be no difficulties.

After the next offer, they express the compliments of the season and do

three informal prostrations.83 The master recites the following:

It is now our great good fortune to be able to practice the retreat together. I also hope, So-and-So and So-and-So, that we will be helped by each other’s Dharma power, and that there will not be any difficulties.

The head monk and all the monks follow the same procedure. At this time, the head monk, all the monks, the main officers, and so on, all do prostrations facing north. Only the abbot, standing in front of the stairs of the Dharma seat, faces south.84 The abbot’s prostration cloth is spread upon the prostration mat. [So] next the head monk and all the monks bow before the abbot, performing two offers and three prostrations. At this time, the disciples, attendant monks, Dharma relatives [of the abbot], and śrāmaṇeras85 “stand to one side; they should not blindly follow the other monks in performing personal salutations.” “Standing to one side” means standing alongside the east wall of the Dharma hall. If strips of paper [showing the names] of sponsors are hanging along the eastern wall, [these monks] should stand by the Dharma drum,86 or they should stand by the west wall. When the monks have finished their prostrations, the main officers return first, to the kitchen hall, and stand at the place of precedence.87 Then the head monk leads the monks to the kitchen hall for personal salutations; that is to say, [the monks] exchange three informal prostrations with the main officers. During this time, the disciples, attendant monks, Dharma relatives, and so on prostrate themselves to the abbot in the Dharma hall. The Dharma relatives should perform two offers and three prostrations, and the abbot returns the prostra tions. The disciples and attendant monks each do nine prostrations; there is no return prostration. The śrāmaṇeras do nine prostrations, or sometimes twelve prostrations, which the abbot receives only by joining hands [in gasshō]. Next, the head monk goes in front of the monks’ hall and to the right of the entrance,88 level with the southern end of the main officers’ [zazen] platforms, [that is,] in

264b front of the cloud hall and facing south, [the head monk] stands before the monks. The monks, facing north, make three informal prostrations to the head monk. The head monk leads the monks into the hall and, in order of years since receiving the precepts, they go around the hall and stand still at their own place.89 The main officers enter the hall and before the sacred monk90 they perform three prostrations with the prostration cloth fully spread, then stand up. Next they perform three informal prostrations before the head monk. All the monks return these prostrations. The main officers do one circuit of, and then leave, the [main] hall and remain standing at their own place91 with hands held in shashu.92 The abbot enters the hall and before the sacred monk burns incense, performs three prostrations with the prostration cloth spread, and stands up. During this time, the disciples stand out of the way behind the sacred monk,93 and the Dharma relatives follow the other monks. Next the abbot performs three informal prostrations to the head monk; that is, the abbot simply remains standing at his own place and performs the informal prostrations facing west. The head monk and all the monks return these prostrations, as before. The abbot goes round the hall and leaves. The head monk, leaving through the south side of the front entrance,94 sees the abbot off. After the abbot has left the hall, all monks from the head monk down95 perform three prostrations and say:

We are fortunate at this time to be practicing the retreat together. I am afraid that my behavior of body, speech, and mind96 will not be good, and I beg for compassion.

This prostration is three prostrations with the prostration cloth spread. After this, the head monk, his assistant, the librarian, and the other [department heads] each return to their own quarters. Monks in the common quarters,97 from the dormitory chief and dormitory head monk down, perform three informal prostrations to each other. The words of salutation are the same as in the ceremony in the hall. The abbot thereupon begins the round of the quarters, starting from the kitchen hall. The monks join the procession in order, escort [the abbot] as far as the abbot’s quarters, and then the monks withdraw. That is to say, the abbot first goes to the kitchen hall. After finishing personal salutations with the main officers, the abbot leaves [the kitchen hall] and performs the round of the quarters, at which time the main officers are walking behind [the abbot]. Walking after the main officers are people staying near the eastern corridor.98 At this time, the abbot does not enter the infirmary but goes down from the eastern corridor to the west, passing the temple gate and continuing on the round of the quarters, whereupon people staying in quarters near the temple gate join the procession. From the south, [the abbot] goes around the 264c western corridor and the various quarters. At this time, while walking through the west side, [the abbot] is heading north. And from this time, retired old people,99 retired officers,100 retired assistant officers,101 centenarians,102 and veteran monks in private quarters,103 as well as the cleaning chief,104 and so on, will have joined the procession. The supervising monk, the head monk, and so on walk behind them. Next in line walk the monks in the common quarters. For the round of the quarters, we join the procession according to the convenience of [the location of our] quarters. This is called “the monks’ escort.” Thus, ascending the western stairs to the abbot’s quarters, the abbot remains on the abbot’s balcony105 at the front of the abbot’s quarters, and stands facing south with hands in shashu. All the monks, from the main officers down, bow to the abbot with joined hands, facing north. This bow should be especially deep. The abbot returns the bow. The monks withdraw. My late master would not lead the monks to the abbot’s quarters; when he reached the Dharma hall he would stand in front of the steps to the Dharma seat, facing south with hands in shashu. The monks would bow with joined hands and withdraw. This is an ancient form. After this, monks perform personal salutations as each pleases. “Personal salutations” means doing prostrations to each other. For example, people from the same home district—even several tens of them—perhaps in the illuminated hall106 or perhaps at a convenient place in a corridor, do prostrations to each other and congratulate each other on sharing the summer retreat. Here too the words of salutation follow the

method used in the hall. There are also personal words conceived in the present. Sometimes there are masters who have brought their disciples. In this case the disciples must inevitably do prostrations to their own master, performing nine prostrations. The Dharma relatives’ prostration to the abbot is two offers and three prostrations; or sometimes they simply do three prostrations with the prostration cloth spread. The prostration of any Dharma relatives among

the monks should be the same. There are inevitably prostrations to the younger and elder brothers107 of one’s master. All those who sleep next to each other and sit next to each other do prostrations to each other. There are prostrations between all those who are mutually acquainted or who have practiced together in the past. Veterans staying in private quarters, and the head monk, head monk’s assistant, librarian, guest supervisor, bath manager, and so on should visit each other’s quarters and perform prostrations of con gratulation. Veterans staying in private quarters, and the chief officer, the prior, the supervising monk, the chief cook, the work leader, veteran masters, nun masters, laypeople of the truth, and so on also should visit each other’s quarters or visit each other’s seats108 to perform prostrations of congratulation. When we go to visit someone’s quarters but the entrance is densely crowded and there is not enough room to enter the quarters, we write a card and peg it up on the entrance. We write the card on white paper an inch or so wide and about two inches long. The form of the writing is as follows:

Soun, Eshō, and others109 Prostrations of congratulation Another form:

So-and-So

Performs a bow of congratulation Another form:

So-and-So Prostrations of congratulation Another form:

So-and-So

Performs humble prostrations

[191]     There are many forms for the writing, but the general outline is like this. So a large number of these cards can be seen beside the entrances. We do not peg them on the left of the entrance, but peg them on the right of the entrance. These cards are taken down after the midday meal by the person in charge of the quarters. On this day110 the bamboo blinds of entrances to all halls and quarters, big and small, are left open. There is a custom that the abbot, the kitchen hall officers, and the head monk, one after another, serve tea and cakes. However, on a remote island or deep in the mountains, we 265b should dispense with it. It is simply [further] instances of prostration. Veteran monks who have retired from a temple, and those established as head monks,111 each, in their own quarters, serve tea and cakes especially for the main officers and assistant officers. Having thus inaugurated the summer retreat, we make effort in pursuit of the truth.112 Even if we have pursued and realized many practices, if we have never done a summer retreat we are not descendants of the Buddhist patriarchs and we are not Buddhist patriarchs. Jetavana Park113 and Vulture Peak, by virtue of the summer retreat, are totally realized. The practice place of a summer retreat is the mind-seal of the Buddhist Patriarch, and is the existence in the world of all the buddhas.

[192]     At the end of the summer retreat, on the thirteenth day of the seventh lunar month, the service of tea and cakes and the reciting of sutras in the common quarters is again the responsibility of the dormitory chief for that month.

Mindful recitation on the evening of the fourteenth, and formal preaching in the Dharma hall, personal salutations, the round of the quarters, and the service of tea and cakes on the following day, are all the same as at the beginning of the retreat. Only the wording of the notices is different. The notice of the kitchen hall officers’ service of tea says:

“The kitchen hall officers, this evening,/Will serve tea and cakes in the cloud hall,/Especially for the head monk and all the monks./We humbly announce this celebration of the end of the retreat,/And we respectfully hope/That all the monks will kindly bestow upon us your illuminating presence./The bhikṣus of the kitchen hall, So-and-So, Expressed with respect.”114

The words for the mindful recitation at the local deities hall are as follows:

“We sincerely reflect that a golden wind is fanning the countryside, and the God of Autumn115 is governing all directions. It is the time when the King of Realization dissolves the retreat. This is the day of completion of the Dharma year. For ninety days there have been no difficulties and all the monks are at peace. We recite the vast names of the buddhas, and respectfully thank the true rulers of all the temple buildings. I respectfully request the assembly to recite. . . .”116

After this is the same as the mindful recitation at the beginning of the

retreat.

[194] After the formal preaching in the Dharma hall, the main officers

say the following words of thanks:

We humbly rejoice that the Dharma year is complete and there have not been any difficulties. This is likely due to the protection of the Master’s Dharma power. As humble sentient beings, we are unable to contain our extreme gratitude.

The abbot’s words of thanks are as follows:

Now the Dharma year is complete, and we all thank Chief Officer and Head Monk So-and-So for sharing the benefit of their Dharma power. I cannot contain my extreme gratitude.

The monks of the hall,117 from the head monk down, and the monks of the dormitories, from the dormitory chief down, say the following words of thanks:

For the ninety days of the summer retreat we have relied upon each other. My behavior of body, speech, and mind118 have not been good, and I have disturbed the assembly. Humbly I beg for compassion.

265c The main officers and the assistant officers make the following announcement: “Brothers in the assembly who are going to travel on should wait until after the service of tea, and then you may [leave] as you please.” (If there is some exigency, this limitation does not apply.)

[195] This custom119 is more fundamental than the ages before and after King Majestic Sound. Buddhist patriarchs attach importance to only this. Non-Buddhists and heavenly demons never disturb only this. Throughout the three countries,120 not a single descendant of the Buddhist Patriarch ever fails to practice it, but non-Buddhists never learn it. It is the Buddhist Patriarch’s one great121 original hope. Therefore, from the morning of attainment of the truth until the evening of nirvana, he proclaims only the meaning of the retreat. Although there are differences among the five schools of monks in India, they are all the same in guarding and retaining the ninety-day summer retreat, which they practice and experience without fail. Not one of the nine sects of monks in China violates the summer retreat. Those who have never in their life practiced the ninety-day summer retreat should not be called bhikṣus who are the disciples of the Buddha. It is not only to practice in the causal state; it is practice and experience of the realized state. The all-enlightened World-honored One, indeed, has practiced and experienced it through his whole life, without missing a single summer. Remember, it is the Buddha’s experience in the realized state. A person who, nevertheless, does not practice and experience the ninety-day summer retreat and yet says, “I may be a descendant of the Buddhist Patriarch,” is laughable, and is a stupid person unworthy of laughter. Do not even listen to the words of people who speak like this. Do not talk with them. Do not sit with them. Do not walk with them on the same path. For in the Buddha-Dharma we treat evil people through the method of silence.122 We must just understand, and maintain and rely upon, the ninety-day summer retreat as the Buddhist Patriarch himself. Its authentic transmission extends from the Seven Buddhas to Mahākāśyapa, 266a and twenty-eight patriarchs in India have authentically transmitted it from rightful successor to rightful successor. The twenty-eighth patriarch personally manifested himself in China and caused Great Master Taiso Shōshū Fukaku, the Second Patriarch,123 to receive its authentic transmission. Since the Second Patriarch it has been authentically transmitted from rightful successor to rightful successor, and it has been authentically transmitted to the present day. Having gone into China, in the order of a Buddhist patriarch [I] directly received its authentic transmission, and [I] am performing its authentic transmission in Japan. Now that we have actually practiced the ninety-day summer sitting in an order to which it has been authentically transmitted, we have received the authentic transmission of the Dharma of summer. To have practiced the retreat, living together with this person124 may be the true retreat. [The retreat] really has been transmitted in face-to-face transmission from rightful successor to rightful successor since the retreat of the Buddha’s lifetime; therefore, we have directly received the authentic transmission of the face of the Buddha and the face of the patriarchs, and we have immediately experienced the body and mind of the Buddhist patriarchs. For this reason it is said that to meet the retreat is to meet Buddha, to experience the retreat is to experience Buddha, to practice the retreat is to practice Buddha, to hear the retreat is to hear Buddha, and to learn the retreat is to learn Buddha. In sum, that the buddhas and the patriarchs never go against or go beyond the ninety-day retreat is the Dharma. This being so, human kings, King Śakra, King Brahmā, and so on should become bhikṣus and, even if only for one summer, practice the retreat; this will be to meet Buddha. Human beings, heavenly beings, and dragons, even if only for one period of ninety days, should become bhikṣus or bhikṣuṇīs and practice the retreat; this will be to meet Buddha at once. To have joined the order of a Buddhist patriarch and practiced the ninety-day retreat is to have met Buddha already. That, fortunately, before our present dewdrop life has fallen, we have already practiced a summer retreat—whether in heaven above or in the human world—is to have had our own skin, flesh, bones, and marrow replaced by the skin, flesh, bones, and marrow of the Buddhist patriarchs. Because the Buddhist patriarchs come and practice the retreat through us, each person’s practice of the retreat is the retreat’s practice of each person. This being so, [we] who have experienced the retreat are simply called “a thousand buddhas and myriad patriarchs.” The reason, if asked, is that the retreat is the very skin, flesh, bones, marrow, mind, and body of the Buddhist patriarchs; it is their brains and eyes; it is their fists and nostrils; it is their round form and buddha-nature;125 it is a fly whisk and a staff; it is a bamboo stick and a round cushion. The summer retreat is not the production of something new, and at the same time it is not the repeated use of something old.

The World-honored One addresses Bodhisattva Round Realization,126 the great assemblies of monks, and all living beings:

If you practice the retreat for three months from the beginning of summer, you will abide in the pure state of a bodhisattva, your mind will leave the state of a śrāvaka, and you will be beyond dependence on others. When the day of the retreat arrives, say before the Buddha the following words: “In order that I, bhikṣu/bhikṣuṇī/upāsaka/upāsikā127 So-and-So, who rides upon the bodhisattva vehicle may perform tranquil practice; that I may harmoniously enter, dwell in, and maintain the pure real form; that I may make the great round realization into my temple; that body and mind may practice the retreat; and that the wisdom whose nature is balance and the peaceful natural state of self may be without hindrances; I now respectfully ask, without relying on the state of a śrāvaka, to practice the three-month retreat together with the Tathāgatas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas. By virtue of enacting the great causes of the supreme and fine truth of the bodhisattva, I will not be involved with others.” Good sons! This is called a bodhisattva’s manifestation of the retreat.128

[200]  Thus, bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs, upāsakas, and upāsikās, whenever they arrive at the three months of the retreat, inevitably enact the great causes of the supreme and fine truth together with the Tathāgatas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas. Remember, upāsakas and upāsikās also should practice the re treat. This place of the retreat is the great round realization. That being so, Vulture Peak and Jetavana Park are both temples of the great 266c round realization of the Tathāgata. We should listen to the World-honored One’s teaching that the Tathāgatas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas all experience together three months of training in the retreat. [202] The World-honored One practices a ninety-day retreat at one place. On the day of indulgence,129 Mañjuśrī suddenly appears in the order. Mahākāśyapa asks Mañjuśrī, “This summer where have you practiced the retreat?” Mañjuśrī says, “This summer I have practiced the retreat at three places.” At this, Mahākāśyapa assembles the monks. He is about to expel Mañjuśrī by striking the block,130 but just as he lifts the clapper he sees countless buddha lands appear. At the place of every buddha there is a Mañjuśrī, and there is a Mahākāśyapa lifting the clapper to expel Mañjuśrī. The World-honored One thereupon addresses Mahākāśyapa, “Which Mañjuśrī are you now going to expel?” Then Mahākāśyapa is dumbfounded.131

[203]  Zen Master Engo,132 in a discussion of the ancients, says:

A bell not struck does not ring. A drum not hit does not sound. Mahā kāśyapa is moored in the main harbor. Mañjuśrī instantly sits away the ten directions. At the present moment there is a lovely scene of a Buddhist event. How regrettable to miss a move! As Old Master Śākyamuni said, “Which Mañjuśrī are you going to expel?” If [Mahā kāśyapa] had immediately given the block a crack . . . imagine! What kind of total solution would the other133 have performed?134

[204]  Zen Master Engo, in a eulogy to the ancients, says:

A big elephant does not play on a rabbit’s path.

What do swallows and sparrows know of swans and storks?135 Obeying the rules is just like creating a style.

Breaking the standard is just like biting a [flying] arrow.136 The whole world is Mañjuśrī.

The whole world is Mahākāśyapa.

Facing one another, each is in the solemn state.

What is there to punish by lifting the clapper?

It is a nice instance of needlework.137

The golden dhūtas138 have gotten rid of [all] obstacles.139

So the World-honored One practices the retreat at one place and Mañjuśrī practices the retreat at three places, but neither ever fails to practice the retreat. One who does not practice the retreat is neither a buddha nor a bodhisattva. There is no example of a descendant of the Buddhist Patriarch failing to practice the retreat. We should recognize those who practice the retreat as the descen dants of the Buddhist Patriarch. That which practices the retreat is the Buddhist Patriarch’s body and mind, the Buddhist Patriarch’s eyes, and the

Buddhist Patriarch’s very life. Those who do not practice the retreat are not 267a the descendants of the Buddhist Patriarch and are not Buddhist patriarchs. Buddhas and bodhisattvas of the present, [whether] of soil or wood, of white silk or gold, or of the seven treasures, should all practice a summer sitting for three months in retreat. This is the ancient tradition of abiding in and maintaining the treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, and it is the Buddha’s instruction. In conclusion, people in the house of the Buddhist Patriarch decidedly must practice the summer sitting in retreat for three months.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Ango

                                    Preached to the assembly at Daibutsuji in Fukui                                     prefecture on the thirteenth day of the sixth                                     lunar month during the summer retreat in the                                     third year of Kangen.140

 

Notes

1     master’s quarters or in a dormitory. Different from Dharma hall.Shōsan, preaching given not necessarily in the Dharma hall, but, for example, in the jōdō, formal preaching in the

2     In other words, we act in the present moment.

3     self-control. Ha-bi-su, a ring used to lead, for example, a water buffalo by the nose. A symbol of

4     The words in quote marks are in the style of a short verse, in Chinese characters only. 5 same time, it suggests the summer retreat as a concrete fact. Literally, “one doorsill of a summer retreat.” “Doorsill” is used as a counter. At the

6     In reality there is nothing to lead us astray.

7     Master Ōryū Goshin (1043–1114), successor of Master Ōryū Soshin. He called himself Shishin, “Dead Mind,” and this is the name given in the original text.

8     Paraphrased from chap. 28 of the Zokudentōroku.

9     To be the extra day.

10    To avoid being subtracted.

11    de scribe his Buddhist order.Waga ko ri, literally, “my concrete place.” Master Tendō Nyojō used these words to

12    Sixty-one (Vol. III), Kenbutsu, lit., “to meet buddha,” means to realize the state of buddha. See Chapter Kenbutsu.

13    For example, the Buddha’s order.

14    For example, Buddhist tradition.

15    An ancient state in central India stretching along the southern bank of the Ganges, first turned the Dharma wheel. with its capital at Rājagṛha. It was in Magadha that the Buddha realized the truth and

16    “Ninety-day summer retreat” is can be interpreted as suggesting 1) the bright and sunny situation of summer, 2) the byaku-ge, literally, “white summer.” hyaku,Byaku, minus the “white,” purity of effort during the retreat, or 3) the character for a hundred,

107

character for one, usual two. ichi, representing the number ninety in one character instead of the 17 and became the second patriarch in India. The Buddha’s disciple and half-brother, who later succeeded Master Mahākāśyapa 18 The four classes of Buddhist practitioners: monks, nuns, laymen, laywomen.

19    Insakyū represents the sound of the Sanskrit Indra-ṣaila-guhā, literally, “Indra’s StoneHideaway.” This was one of five sacred mountains and monasteries in India.

20    Sentences similar to the preceding sentences can be found in the Sutra of the Collected Essential Teachings of the Buddhas), pt. 1.Shobutsuyōshūkyō

(

21    1245. The sentence in parenthesis is represented in small characters in the source text. 22 Master Dōgen did not deny the value of transcending speech and transcending intellectual thinking, but he criticized the relative interpretation of the wrong groups.

23    Dai-ichi-gi-tai, literally, “the philosophy that is number one in meaning” or “the con-Shōbōgenzō. summate philosophy.” This phrase appears elsewhere in the

24    Dai-ichi-mu-tai, literally, “the philosophy that is number one in absence.” This phrase is Master Dōgen’s variation.

25    Era Record of the Universal Torch the Shin district fished out from Raitaku Lake what he thought to be the shuttle of a Quoted from a verse by Master Busshō Hōtai recorded in the ), chap. 28. The original story appears in the book). A man called Tion from Kataifutōroku (Katai

Jiruizenshū (Collection of Matters and Examples, Part One

Spring Sword.it turned into a dragon and ascended to the sky, for it was in fact the precious Dragon loom. He carried it home and hung it on his wall. Then one day, during a thunderstorm,

26    Vulture Peak.

27    Ten Serious Prohibitions and forty-eight less serious precepts. The In Sanskrit, the was translated into Chinese by Kumārajīva during the latter Shin era (384–417).Brahmajāla-sūtra, a precepts sutra for monks and nuns listing the Pure Net Sutra 28 Master Dōgen is the fifty-first patriarch, counting from Master Mahākāśyapa as the first.

29       Zen’enshingishingiHyakujō’s was completed by Master Chōrō Sōsaku in 1103. It was based on Master Koshingi (Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries(Old Pure Criteria).    ), chap. 2. The editing of the Zen’en-

30       Ninji,Vol. III), which essentially means doing prostrations, is explained in Chapter Fifty-fiveDarani.

(

31       “Securely installed” is verb.     ango seri, as in the chapter title, but here ango is used as a 32 A hut in the temple grounds.

33 or ascetic practices, may be seen as an ultimate teaching of the Small Vehicle.as an ultimate teaching of the Great Vehicle, and the teaching of the twelve For example, the teaching of the establishment of the will to the truth may be seendhūtas, 34 main officers of a temple. Dōsu, also called inō, the supervisor of monks in the zazen hall, and one of the six

35    Shūryō, monks’ dormitories.

36    Gekan, upper and the left side as lower. “Interval” refers to the spaces between the outer of the front wall between the left side of the entrance and the first pillar on the left. pillars supporting the roof of the building. So “the lower interval” means the section literally, “lower interval.” The custom in China is to express the right side as

37    sitting of the day.Hō-san-shō, lit., “release-from-practice bell,” means the bell at the end of the last

38    The six main temple officers, office, treasurer; 2) of monks in the zazen hall, rector; 5) kansu, prior; 3) roku chiji,fusu,tenzo,are 1) assistant prior; 4) chief cook; and 6) tsusu, chief officer, head of the temple dōsushissui,or inō,work leader, supervisor officer in charge of buildings and fields.

39    The six assistant officers, clerk assisting the head monk; visor of the Buddha hall; and roku chōshu,chiyoku,zōsu, librarian; are bath supervisor.shuso,shika,head monk (lit., “chief seat”); guest supervisor; chiden, super-shoki,

40    Seidō, lit., “West Hall,” is a title for a retired master or a guest master—“Veteran located to the west. Master.” The title derives from a traditional temple layout in which guest rooms are 41 See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Jōza, lit., “senior seat,” represents the Sanskrit ācārya, a term of respect for a teacher. 42 For example, a retired senior monk who is living in the order where the retreat istaking place does not use the title Seidō during the retreat.

43    E-hatsu jisha-ryō,; in other words, “the acolytes’ quarters.” lit., “quarters for those who attend to [the master’s] robes and pātra

44    Sōrin,Sanskrit Terms. lit., “flourishing forest,” representing the Sanskrit piṇḍavana. See Glossary of

45    Lotus Sutra, HōbenAjñāta-Kauṇḍinya, a disciple of the Buddha, and one of the five practitioners to whomthe Buddha gave his first preaching after realizing the truth. He is mentioned in the(“Expedient Means”). See LS 1.74.

46    1213.

47    1184. The names of the eras are chosen at random, not in chronological order. 48 Keshu, responsible for visiting the houses of supporters and collecting donations.

49 Dōshu, literally, “hall chief.” In this case, “hall” means the temple infirmary. 50 Literally, “the right.” The original is written from right to left.

51    standard style in Master Dōgen’s time. It is almost the same as the standard blockShinsho, kaisholit., “true writing,” a non cursive style (therefore easier to read) that was the) used for printed characters today. style (

52    between the Reisho is derived from the tensho and kaishotenshostyles.style which is used today for seals. It is midway

53    charcoal, hot water, and so on. resentative. In charge of inspecting the monks’ clothes and Ryōshu, a monk elected from among the monks of the common quarters as their rep-pātra, preparing books,

54    Shōsō (“sacred monk”). Usually an image of the Buddha, of Mañjuśrī Bodhisattva, memories, and other buildings of the temple. or of the so-called Happy Buddha (Hōtai) placed in the zazen hall, the monks’ dor-

55    The entrance to the monks’ hall (zazen hall) is on the east.

56    main officers and other monks who have daily duties outside the zazen hall sit here “The front hall” is zenka, lit., “front stand,” usually called the gaitan or zentan. The so as to be able to come and go more freely.

57    The words in parenthesis are in small characters in the source text.

58    buddhas. A board notifying the monks of the forthcoming recitation of the names of the ten

59    containing a shrine to the deities of local lands and to guardian gods of the Dharma.Tochidō, lit., “lands hall,” a small hall located next to the Dharma (lecture) hall and 60 eburnation of the Buddha’s birth), and Yokubutsu, also called kō-tan-e (celebration of the descent and birth), kan-butsu-e (celebration of bathing the Buddha),busshō-e (reperformed on April 8th to celebrate the Buddha’s birthday. The buddha image is sprinkled with perfumed water or sweet tea.

61    jinbow with the palms of the hands together (Monjin literally means “to ask [how someone is],” but concretely it means to either gasshō monjin) or with the left hand curled Hashu moon-round the thumb and the right hand covering the back of the left hand ().

62    Entei, literally, “Emperor of Flames,” or the sun.

63    Hōsshin, from the Sanskrit dharmakāya. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 64 The Sun Buddha.

65 Hōshin, from the Sanskrit saṃbhogakāya. Saṃbhoga means eating, enjoyment, use, body. See Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Employment, sensual pleasure, joy. So saṃbhogakāya suggests the concrete physical 66 by Śākyamuni Buddha.It is said that Maitreya Buddha will descend from heaven to save all those left unsaved

67    Hokke referred to throughout the Mañjuśrī and Universal Virtue (Sanskrit: Samanta Bhadra) are legendary bodhisattvas). Their images often attend that of the Buddha. Mañjuśrī is a symbol of wisdom Lotus Sutra (see Chapter Seventeen [Vol. I], Hokke-tenand Samanta Bhadra is a symbol of balance.

68    Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, a symbol of life, also praised in the Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kannon. Lotus Sutra. See 69 is called See Chapter Two (Vol. I), Jū-butsu-myō (“Names of the Ten Buddhas” Maka-hannya-haramitsu. This traditional ten-line recitation).

70    mo-ko-sa, mo-ko-ho-ja-ho-ro-mi. These words are recited after a Buddhist lecture in Japan. The characters would nor-juppō sanze issai shobutsu, sho-son-bosatsu-makasatsu, maka-han-ji-hō-san-shi-i-shi-fu, shi-son-bu-samally be read as nya-haramitsu. But the traditional recitation is

71    Another name for the monk’s (zazen) hall.

72    officers). In the traditional temple layout the kitchen hall (or administration hall), The chief officer, prior, and assistant prior (the three highest-ranking of the six main under one roof (on the other side of the Buddha hall from the zazen hall).kitchen itself, and the offices of the chief officer, prior, and assistant prior are located 73 Hi-i, literally, “covered place”—that is, the place covered by the monk’s own mat. 74 They sit facing away from the wall or screen that they usually face in zazen.

75    cer is to do three sets of three prostrations with the prostration cloth spread. But asRyōten sanpai, literally, “two spreads, three prostrations.” The intention of the office offers and three prostrations. “This process is repeated. Finally the officer does just one set of three prostrations without spreading the prostration cloth. From here sweeping motion of the right hand that such a formal prostration is not necessary. The officer prepares to open the prostration cloth, the head monk signals with a shortryōten sanpai is translated as “two

76    Gekan. See note 36.

77    The front of the zazen hall faces east, so to the south of the entrance means to the left of the entrance. 78 Literally, “the beginning.” As Chinese characters are written from top to bottom and from right to left, “the beginning” suggests either the top or the right side of the board. The next line suggests that the envelope was pasted to the side of the board.

79    Five bu; that is, half of one sun. One sun is 1.2 inches.

80    master. Hoken (“Dharma relatives”), for example, monks who are disciples of the master’s 81 Hōza (“Dharma seat”), the lecture platform for formal preaching in the lecture hall. 82 Haiseki, literally, “prostration seat.” A rectangular straw mat.

83    on the ground, and only the forehead touches the prostration cloth. Sokurei, literally, “touching bow.” In this case, the folded prostration cloth is placed

84    hall and lecture hall are usually built facing south. It was the custom in China for anIt is a Buddhist tradition that the master faces south on formal occasions. The Buddha emperor or king to sit facing south.

85    Novices serving as the abbot’s assistants. 86 That is, in the corner of the Dharma hall.

87 The place of precedence is the northern end of the kitchen hall, from which the main officers would be facing south. See note 84. 88 Jōkan, pillar on the right (north).lit., “upper interval,” means the interval between the entrance and the first 89 For the retreat, the monks’ seats in the zazen hall are arranged according to yearssince receiving the precepts. 90 it faces the main entrance, and has a prostration mat in front of it.An image, usually of Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī. Located in the center of the zazen hall,

91    The officers’ places are not in the main hall but in the zentan, or front hall.

92    in front of the chest; the palm of the right hand rests on the back of the left hand. In shashu the fingers of the left hand are curled into a fist around the thumb, and held

93    They take care not to receive the prostration of their own master.

94    The master leaves the hall through the north side of the entrance.

95    attendants, and Dharma relatives. That is, all monks excluding the master, the main officers, and the master’s disciples,

96    Sangyō, lit., “three behaviors,” that is, actions of body, speech, and mind.

97    monks who are staying in the zazen hall. That is, monks who are staying in the shūryō, or “common quarters,” as opposed to

98    the west are the monks’ (zazen) hall, the toilet, the washroom, and the monks’ common A Buddhist temple was traditionally built on the southern slope of a mountain. To novices hall, and the monks’ common quarters. In the middle are (from top to bottom)quarters. By the east corridor are the kitchen hall, the main officers’ quarters, the See Volume I, Appendix V, Traditional Temple Layout.the abbot’s quarters, the Dharma (lecture) hall, the Buddha hall, and the main gate.

99    their old age and have therefore come to live at the temple.Anrō, lit., “peaceful old age,” people who have established the will to the truth in

100  Gonkyū, post of a main officer. Lit., “served formerly,” usually describes a monk who has formerly held the

101  Zenshi, assistant officer for more than three years. Lit., “former assistant,” is a title reserved for a monk who has served as an

102  Idō, literally, “hall of centenarians.”

103  Tanryō, literally, “single quarters.”

104  Chinju, the monk in charge of cleaning the toilet.

105  means the abbot’s quarters. “The position” is probably a kind of balcony or podium. Literally, “the position/throne for the abbot on the main building.” “The main building” 106 busy, the senior monk uses this room to instruct other monks. The shōdō (“illuminated hall”) is located behind the zazen hall. When the master is

107  brother means a monk who took the precepts before the master took them. The master’s That is, the master’s fellow disciples in the order of his master. The master’s elder younger brother means a monk who took the precepts after the master took them.

108  In the zazen hall.

109  Soun and Eshō are examples of visitors’ names.

110  The fifteenth of the fourth lunar month.

111  Suggests head monks established as dormitory head monks for the duration of the retreat.

112  Kufū bendō. Master Dōgen frequently uses this expression to represent the practice of zazen itself.

113  panada thereupon purchased the park from Prince Jeta, a son of King Prasenajit ofA wealthy lay follower of the Buddha, Anāthapiṇḍana, offered to provide for the Buddha’s order a place for the retreat in Śrāvastī (northeast of present-day Lucknow).The Buddha stipulated that the retreat should be situated in a solitary place. Anātha- Kodoku-on, lit., “Solitary Garden,” refers to Jetavana Park (or “Prince Jeta’s Park”). at Jetavana Park. Kosala. It is said that the Buddha practiced eighteen summer retreats in succession 114 Zen’enshingi, chap. 2.

115  Hakutei, literally, “White Emperor.” In China, each of the four directions was represented with a color. West was white. Autumn was seen as the season of the sun’ssetting (in the west) and so white suggests autumn.

116  Zen’enshingi, chap. 2.

117  Monks staying in the zazen hall.

118  Sangyō, lit., “three behaviors,” actions of body, speech, and mind.

119  The summer retreat.

120  India, China, and Japan.

121  the Buddha, to cause living beings to realize the wisdom of the Buddha, and to cause Ichidaijithe buddhas appear in the world only by reason of one great purpose: to cause living beings to disclose the wisdom of the Buddha, to show living beings the wisdom of alludes to ichidaiji innen, “one great purpose.” The Lotus Sutra says that

1.88–90living beings to enter the state of truth, which is the wisdom of the Buddha. See LS; Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Hokke-ten-hokke.

122  order did not talk to a member of the order who had committed a sin. “Silence” is “pure rod.” This was a form of punishment in which the other members of a Buddhist Ondan, representing the Sanskrit brahma-daṇḍa, which literally means

123  Master Taiso Eka, the Second Patriarch in China.

124  person. “This person” suggests Master Dōgen himself, and at the same time, each individual

125  Nāgārjuna quoted in Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Ensō, “round form,” and busshō, “buddha-nature,” allude to a story about Master Busshō. 126 A bodhisattva who appears in the is thought to have been written in China. Engakukyō (Sutra of Round Realization). The sutra 127 The four classes of Buddhist practitioners: monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen. 128 Engakukyō (Sutra of Round Realization).

129  The day on which the restrictions of the summer retreat end. On this day, practitioners forgiven. confess to each other the mistakes they have made during the retreat, and ask to be

130  clapper are traditional instruments still seen in Buddhist temples in Japan today.Byakutsui, lit., “to strike the hammer,” means to strike an octagonal wooden block, tsui, a small wooden clapper. The octagonal block and about three feet high, with a

131  in the DaihōkōhōkyōgyōEngokoroku (General Record of Engo Kokugon(Great Square and Wide Treasure Chest Sutra).    ). Also quoted 132 the Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Master Goso Hōen, and editor of Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record).

133  The Buddha.

134  Gassatsu,of tranquility. lit., “total killing,” suggests a complete solution, or the perfect restoring Engokoroku, chap. 17. 135 Mahākāśyapa and Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī. In the first two lines Master Engo praises the exceptional personalities of Master

136  suggests behavior that is exactly right. The latter phrase alludes to a Chinese legend Mañjuśrī’s transcendence of idealistic rules. Teki [o] yabu[ru koto], lit., “breaking the target” or “violating the mark,” suggests Zoku [o] ka[mu], lit., “biting an arrow,” Taihei Eratest each other’s skill in archery, Toku Kunmo caught in his teeth an arrow shot bythat when two excellent warriors, Toku Kunmo and O Reichi, had a competition to Taiheikōki (Widely Extending Record of the

O Reichi. The story is recorded in the ), chap. 227.

137  Suggests sharp action in the moment of the present.

138  “golden Zuda represents the Sanskrit dhūtas” means the Indian practitioners themselves. See Volume I, Glossary dhūta, which means hard or ascetic practice. In this case, of Sanskrit Terms.

139  a bamboo symbolizes something difficult to break, or a problem that is difficult to solve. “Gotten rid of [all] obstacles” is Engokoroku, chap. 19.        raku-setsu, literally, “dropped joints.” The joint of

140  1245.

 

[Chapter Eighty] Tashintsū

The Power to Know Others’ Minds

Translator’s Note: Ta means “others,” shin means “mind,” and tsū (short for jinzū) means “mystical power.” So tashintsū means “the mystical power to know others’ minds.” Some Buddhist groups believed it possible for Buddhist practitioners to attain a mystical power allowing them to see into others’ minds. On this subject, there is a famous story concerning Master Nan’yō Echū’s questioning of an Indian monk called Daini Sanzō. The story was often discussed, and the interpretations of five famous Buddhist masters are given in this chapter. Master Dōgen was not satisfied by their explanations and criticizes the views they expressed, in the process presenting us with his own views.

[209] National Master Echū1 of Kōtakuji in the Western Capital,2 is a man from Shoki in Esshū district.3 His family name is Zen. After receiving the mind-seal, he lives on Hakugaizan in Tōsukoku Valley in Nan’yō district.4 For more than forty years he never goes down from the temple gate, [but] rumor of his practice of the truth is heard even in the imperial capital. In the second year of Jōgen,5 during the reign of the Tang emperor Shukusō,6 the emperor sends his private messenger, Son Chōsin, to convey the decree that [the master] should come to the capital. [The emperor] receives [Master Echū] with the courtesies shown to one’s master, and installs him by imperial decree at Seizen-in Monastery in the grounds of Sempukuji.7 When Emperor Daisō8 takes the throne, he also sends for [the master] and has him stay at Kōtaku Temple.9 During sixteen years there, [the master] preaches the Dharma according to [practitioners’] makings. At that time a certain Daini Sanzō10 from India arrives in the capital, saying, “I have attained the eye that intuits the minds of others.” The emperor decrees that the

117

National Master should examine him. As soon as Sanzō meets the master he prostrates himself at once and stands to the [master’s] right. The master says, “Have you got the power to know others’ minds?” [Sanzō] answers, “I would not be so bold [as to say so].”11 The master says, “Tell me where [this] old monk is just now.” Sanzō says, “Master, you are the teacher of the whole country. Why have you gone to the West River to watch a boat race?”

The master asks a second time, “Tell me where the old monk is

just now.”

Sanzō says, “Master, you are the teacher of the whole country. Why are you on Tianjian Bridge12 watching [someone] play with a monkey?”

                      The master asks a third time, “Tell me where the old monk is just now.”

Sanzō takes a good while but he does not know where [the master] has been. The master scolds him, saying, “You ghost of a wild fox,

where is your power to know others’ minds?” Sanzō has no answer.13

[211]    A monk asks Jōshū,14 “Daini Sanzō does not see where the National Master is the third time. I wonder where the National Master is.” Jōshū says, “He is right on Sanzō’s nostrils.”

[212]    A monk asks Gensha,15 “If he is already on [Sanzō’s] nostrils, why does [Sanzō] not see him?” Gensha says, “Simply because of being enormously close.”

[212]    A monk asks Kyōzan,16 “Why does Daini Sanzō not see the National Master the third time?” Kyōzan says, “The first two times [the master’s] mind is concerned with external circumstances;17 then he enters the samādhi of receiving and using the self,18 and so [Sanzō] does not see him.”

[213]    Kaie [Shu]tan19 says, “If the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils, what difficulty could [Sanzō] have in seeing him? Above all, it has not been recognized that the National Master is inside Sanzō’s eyeballs.”

[213]  Gensha chides Sanzō: “You! Say! Have you seen at all, even thefirst two times?” Zen Master Myōkaku Jūken20 of Setchō says, “I am defeated, I am defeated.”21

[214]  The odorous fists are many who, since ancient times, have made comments on and assertions about the story of how National Master Daishō22 tested Daini Sanzō, but there are five particularly venerable old fists among them. And although I do not deny that the insight and accuracy of each of these five venera ble patriarchs are very insightful and accurate, there are many respects in which they have not glimpsed the conduct of the National Master. The reason, if asked, is that all concerned, past and present, have thought that the first two times Sanzō unerringly knew the National Master’s situation. This is our ancestors’ great error, and we students of later ages should not be ignorant of it. My present doubts about the five venerable patriarchs are twofold. First, [the venerable patriarchs] do not know the National Master’s fundamental intention in examining Sanzō. Second, they do not know the National Master’s body and mind.

[215]  Now the reason I say that they do not know the National Master’s fundamental intention in examining Sanzō is as follows: The first time the National Master says “Tell me where [this] old monk is just now,” his fun- 267c amental intention is to question whether Sanzō has eyes that see and hear the Bud dha-Dharma. He is questioning whether Sanzō has within himself the power to know others’ minds, which belongs to the Buddha-Dharma. At this time, if the Buddha-Dharma were present in Sanzō, when asked “Where is the old monk just now?” he would have a way of getting the body out; he would manifest a practical means that was familiar to him. The National Master’s words “Where is the old monk just now?” are as if to ask “What is the old monk?” “Where is the old monk just now?” asks “Just now is what kind of moment?” “Is where” asserts that “This place is where something ineffable exists.” [The master’s words] contain the truth of calling something ineffable “the old monk.” The National Master is not necessarily an “old monk,” but “the old monk” is always a fist.23 Daini Sanzō does not know this idea because, although he has come from the faraway Western Heavens, he has not learned the Buddha’s truth, and because he has only vainly learned the ways of non-Buddhists and the two vehicles. The National Master asks again “Tell me where the old monk is just now.” And here again Sanzō offers

futile words. The National Master asks once again, “Tell me where the old monk is just now.” This time Sanzō takes a while but is dumb founded and without a response. Then the National Master scolds Sanzō, saying, “You ghost of a wild fox, where is your power to know others’ minds?” Even after being scolded like this, Sanzō still has nothing to say for himself. He does not respond. He has no through route. Nevertheless, the ancestors all think, in regard to the National Master’s scolding of Sanzō, “The first two times

[Sanzō] knew where the National Master was; he does not know and does

not see only at the third time, and therefore he is scolded  by the National Master.” This is a great mistake. The National Master’s scolding of Sanzō scolds Sanzō outright for never having seen the Buddha-Dharma from the beginning, even in a dream. He does not scold Sanzō for having known the first two times but not knowing the third time. He scolds [Sanzō] outright for boasting that he has attained the power to know others’ minds when in fact he does not know others’ minds. The National Master first tests [Sanzō] by asking whether the power to know others’ minds exists in the Buddha Dharma. By saying “I would not be so bold,” [Sanzō] seems to affirm that it exists. After that, the National Master thinks, “If we say that the power to know others’ minds exists in the Buddha-Dharma, and if we cause the power to know others’ minds to exist in the Buddha-Dharma, it should be in such and-such a state. If expression of the state lacks the total manifestation of the state, it cannot be the Buddha-Dharma.” Even if Sanzō narrowly managed to say something the third time, if it had anything in common with the first two attempts it would not include expression of the state, and [the master] would have to scold him outright. In now venturing to ask three times, the National Master is asking again and again whether Sanzō is able to understand the National Master’s question, and so he repeats the question three times.

[218]     The second [doubt] is that none of the ancestors has known the body and mind of the National Master. What I have called “the body and mind of the National Master” cannot easily be seen or known by Dharma teachers of the three baskets.24 It is beyond even [bodhisattvas in] the ten sacred stages and the three clever stages,25 and it is not clarified by [bodhisattvas] at the place of as signment26 or in the state of balanced awareness.27 How could a scholar of the three baskets, a common person, know the whole body of the National Master? We must affirm this principle with total certainty. To say that the body-mind of the National Master could be known or could be seen by a scholar of the three baskets is an insult to the Buddha-Dharma. To recognize that [the master’s body and mind] might be on the level of a teacher of sutras and commentaries is the utmost madness. Do not learn that 268b a person who has attained the power to know others’ mind might be able to know the place where the National Master is.

[219]     From time to time there are people who acquire the power to know others’ minds as an ethnic custom of the Western Country, India. [But] no example has ever been heard of a person who, without relying upon establishment of the bodhi-mind and without relying on the right viewpoint of the Great Vehicle, has attained the power to know others’ minds and by virtue of the power to know others’ minds has realized the Buddha-Dharma. Even after acquiring the power to know others’ minds, if a person proceeds, as a common person, to establish the will and to undergo training, he will naturally be able to experience and to enter the Buddha’s truth. If it were possible to know the Buddha’s truth only by virtue of the power to know others’ minds, all the past saints would have first learned the power to know others’ minds and then used that ability to know the buddha-effect. During the appearance in the world of even a thousand buddhas and ten thou sand patriarchs, such a thing will never be. Of what use are those who are unable to know the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs? We can say that they are of no use to Buddhism. One who has attained the power to know others’ minds, and a common person who has not attained the power to know others’ minds, may be exactly equal. In maintaining and relying upon the buddha-nature, a mind-reader and a common person may be the same. Students of the state of Buddha must never think that non-Buddhists and people of the two vehicles who have the five powers or the six powers28 are superior to the common person. A person who has only the will to the truth yet hopes to learn the Buddha-Dharma may be superior to [a person who has] the five powers or six powers—as the song of the kalaviṅka,29 even in the egg, is superior to [the songs of] ordinary birds. Furthermore, what is called in India “the power to know others’ minds,” should be called “the power to know the images in others’ minds.”30 [Mind readers] may dimly detect, on the outer edges of perception, images arising in the

 

268c

 

mind. In the absence of images in the mind, however, they are dumbfounded; that must be laughable. Moreover, the mind is not always mental images, and mental images are not always the mind. When the mind becomes the image,31 the power to know others’ minds cannot know it; and when the image becomes the mind, the power to know others’ minds cannot know it. This being so, the five powers and the six powers of India are not equal to our mow ing weeds and working the fields in this country. They are of no use at all. For this reason, all the past masters in and to the east of China have not liked to practice the five powers and the six powers, because there is no need to do so. Even a one-foot gem can be necessary, [but] the five powers and the six powers are not necessary. Even a one-foot gem is not a treasure, [but] every inch of time is vital. How could a person who attaches importance to time want to learn the five or six powers? In sum, we should decisively affirm the principle that the power to read others’ minds cannot reach the boundary of the Buddha’s wisdom.

[223] For each of the five venerable patriarchs to have thought, on the contrary, that at the first two times Sanzō knew the situation of the National Master, is greatly mistaken. The National Master is a Buddhist patriarch. Sanzō is a common person. How could we even discuss a meeting between the two of them? First the National Master says, “Tell me where the old monk is just now.” There is nothing hidden in this question; it contains a clearly manifest expression of the state. That Sanzō does not know it is not his fault. That the five venerable patriarchs neither hear nor see it is a mistake. The National Master has said already, “Where is the old monk just now?” He never says, “Tell me where the old monk’s mind is just now.” He does not say “Where are the old monk’s thoughts just now?” [What he says] is an expression of the state that is extremely necessary to observe and to inspect. Nevertheless, [the five venerable patriarchs] neither know nor see it. They neither hear nor see the National Master’s expression of the state, and for that reason they do not know the body and mind of a National Master— because one in whom there is expression of the state is called “National Master,” and because one who lacks expression of the state cannot be a National Master. Moreover, they cannot recognize that the National Master’s body mind is beyond big and small, and beyond self and others. They seem to have forgotten that he possesses the brains and possesses the nostrils. Though

the National Master has no time free from practice, how could he intend to become Buddha! Therefore, we should not expect to meet him by referring to “Buddha.” The National Master already possesses the body-mind of the Buddha-Dharma. We cannot fathom it through mystical powers and practice and experience, and we cannot suppose it by means of transcending thought and forgetting involvements. It is never hit by thinking or non-thinking. The National Master is beyond having the buddha-nature, is beyond not having the buddha-nature, and is beyond the body of space.32 This state of the National Master’s body-mind is utterly beyond recognition. In the present lineage from the order of Sōkei, besides Seigen and Nangaku only National Master Daishō is such a Buddhist patriarch.33 Now I would like to test and to defeat each of the five venerable patriarchs.

[225]  Jōshū says that because the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils, [Sanzō] does not see him. This expression has no meaning. How could the National Master be right on Sanzō’s nostrils? Sanzō has never had nostrils. If we affirm that nostrils are present in Sanzō, then the National Master, from his side, should meet with Sanzō. A meeting of the National Master and Sanzō, if we affirm that there is one, may simply be a pair of nostrils facing a pair of nostrils.34 Sanzō cannot really meet with the National Master at all.

[226]  Gensha says, “Simply because of being enormously close.” Certainly, his “enormously close”35 can be left as it is, but still he has missed the point. What is “enormous closeness”? I guess that Gensha has never known 269b “enormous closeness” or experienced “enormous closeness.” The reason, if asked, is that he knows only that in being enormously close there is no seeing each other, but he does not know that mutual realization is “enormous closeness” itself.36 We can say that in regard to the Buddha-Dharma he is the farthest of the far. To describe only the third time as enormously close would suggest that the state at the first two times was enormously distant. Now let us ask Gensha: What do you call “enormously close”? Are you describing a fist? Are you describing the Eye? From now on, do not say that nothing is seen in the state of “being enormously close.”

[227]  Kyōzan says, “The first two times [the master’s] mind is concerned with external circumstances; then he enters the samādhi of receiving and using the self, and so [Sanzō] does not see him.” Kyōzan! Though you live in an Eastern Land, you have extended your acclaim as a lesser Śākyamuni even to India in the west. Never the less, your words now contain a great error. The mind that is concerned with external circumstances, and the samādhi of receiving and using the self, are not different. Therefore you should not say that [Sanzō] does not see because of the difference between the mind that is concerned with external circumstances and the state of receiving and using the self. That being so, though you proffer a reason based upon the difference between the state of receiving and using the self and the mind that is concerned with external circumstances, your expression is not an expression at all. If you say, “When I enter the samādhi of receiving and using the self, other people cannot see me,” then the state of receiving and using the self can never experience the state of receiving and using the self, and there can be no practice and experience. Kyōzan! If you understand that Sanzō really believes that he sees where the National Master is the first two times, you are not yet a person who is learning Buddha. In short, Daini Sanzō neither knows nor sees where the National Master is, not only the third time but also the first two times. And if you are as the above expression suggests, Sanzō is not the only one who does not know the situation of the National Master; we might say that Kyōzan also has never known the situation of the National Master. Now I will ask Kyōzan: “Where is the National Master just now?” And at that moment, if Kyōzan makes to 269c open his mouth, I will at once let out a yell.

[229] Gensha chides Sanzō, saying, “Have you seen [the National Master] at all, even the first two times?” The present utterance “Have you seen at all, even the first two times?” sounds as if it says what needs to be said. [But] Gensha should study his own words. The excellence of this remark is as it is. At the same time, it is not right, because it seems only to suggest that [Sanzō’s] seeing is like not seeing.37 Hearing the above, Jūken, Zen Master Myōkaku of Set chōzan, says, “I am defeated. I am defeated.” When we have seen Gensha’s words as the truth we should say this, but when we do not see Gensha’s words as the truth we should not say this.

[229]     Kaie [Shu]tan says, “If the National Master is right on Sanzō’s nostrils, what difficulty could [Sanzō] have in seeing him? Above all, it has not been recognized that the National Master is inside Sanzō’s eyeballs.” This again discusses only the third time. It does not criticize [Sanzō] as he should be criticized, for never having seeing at all, even the first two times. How could [Kaie] recognize that the National Master was on Sanzō’s nostrils or inside his eyeballs? If he speaks like this, I must say that he has never heard the National Master’s words. Sanzō has never had nostrils or eyes. Even supposing that Sanzō were to maintain and rely upon eyeballs and nostrils of his own, if the National Master came and entered those nostrils and eyeballs, Sanzō’s nostrils and eyeballs would each instantly be split apart. Having been split apart, they would not be a haunt of the National Master.

[230]     None of the five venerable patriarchs knows the National Master. The National Master is an eternal buddha through all the ages and a Tathāgata for all the world. He has clarified and received the authentic transmission of the Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury, and has securely retained black bead eyes.38 He passes the authentic transmission to the buddha of himself, and he passes the authentic transmission to the buddha of others. He has already experienced the same state as Śākyamuni Buddha, and yet he is investigating the state simultaneously with the Seven Buddhas. At the same time, he has experienced the same state as all the buddhas of the three times. He 270a has realized the truth before Emptiness King,39 he has realized the truth after Emptiness King, and he has realized the truth in the same state as, and just in the time of, the Buddha Emptiness King. The National Master has always seen the sahā world as his national land; at the same time, “the sahā [world]” is not necessarily present within his world of Dharma and not necessarily present within his whole universe in ten directions. And Śākyamuni Buddha, as the ruler of sahā nations, neither usurps nor restricts the national land of the National Master—just as, for example, former and latter Buddhist patriarchs each have countless realizations of the truth, but they neither detract from nor restrict each other. The situation is like this because former and latter Buddhist patriarchs’ realizations of the truth are restricted, in each case, by realization of the truth itself.

[232] With Daini Sanzō’s failure to know the National Master as evidence, we should decisively affirm the principle that śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas, people of the Small Vehicle, do not know the periphery of a Buddhist patriarch. We should clarify and learn the National Master’s intention in scolding Sanzō, as follows. Even if the National Master himself scolded [Sanzō] for knowing his situation the first two times and only failing to know the third time, that would be meaningless. To know two thirds of the whole is to know the whole itself. [Sanzō] would not deserve to be scolded for being like that. If he were scolded, it would not be for failing to know completely. Sanzō’s attitude is an insult to the National Master. If [the National Master] scolded Sanzō on not being recog nized only the third time, who could believe in the National Master? With ability that had been able to know the first two times, Sanzō might scold the National Master. The National Master’s intention in scolding Sanzō is this: he scolds [Sanzō] for totally failing all three times, from the outset, to know the National Master’s situation, his thoughts, and his body mind. He scolds [Sanzō] for never having seen, heard, or learned the Buddha-

270b Dharma at all. With this intention, from the first time to the third time, he questions [Sanzō] with the same words. At the first try Sanzō says, “Master, you are the teacher of the whole country. Why have you gone to the West River to watch a boat race?” Addressed thus, the National Master never agrees, “Yes, Sanzō, you have truly recognized the situation of the old monk”; he only repeats the question again and again, three times. Failing to recognize and failing to clarify this fact, old veterans in all directions, for several centuries since the time of the National Master, have delivered comments and set forth theories at random. The comments of each past individual are wholly irrelevant to the original intention of the National Master, and they do not accord with the fundamental teaching of the Bud dha-Dharma. It is pitiful that the old drills of the past have each blundered on in error. Now, if we say that there is the power to know others’ minds in the Buddha-Dharma, there must be the power to know others’ bodies, there must be the power to know others’ fists, and there must be the power to know others’ eyes. That being so, there must be the power to know our own mind, and there must be the power to know our own body. If the state is like this already, self-command of our own mind40 may be nothing other than “the power to know our own mind.”41 When expressions like this are realized, the state may be the power to know others’ minds [that naturally emerges] from the self itself and from the mind itself. Now let us ask: Is it right to command the power to know others’ minds or is it right to command the power to know our own minds? Speak at once! Speak at once! Setting that aside, [we can conclude that] “You have got my marrow” is just the power to know others’ minds.42

                                    Shōbōgenzō Tashintsū

 Preached to the assembly at Daibutsuji in Etsu-u                                     on the fourth day of the seventh lunar month in                                     the third year of Kangen.43

Notes

1     Master Nan’yō Echū (d. 775), successor of Master Daikan Enō.

2     In this case, the capital corresponds to the present-day city of Luoyang in north Hunan, Seikei (“Western Capital”). There were five capitals in ancient China with this name. east China, in the Huang basin.

3     A district in modern-day Zhekiang province in east China. 4  In modern-day Hunan province in east China.

5     761.

6     (Emperor Shukusō reigned from 756–763. He is also mentioned in Chapter Twelve Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Vol. I), Kesa-kudoku;pt. 1, no. 26); and in Chapter Eighty-six, in the notes to Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), HensanShukke-kudoku.(from the

7     The suffix ji is translated here as “temple,” and the suffix in as “monastery.”

8     Emperor Daisō reigned from 763–779. In Chapter Eighty-six, Shukke-kudoku, paragraph 106, he is criticized alongside Shukusō for attaching to the throne. But he ispraised in Chapter One (Vol. I), Bendōwa, paragraph 52, for sitting in zazen.

9     In this case “temple” is saṃghārāma,seiran. Seipratyekabuddhavihāralit., “a resting place for a company [of monks],” a term means “spiritual” or “pure.” . Ran is de rived from equivalent to the Sanskrit the Sanskrit

10    Daini-sanzō. Daini literally means “Big Ears.” Sanzō represents the meaning of the

Abidharma (commentaries). The title Sanzō was given to a person who was accom-Sanskrit Tripiṭaka, the three baskets of Sutra (discourses), Vinaya (discipline) and plished in studying the Tripiṭaka.

11    73Fukan,, Master Dōgen explains the characters as follows: “Ōbaku says, ‘I would not be literally, “I do not dare.” In Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), Busshō, paragraph you say these words ‘I would not be so bold’ to suggest that the ability is [your own]so bold.’ In the land of Song when you are asked about an ability that you possess, his power. Ability.” So Sanzō is suggesting that out of modesty he does not want to boast about

12    jing.Tianjian is a large port city in northeast China, in Hopeh province, southeast of Bei-

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13    Chapter Nineteen (Vol. I), Quoted directly from the Keitokudentōroku,Shin-fukatoku, as are the following comments of the five chap. 5. The story is also discussed in venerable patriarchs.

14    Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. See also, for example, Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. II), Hakujushi.

15    Master Gensha Shibi (835–907), successor of Master Seppō Gison. See also, forIkka-no-myōju. example, Chapter Four (Vol. I),

16    Master Kyōzan Ejaku (803–887), successor of Master Isan Reiyū.

17    Shōkyōshin. Shō, wata[ru] literally means cross over or float across, and kyō, sakai his commentary, Master Dōgen says that this mind and the balanced state (are the same. shōkyōshin means boundaries or external circumstances. In Master Kyōzan’s usage, the phrase suggests the mind that is attached to external things and events. But insamādhi)

18    Jijuyo zanmaiance. (“samādhi of receiving and using the self”), the state of natural bal19 Master Kaie Shutan (1025–1072), successor of Master Yōgi Hōe.

20    Myōkaku is his posthumous title. Master Setchō Jūken (980–1052), a successor of Master Chimon Kōso. Zen Master

21    are quoted also changes: Master Kyōzan’s comment comes first in third in this chapter, and last in Chapter Nineteen, in Chapter Nineteen (Vol. I), In this chapter, the five comments are all quoted directly in Chinese characters, whereas Shin-fukatoku, direct quotes from the Chinese are inter-kana. The order in which the comments Shin-fukatoku.Keitokudentōroku, spared with words and phrases in Japanese

22    Daishō is the posthumous title of Master Nan’yō Echū.

23    The concept “old monk” is not always applicable to the National Master, but the self that he expressed as the old monk is always present.

24    was a title sometimes used for scholar-priests and teachers of theory as opposed to monks who practiced zazen. See also note 10.Sanzō-hōshi, “Dharma teacher of the Tripiṭaka.” Hōshi, “Dharma teacher,” like Sanzō,

25    through fifty-two stages before becoming a buddha: ten stages of belief (phases one Jūshō-sanken, literally, “ten sacred and three cleavers.” A bodhisattva is said to pass sacred stages (forty-one to fifty); then the penultimate stage of balanced awareness to ten); then thirty stages classed as the three clever stages (eleven to forty); then tenfifty-one); and finally the ultimate stage of subtle awareness (fifty-two).

(

26    Fusho,in one life”—that is, stage fifty-two, also called short for isshō-fusho no bosatsu, lit., “a bodhisattva at the place of assignment  myōkaku, subtle awareness.

27    Tōkaku, stage fifty-one.

Chapter Eighty

28    Explained in Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Jinzū.

29    no one ever tires of hearing it. The kalaviṅka is said to be a bird of the Himalayas whose voice is so beautiful that

30    first—is the state of awareness of reality, or the image of reality as reflected in the Tanentsu ,images in the mind—ideas, thoughts, illusions, wishes, dreams, Buddhist theories, etc. The second meaning of “the power to know others’ ideas.” The first meaning of the noun Nen—which is not always easy to distinguish from  three, balanced state of action. See also the discussion of mindfulness in Chapter Seventy-Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō, paragraph 14.

31    mind becomes awareness,” or “when the mind becomes awareness of the image.” Shin no nen naran tokias for example, in the moment when an archer shoots an arrow at the target, or at the phrase suggests the state of undivided wholeness in the moment of the present—means “when the mind becomes the image,” or “when the moment when a batter hits the ball.

32    Kokū-shin. The Garland Sutrage-kyō-jūbutsulists “ten states of buddha understood by their objective), namely: the body of living beings, the body of aśrāvaka body, the pratyekabuddha body, the bodhisattva body, the body of the Tathāgata, the body of wisdom, the Dharmanational land, the body of karmic reward, the body, and the body of space. Circumstances” (

33    Master Seigen Gyōshi became the ancestral master of Master Dōgen’s lineage. Master Daikan Enō transmitted the Dharma to these three masters on Mount Sōkei.

Nangaku Ejō’s successors include the ancestral masters of the Rinzai sect.

34    and second, two people meeting each other.In this paragraph Sanzō lacks; and second, means an ordinary pair of nostrils, which Sanzō has. Similarly, miru, “to meet” or “to see,” first suggests mutual realization between two buddhas; Iku, “nostrils,” first symbolizes the vigorous Buddhist state, which

35    see what was right there in front of him (right in front of his nose!).Master Dōgen affirmed Master Gensha’s comment as meaning that Sanzō could not

36    when two people do not notice each other because they are too close together. “Seeing Master Gensha only recognized the situation (for example, in a tightly packed crowd)sōken. each other” and “mutual realization” are originally the same characters,

37    Master Dōgen is interested in whether or not Sanzō could see where the National Master was—right there in front of him!

38    Mokkansu-gen. Mokkansuaspera; each seed is about the size of a pupil. are the black spherical seeds of the fruit of the Gen means eyeball. Retaining black-aphananthe eight (Vol. II), bead eyes means remaining balanced and therefore detached. See also Chapter Twenty-Butsu-kōjō-no-ji, paragraph 65. 39 Kū-ō (Emptiness King), the name of a legendary eternal buddha who ruled the worldduring the kalpa of emptiness (the eternal past).

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40       Jishin no jinen,of the whole self through the practice of zazen. Various meanings of “taking hold by oneself of the mind of the self,” suggests self-regulation Nen, including

“take hold,” “twirl,” “utilize,” and “comprehend,” are discussed in the notes to Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Udonge.

41       Jishintsū.

42       The sentences from “Now let us ask” to the end of the paragraph are in Chinese char-acters only but were almost certainly composed by Master Dōgen himself.

43       1245.

[Chapter Eighty-one]

                                               Ō-saku-sendaba                                    

A King’s Seeking of Saindhava

Translator’s Note: Ō means “king,” saku means “to seek,” and sendaba is a phonetic rendering of the Sanskrit saindhava. Saindhava means “products of the Indus River basin.” The Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra contains a story which uses the multiple meanings of words to express the ambiguity of reality. When a king needs to wash his hands and requests saindhava, his servant will bring water. When the king is eating a meal and requests saindhava, the servant will bring salt. When the king wants to drink water and requests saindhava, the servant will bring a cup. And when the king wants to go out and requests saindhava, the servant will bring a horse. Buddhist monks in China often used this story to discuss the multiple meanings of words and the ambiguous nature of reality. In this chapter Master Dōgen explains the meaning of “A King’s Seeking of Saindhava” from his own unique viewpoint.

[237]  Words—no words;

Real wisteria and real trees; Feeding donkeys, feeding horses;

Clear water and transparent clouds.1

[238]  Because this is the way it is already,

In the Sutra of the Great Parinirvāṇa2 the World-honored One says: For example, it is like a great king telling his retainers, “Bring sain dhava!Saindhava is one word for four products. The first is salt, the second is pots, the third is water, and the fourth is horses. These four things each have the same name. [Yet] a wise retainer is able to know [the meaning of] this word. If the king requests saindhava when about to wash, [the retainer] at once serves water. If the king requests sain dhava when eating, [the retainer] at once serves salt. If the king requests

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saindhava after eating, when he wants to drink water, [the retainer] at once serves a pot. If the king requests saindhava when he wants to go out, [the retainer] at once serves a horse. A wise retainer like this is able to understand in four ways a great king’s secret talk.3

[240]       This king’s seeking of saindhava, along with the retainer’s serving of saindhava, have come to us from long ago. They have been transmitted in common with the Dharma robe. The World-honored One himself inevitably discussed them, and so his descendants have discussed them again and again. We can guess that those who have experienced the same state as the World honored One have made saindhava into their own practice. To those who are not in the same state as the World-honored One: When you buy some straw sandals and tread one step forward on foot, you will have got it already!4 Sain dhava in the house of the Buddhist patriarchs has secretly leaked out already, and so saindhava is present in the residences of great kings.

[241]       The eternal buddha Wanshi5 of Tendōzan in the Great Song city of Keigenfu,6 in formal preaching in the Dharma hall, preaches to the assembly: To quote: “A monk asks Jōshū,7 ‘How is it when a king seeks sain- dhava?’” Jōshū bows with hands folded.8 Setchō9 comments, “It was the seeking of salt and the serving of a horse.” Master [Wanshi] says, “Setchō is an excellent master of a hundred years ago; Jōshū is an eternal buddha one hundred and twenty years of age. If Jōshū is right,

Setchō is wrong. If Setchō is right, Jōshū is wrong. Now say: in the

271a               end, how is it? [I,] Tendō, cannot help adding a footnote. If we differ

from it by a thousandth or a hundredth we miss it by a thousand miles.”

To understand is to beat about in the grass to scare snakes,10 And not to understand is to burn money to attract demons.11

Without preferences in regard to an uncultivated field is Old

    Gutei.12

Extending his hand, [he tackles] what he picks up just now.13

[242]       During formal preaching in the Dharma hall my late master, the eternal buddha, would usually say, “The eternal buddha Wanshi.” But only my late master, the eternal buddha, has met the eternal buddha Wanshi as an eternal buddha. In Wanshi’s time there was a certain Sōkō, called “Zen Master

Chapter Eighty-one

Daie of Kinzan Mountain,”14 who may have been a distant descendant of Nangaku.15 The whole realm of the Great Song thinks that Daie might be equal to Wanshi. Moreover, some have thought that he is more of a person of the fact than Wanshi. This mistake has arisen because both monks and laypeople in the great kingdom of Song, being negligent in learning, are not yet clear in their eyes for the truth, are without clarity in knowing people, and are without the ability to know themselves. In Wanshi’s comment the real establishment of the will is present. We should learn in practice the principle of the eternal buddha Jōshū bowing with hands folded. Just at that moment, is it the king’s seeking of saindhava, or not? And is it the retainer’s service of saindhava, or not? We should learn in practice Setchō’s teaching that “It was the seeking of salt and the serving of a horse.” The “seeking of salt” and the “serving of a horse” is each the king’s seeking of saindhava and the retainer’s seeking of saindhava. The World-honored One seeks sain- dhava and Mahākāśyapa’s face breaks into a smile. The First Patriarch seeks sain dhava and the four disciples serve a horse, salt, water, and a pot.16 We should learn the pivotal state which—at the moment when a horse, salt, water, or a pot and the seeking of saindhava become one—is the serving of a horse or the serving of water.17

[245] Nansen18 one day on seeing Tō Impō19 coming toward him points to a water jar and says, “The jar is circumstances. Inside the jar there is water. Without disturbing the circumstances, bring some water to this old monk.” [Im]pō then brings the jar of water before Nansen and pours. Nansen leaves it at that.20

Thus,

Nansen seeks water,

The ocean having dried right to the bottom.

Impō serves a pot,

Tipped over and emptied out completely.

          And though they are like this, at the same time we should learn in practice      

that “in the reality21 of circumstances there is water,”22 and “in the reality of water there are circumstances.”23 To disturb water is immature, and to disturb circumstances is immature.

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[246] Great Master Kyōgen Shūtō,24 the story goes, is asked by a monk,

“What is a king’s seeking of saindhava?” [Kyō]gen says, “Pass there and come here.” The monk leaves.

[Kyō]gen says, “His stupid response [could] kill a person!”25

Now let us ask: Is the state Kyōgen expressed as “Pass there and come here” the seeking of saindhava, or is it the serving of saindhava? Try, if you will, to say something!26 Is the monk’s having left that place the state that Kyōgen sought? Is it a state that Kyōgen served? Is it what Kyōgen originally expected? If it is not what [Kyōgen] originally expected, he should not say “His stupid response could kill a person!” If it is what [Kyōgen] originally expected, it could not be a stupid response that kills a person. What Kyōgen has expressed is the total effort of his whole career; even so, he has not been able to avoid losing his body and losing his life.27 He is like the general of a defeated army still talking of his bravery. In sum, the brains and the eyes that preach the yellow28 and describe the black29 are, naturally, the painstaking and meticulous seeking and serving of saindhava. Who could claim not to understand the taking up of a staff or the holding up of a fly whisk? At the same time, [the seeking and serving of saindhava] are not the state of people who play stringed instruments with the bridges glued.30 Because these people do not know that they are playing stringed instru ments with the bridges glued, they are not in the state.

[248] The World-honored One, one day, ascends the seat [of preaching]. Mañjuśrī claps the sounding block31 and says, “When we see into the Dharma of the Dharma King, the Dharma of the Dharma King is like this.” The World-honored One descends from the seat. Jūken, Zen Master Myōkaku32 of Setchōzan, says:

An excellent practitioner among the forest’s sacred ranks,33

Knows that the Dharma edict of the Dharma King is not like that. If any in the assembly is an exponent of saindhava, Why does Mañjuśrī need to deliver a clap?

So what Setchō says is this: if one clap is flawlessness through the whole body,34 to have delivered it and not to have delivered it both may be

Chapter Eighty-one

the liberated state of flawlessness. If in the state like this, one clap is sain - 271c dhava itself. And [the person] may be a person of the ineffable already; that is, “an exponent of saindhava” in sacred ranks united as one forest.35 Thus, “The Dharma of the Dharma King is like this.” To be able to use the twelve hours is to seek saindhava. To be used by the twelve hours is to seek sain dhava. We should seek a fist and should serve a fist. We should seek a fly whisk and should serve a fly whisk. Nevertheless, people in the temples of Great Song China today who call themselves veterans have never realized the state of saindhava even in a dream. How painful it is, how painful it is, that the Patriarch’s truth is going downhill.36 Do not shirk hard practice, and you will surely succeed to the lifeblood of the Buddhist Patriarch. For example, when the question “What is buddha?” is put and the answer “The mind here and now is buddha” is given, what does that mean? Is this not sain dhava? We should painstakingly investigate who is described by “The mind here and now is buddha.” Does anyone know that it is saindhava jostling?

                                    Shōbōgenzō Ō-saku-sendaba

 Preached to the assembly at Daibutsuji in Esshū37                                     on the twenty-third day of the tenth lunar month in the third year of Kangen.38

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Notes

1     This is the first, or intellectual, phase. The second line suggests the concrete interre-This poem describes the world in which we live. The first line suggests that sometimes there are words to affirm things, and sometimes there are no words to affirm things. for support. The line can also be seen as representing the negation of words, phrases, relationship between real things—here, for example, wisteria, which relies on a tree In the third line people feed donkeys and people feed horses—suggesting action in ideas (the first phase) and passage into the area of concrete things (the second phase). fourteenth patriarch in India.and clouds are just clouds—things as they are. The poem also alludes to the philo-sophical system called daily life (the third phase). The final line suggests that in reality, water is just watershiku-funbetsu that was elucidated by Master Nāgārjuna, the

2     Sutra of the Great Demise,The Daihatsunehankyō (Sanskrit: or, more commonly, the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtraNirvana Sutra.). Sometimes known as the

3     from the Mitsugo,Daihatsunehankyō, “secret talk,” is the title of Chapter Fifty-one (Vol. III), vol. 9, the Nyorai-sho-bonsaindhava(“The Nature of the Tathāgata”with the situation that theMitsugo. Quoted) momentary.Tathāgata’s nirvana is unchanging and eternal but its manifestation is changing andchapter. The sutra compares a king’s request for

4     From the Wanshizenjigōroku.

5     Master Wanshi Shōgaku (1091–1157), successor of Master Tanka Shijun. MasterWanshi is praised, for example, in Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), Zazenshin.

6     Modern-day Ningbo, in northern Zhekiang province in east China.

7     Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan.

8     against the sternum; the right palm rests over the back of the left hand; forearms are Shashu. With the fingers of the left hand curled around the thumb, the left fist is placed held horizontal.

9     Master Setchō Jūken (980–1052), successor of Master Chimon Kōso.

10    A symbol of ineffective effort. Related passages appear in the Chinese book (Rhymes of Good Fortune).      Inzui

11    A symbol of unreasonable behavior. There was a custom at Chinese funerals of placing coins (called “money for the six realms”) in the coffin. Later the authorities

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evolved. Related passages appear in the Chinese book Underworldprohibited the burying of money, and the custom of burning imitation paper money).   Meihoki (Chronicles of the

12    Master Gutei of Mount Kinka, who was famous for his “one-finger Zen.” It is said that he answered questions by just raising one finger; see Chapter Sixty-two (Vol.III), Hensan, paragraph 66.

13    Wanshizenjigōroku.

14    practice of zazen (see Chapter Twenty-seven [Vol. II], mai.was a proponent of so-called Master Daie Sōkō (1089–1163), a successor of Master Engo Kokugon. Daie Sōkōillumination”) Zen. Sōkō himself is denigrated in Chapter Seventy-five, kōan Zen who denigrated Master Wan shi’s traditionalZazenshin) as mokushō Jishō-zan-(“silent

15    transmitted from Nangaku Ejō through Baso Dōitsu, Hyakujō Ekai, and Ōbaku KiunMaster Nangaku Ejō (677–744), successor of Master Daikan Enō. The Dharma wasto Rin zai Gigen, founder of the Rinzai sect. Daie Sōkō belonged to this lineage.

16    See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Kattō.

17    A horse, salt, water, and a pot are objective things. Seeking is the subjective function of the mind. At the place where object and subject are one, there is serving (action). 18 Master Nansen Fugan (748–834), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu.

19 was his family name before becoming a monk.Master Godai Impō (dates unknown), also a successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. “Tō” 20 chap. 8; Suggests Master Nansen’s affirmation of Master Impō’s behavior. Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 64. Keitokudentōroku,

21    See, for example, notes to Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), time, in the Chūeight (Vol. II), means “inside” (as in the story: “Inside the jar there is water.”). At the sameShōbōgenzō, chūMuchū-setsumu.sometimes means “in the state of” or “the reality of.”Busshō; Chapter Thirty-

22    Kyō-chū sui ahei, “jar.” Master Dōgen suggests that in concrete cir cumstances real things (like[ri]. This is Master Nansen’s phrase with kyō, “circumstances,” substituted water) exist.for

23    pendence of subject and object.Sui-chū kyō a[ri]. Dōgen’s characteristic reversal of elements suggests the interde -

24    is his posthumous title.Master Kyōgen Chikan (d. 898), successor of Master Isan Reiyū. Great Master Shūtō

25    Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record), no. 92.

26    Kokoromi[ni] ko[u] i[e] mi[n] is a more polite version of the phrase kokoromi[ni] i[e]

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make the sentence more polite.Soshi-sairai-no-i. Komi[n], which is discussed in the notes at the end of Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III),[u], which literally means to request or to invite, is added to

27    defeated. At the same time, it suggests that, looking at the monk’s behavior, MasterSōshin-shitsumei, “losing body and losing life,” suggests that Master Kyōgen was

Kyōgen came back to reality.

28    “yellow,” suggests the color of the earth in China, and thus alludes to somethingOurealistic or down to earth.[o] to[ku], “preaching the yellow,” means manifesting the Buddhist state. Ou,

29    Koku [“black,” means the misconceptions, wrong views, and bad habits that Buddhisto] i[u], “describing the black,” suggests the behavior of Buddhist patriarchs. patriarchs by skillful means bring to the attention of their students. Koku,

30    Playing a koto with its bridges glued symbolizes blind adherence to fixed ideas or Alludes to the movable bridges positioned under the strings of a koto, Japanese harp. needs. Rules, inflexibility, and corresponding lack of sensitivity to actual conditions or real

31    The make conspicuous, to sound. is an octagonal wooden pillar usually three or four feet high. Byaku-tsui. Byakutsui, or clapper, is a small wooden block used as a mallet to strike the literally means “white,” but here it is used as a verb meaning to Tsui stands for tsui-chin, “clapper and sounding block.”Byaku-tsuichin, means to which attract everyone’s attention by striking the sounding block.

32    Master Setchō Jūken (see note 9). Zen Master Myōkaku is his posthumous title.

33    where many Buddhist practitioners are sitting in rows. Resshō-sō-chū, lit., “inside a thicket of lines of the sacred,” means in a monas stands for sōrin, lit., “thicket are gathered for Buddhist practice. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.forest,” from the Sanskrit piṇḍavana, which means a place where many practitioners

34    Konshin-muku, literally, “the whole body without holes.”

35    Resshō-issō.for Master Setchō’s intention may have been to eliminate any sense of disjuncture conveyed by the phraseresshō, “ranks of the sacred.” Master Dōgen substituted sō-chū, lit., “inside a thicket” or “in a monastery.” Master Dōgen’sissō, lit., “one thicket” or “the whole monastery,”

36    Tendō in Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), Ku [naruSodō-ryōi,] kana ku “the decline of the Patriarch’s truth,” is a phrase used by Master[naru] kana, sodō-ryōiShisho, paragraph 21.looks like the words of Master Tendō

Nyojō.

37    boundary of a country. Master Dōgen seems to use the two terms interchangeably. Fukui prefecture. Esshū is another name for Etsu-u, the ancient district corresponding to present-dayShū means state or district and u means 1) sky or roof, and 2) the

38    1245.

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[Chapter Eighty-two] Ji-kuin-mon

Sentences to Be Shown in the Kitchen Hall

Translator’s Note: Ji means “to show,” kuin means the kitchen hall of a temple, and mon means “sentences.” So ji-kuin-mon means “sentences to be shown in the kitchen hall.” This chapter was not originally included in the Shōbōgenzō, but when Master Hangyō Kōzen edited the ninety-five–chapter edition in 1690, he included this chapter along with Bendōwa (Chapter One, Vol. I) and Jū-undō-shiki (Chapter Five, Vol. I). Master Dōgen placed great value on the activity of cooking in Buddhist temple life, and wrote his views down in a book called Tenzokyōkun (Instructions for the Cook). The reason that he wrote the book, and the reason he revered the activity of cooking in the temple, originates with his experiences in China. Just after arriving in China, he met an old monk who took pride in being the cook in his temple, and who explained to Master Dōgen that cooking is Buddhist practice itself. Later, Master Dōgen came across another old monk who was diligently drying seaweed for the monks’ meals, and he realized how important is the activity of cooking meals for the practitioners in the temple.

[3] On the sixth day of the eighth lunar month in the fourth year of Kangen1 I preached to the assembly as follows:

In preparing meals for the sangha, To do so with reverence is fundamental.

During the authentic transmission of the Dharma from the distant land of India and the authentic transmission of the Dharma from the near nation of China, since the Tathāgata’s passing, gods have served to the Buddha and the sangha heavenly offerings, and kings have served to the Buddha and the sangha offerings of royal fare. In addition, [meals] were offered from the

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272a homes of wealthy people and householders, and offered from the homes of vaiśyas and śūdras.2 Acts of reverence, in each such instance of serving offerings, are polite and sincere. Beings in the heavens above and in the human world, by employing the most respectful courtesies and by showing their reverence with the most honorific words, are well able to make preparations for the service of meals and other offerings. This has profound meaning. Now, even though we are deep in remote mountains, we should directly receive the authentic transmission of the polite manners and words of a temple kitchen.3 This, in the heavens above or in the human world, is to learn the Buddha-Dharma.

[5] For instance, call gruel4 “honorable gruel” or call it “morning gruel”; do not call it [just] gruel. Call lunch “the honorable midday meal” or call it “lunchtime”; do not call it [just] lunch. Say “would you make the rice white?”; do not say “pound the rice!” In regard to washing rice, say “would you cleanse the rice?”; do not say “dunk the rice!” Say “please choose some ingredients for the honorable side dish”;5 do not say “choose some vegetables!” Say “would you prepare some honorable soup?”; do not say “boil the soup!” Say “would you prepare some honorable broth?”; do not say “make the broth!” Say that “the honorable lunchtime rice” or “the honorable morning gruel” has been “cooked nicely.” Treat with such respect all utensils containing rice and gruel. Disrespect invites misfortune and mistakes; it never has good effects. While the midday meal or the morning gruel is being prepared, people must not breathe on the rice, on the side dish, or on any other item. Do not touch even dried items with a sleeve of your gown. If a hand has touched head or face do not, before washing, touch with the hand any malware or the meals6 themselves. If you scratch an itchy part of the body at any time during the preparation—from sorting the rice to cooking the rice and making the soup—be sure to wash the hand. At places where the meals are prepared, we may recite lines of Buddhist sutras and words of the ancestral masters, but do not speak worldly words or dirty talk. In general, use the polite form to describe the presence of rice, vegetables, salt, soy sauce, and the various other items. Do not say [in the plain form] “there is rice” or “there are vegetables.” When monks and novices pass by a place where the midday meal or morning gruel are present, they should join hands and bow the head. Spilled vegetables, spilled rice, and so on should be put to use7 after the meal. As

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long as a meal is unfinished, do not violate [this rule]. Kindly protect and care for the utensils used in preparing the meals; and do not use them for other purposes. Do not let them be touched by the hand of anyone who has come from lay society and who has not yet washed the hands. Vegetables, fruit, and so on that have come from laypeople and that have yet to be purified should be rinsed, incensed, and exposed to fire, and then offered to the Three Treasures and to the monks of the sangha. In the mountains and temples of Great Song China today, dumplings, dairy cakes, steamed cakes, and so on that have come from laypeople are re-steamed before being served to the monks. This purifies them. They are not served without being steamed.

[8] These items are just a few among many. Understand their gist, venerable cooks of the kitchen hall,8 and put them into practice. In all your myriad duties, never violate the standard.

Each of the aforementioned articles,

Is the lifeblood of the Buddhist patriarchs, And the Eye of a patch-robed monk.

               Non-Buddhists have never known them,                                                       

Heavenly demons cannot abide them:

Only disciples of the Buddha Are able to receive their transmission.

Main officers of the kitchen hall!

Understand them and do not forget them.9

                                    Displayed10 by the founding monk, Dōgen.

[9] [The Master of] Eiheiji, Now addresses the main officers: Henceforth,

If it is already past noon,

When a dānapati11 offers cooked rice, It will be kept for the next day.

[But] if [the offering] is cakes, fruit, Or any kind of gruel or suchlike,

Even in the evening, let us eat it.12

It is the “medicine”13 of the orders of Buddhist patriarchs.

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Moreover, it is an excellent trace of those in Great Song China Who possessed the state of truth. The Tathāgata permitted underclothes for monks in snowy mountains.

On this mountain we too permit medicine during the season of snow.14

                                    The founder of Eiheiji,

                                    Kigen (his seal)15

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Notes

1     1246.

2     Vaiśyaand fourth of the four classes in the Indian caste system.s are workers or peasants; śūdras are servants or slaves. These are the third

3     says that the Buddhist layman Vimalakīrti obtained food from a Tathāgata called Fra-grance Accumulation (Kōshaku) with which to serve the sangha.Kōshaku-kyoku, literally, “Fragrance Accumulation’s office.” The Vimalakīrti Sutra

4     Gruel and breakfast were synonymous.

5     “Side dish” is bowl of rice or gruel, a medium bowl of miso soup, a small bowl of pickles, and onewhich means a side dish. A standard meal in a Japanese temple consists of a largesai, literally, “vegetables.” In this case the character suggests sōzai, or two side dishes (usually vegetables, an egg, tofu, etc.).

6     “Meals” is sai-shuku, literally, “midday meal and [morning] gruel.” These were the only two meals.

7     For example, to feed domestic animals.

8     Ku-in kōshaku, literally, “Kōshakus of the kitchen hall.” See note 3.

9     This paragraph (in the style of a gāthā, four-line verse) is written in Chinese characters only but it was almost certainly written by Master Dōgen himself.

10    the form of a notice to be read by monks of the kitchen hall.Ji, shimeand is translated as “preached [to the assembly. . . ].” But this chapter was written in[su], lit., “to show,” appears in the concluding sentence of most chapters,

11    A donor.

12    meal.In Buddhist monasteries in hot countries it is often forbidden to eat after the midday

13    that had the same warming effect. But this interpretation is open to doubt. A simpler warm, monks sometimes wrapped up a heated stone and kept it by their lower Yaku-seki, literally, “medicine stone.” One traditional interpretation is that, to keepseki refers to the stone needle used in acupuncture treatment andyaku-seki, and the same name was given to a supper abdomen. The stone was called

explanation is that thus yaku-seki is a single concept: “medicine.” In relatively cold countries like China

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meals “medicine. “and Japan Buddhist monks ate meals in the evening, and they called these evening

14    Master Dōgen also wrote these sentences in Chinese characters, but they are separated from the preceding gāthā in the source text. 15 Kigen is one of Master Dōgen’s names. Master Dōgen signed the name “Kigen” and

stamped his seal next to it.

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[Chapter Eighty-three]

Shukke

Leaving Family Life

Translator’s Note: It was the custom in ancient India for people who wanted to pursue the truth to leave their family, and this custom was retained in Buddhist orders. It is said that Gautama Buddha first left his family life and began the life of a monk when he was twenty-nine years old. For this reason, Buddhist orders revere the tradition of transcending family life in pursuit of the truth, and Master Dōgen explains the custom in this chapter.

[12] The Zen’enshingi1 says:

The buddhas of the three times all say that to leave family life2 is to realize the truth. The twenty-eight patriarchs in India and the six patriarchs in Tang China3 who transmitted the buddha-mind–seal were all śramaṇas.4 Perhaps it was by strictly observing the Vinaya5 that they were able to become universal models for the triple world. Therefore, in practicing [za]zen and inquiring into the truth, the precepts are foremost. Without having departed from excess and guarded against wrong, how is it possible to realize the state of buddha and to become a patriarch? The method of receiving the precepts is [as follows]: The three robes6 and pātra7 must be provided, together with new and clean clothes. If you have no new clothes, wash [old clothes] clean. Never borrow robes and pātra to go onto the platform and receive the precepts. Concentrate wholeheartedly and be careful not to go against circumstances. To assume the form of the Buddha, to come into possession of the Buddha’s precepts, to get what the Buddha received and used: these are not small matters. How could they be treated lightly? If we were to borrow robes and pātra, even if we mounted the platform and received the precepts we would not get the precepts at all. Unless we

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received [the precepts] again, we would be people without precepts throughout our life, fraternizing without reason in the lineage of emptiness, and accepting devout offerings in vain. Beginners in the truth have not yet memorized the Dharma precepts; it is masters, by not saying anything, who cause people to fall into this [wrongness]. Now I have spoken a stern exhortation. I dare to hope that you will engrave

it on your hearts. If you have already received the śrāvaka precepts8 you should receive the bodhisattva precepts. This is the first sign of having entered the Dharma.

[14]  Clearly know, the buddhas’ and the patriarchs’ realization of the truth is nothing other than their leaving family life and receiving the precepts. The lifeblood of the buddhas and the patriarchs is nothing other than their leaving family life and receiving the precepts. Someone who has not left family life is never a Buddhist patriarch. To see the buddhas and to see the patriarchs is to leave family life and to receive the precepts.

[15]  Mahākāśyapa,9 following the World-honored One, seeks to leave family life and desires to deliver all things. The Buddha says, “Welcome, bhikṣu!” [Mahākāśyapa’s] hair and beard fall off by themselves, and a kaṣāya covers his body.10

When [a person] follows the Buddha and becomes free of all things, the excellent example of leaving family life and receiving the precepts is, in every case, like this one.

[15] The Great Prajñā Sutra,11 fascicle 3, says:

The World-honored Buddha said, “If a bodhisattva mahāsattva thinks, “At some time, I will relinquish a throne and leave family life, on which day I will realize the supreme, right, and balanced state of bodhi; also on that day, I will turn the wonderful wheel of Dharma, causing countless, innumerable sentient beings to depart from dust and leave dirt, and causing them to have the pure Dharma-eye; at the same time, I will cause countless, innumerable sentient beings to end forever all excesses, and to liberate their mind and intuition; further, I will cause countless, innumerable sentient beings all to attain the state of not regressing or straying from the supreme, right, and balanced state of

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bodhi,” [then] this bodhisattva mahāsattva who wants to realize those things should learn the prajñāpāramitā.”12

[16] In sum, the supreme state of bodhi is perfectly satisfied at the time of leaving family life and receiving the precepts. It never becomes perfect on a day other than the day of leaving family life. That being so, by bringing in the day of leaving family life, we actualize a day of realizing the supreme state of bodhi. And that which brings forth the day of realizing the supreme state of bodhi is a day of leaving family life. This leaving family life, which is to somersault, is the turning of the splendid Dharma wheel. This leaving family life itself causes innumerable sentient beings not to regress or to stray from the supreme state of bodhi. Remember, the situation in which self benefit and benefiting others become perfectly satisfied at this concrete place, and there is neither regression nor straying from anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, is the leaving of family life and receiving of the precepts. Realizing the 273b supreme state of bodhi, conversely, makes the day of leaving family life realize bodhi. Remember, in truth, that the day of leaving family life is beyond unity and difference. On the day we leave family life, we practice and experience three asaṃkhya kalpas. On the day we leave family life, we abide in the ocean of infinite kalpas and turn the splendid wheel of Dharma. The day of leaving family life is beyond the time of “meal time,”13 is beyond sixty minor kalpas, has transcended the three times, and has gotten free from the brain. The day of leaving family life has transcended already the day of leaving family life. And though this may be so, when nets and cages are broken open, the day of leaving family life is just the day of leaving family life, and the day of realizing the truth is just the day of realizing the truth. [18] The Great Commentary,14 number 13, says:

The Buddha is at Jetavana Park. A drunken brahman comes to the Buddha’s place, wanting to become a bhikṣu. The Buddha instructs the other bhikṣus to give [the brahman] a shaved head and to put a kaṣāya on him. When he sobers up, [the brahman] is astonished and bewildered to see that his form has suddenly changed into that of a bhikṣu, and he runs away at once. The other bhikṣus ask the Buddha, “Why did you permit the drunken brahman to become a bhikṣu, only now to go back [home]?” The Buddha says, “This brahman for countless

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eons was without the will to leave family life. Now, as a result of getting drunk, he has momentarily established a bit of the will. Because of this circumstance, he will leave family life in the future.” There are many kinds of stories like this one. Breaking of the precepts having left family life is better than keeping the precepts as a layperson, because with the precepts of a layperson we do not realize liberation.15

[20]     The point of the Buddha’s instruction is clear. In the Buddha’s teaching just to leave family life is fundamental, and that which has not left family life is not the Buddha-Dharma. While the Tathāgata was in the world, when various non-Buddhists devoted themselves to the Buddha-Dharma, having discarded their own false ways, they always requested at the outset to leave family life. Either the World-honored One himself graciously offered the words “Welcome bhikṣu!” or he instructed the other bhikṣus to shave [the newcomer’s] hair and beard and cause [the newcomer] to leave family life and receive the precepts. In each case, the means for leaving family life and receiving the precepts were provided at once. Remember, when the Buddha’s teaching has already covered body and mind, hair naturally falls from the head and a kaṣāya clothes the body. Without the consent of the buddhas, hair and beard are not shaved off, the kaṣāya does not clothe the body, and the Buddhist precepts are impossible to receive. In sum, to leave family life and receive the precepts is [to experience] the personal affirmation of the buddhatathāgatas.

[21]     Śākyamuni Buddha says:

“Good sons! Seeing living beings who take pleasure in small things, whose virtue is scant and whose filthiness is accumulated, the Tathāgata to these people states, ‘In my youth I left family life and attained anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.’ And since I actually realized [the state of] buddha, [my] eternity has been such as it is. Only to teach and transform living beings, by expedient means, so that they will enter the Buddhist truth, do I make statements like this.”16

Thus, realization of the eternal is “In my youth I left family life.” Anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi is “In my youth I left family life.” When [the Buddha] describes that “In my youth I left family life,” living beings who, with scant

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virtue and accumulated filthiness, take pleasure in small things, also realize “In my youth I [will] leave family life.” At any place where we see, hear, and learn in practice the Dharma preaching that “In my youth I left family life,” we meet the Buddha’s state of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. When [the Buddha] delivers living beings who are taking pleasure in small things, to these people he states, “In my youth I left family life and attained anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.” Though I have described it like this, someone might ask, in conclusion, “How important is the virtue of leaving family life?” I would

say to that person, “As important as your head!”

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shukke

                                    Preached to the assembly at Eiheiji in Fukui                                     prefecture on the fifteenth day of the ninth                                     lunar month in the fourth year of Kangen.17

 

Notes

1         The by Master Chōrō Sōsaku in 1103. This quotation from the first fascicle also appears Zen’enshingi (Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries Shukke-kudoku; Chapter Ninety-four, ) is a ten-fascicle text compiled Jukai. in Chapter Eighty-six,

2         he strongly affirms the forms of a Buddhist monk. As a noun, assume the forms of a Buddhist monk. In the laypeople’s pursuit of the Buddhist truth (which cannot begin without discarding the Shukke suru, scend the values of secular society; and 2) concretely to leave family life, that is, tolit., “to leave home,” means: 1) to transcend family life, that is, to tran-Shōbōgenzō, Jū-undō-shiki Master Dōgen affirms shukke); at the same time, means “one will to fame and gain—see Chapter Five [Vol. I], who has left home,” that is, a monk.

3         masters of successive generations.” The original text may have been abbreviated or the version in Chapter Ninety-four, Jukai, abbreviates the subject to “the ancestral from memory. expanded during copying in China. It is also possible that Master Dōgen was quoting

4         Buddhist monks.

5         The rules of discipline, or precepts.

6         (KaṣāyaVol. I), s of five stripes, seven stripes, and nine or more stripes. See Chapter Twelve Kesa-kudoku.

7         The Buddhist alms bowl. See Chapter Seventy-eight, Hatsu-u.

8         Suggests precepts taken by Hinayana Buddhists (of which there are two hundred and bodhisattva precepts (explained in Chapter Ninety-four, fifty for monks and three hundred and forty-eight for nuns), as opposed to the sixteen Ukai). 9 Master Mahākāśyapa, the Buddha’s successor and the first patriarch in India.

10    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 1.

11    In Sanskrit, Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra.

12    This paragraph is also quoted in Chapter Eighty-six, Shukke-kudoku.

13    Literally, “is beyond being called ‘like meal time.’”

14    Dairon stands for Daichidoron, lit., “Discussion of the Accomplishment that is Great

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Nāgārjuna.topadeśa, Wisdom,” the Chinese translation by Kumārajīva of the a commentary on the Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra,Mahāprajñāpārami-attributed to Master

15    Shukke-kudoku. A slightly different version of this paragraph is quoted in Chapter Eighty-six,

16    Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō (“The Tathāgata’s Lifetime”). See LS 3.16.

17    1246.

[Chapter Eighty-four]

                                                    Sanji-no-gō                                       

Karma in Three Times

Translator’s Note: San means “three,” ji means “time,” and means “conduct.” In this chapter, sanji means three kinds of time lag and refers to both conduct and its effect.1 Belief in cause and effect forms a central part of Buddhist philosophy. This is the reason why Master Dōgen wrote the chapter of the Shōbōgenzō titled Shinjin-inga (Chapter Eighty-nine), or “Deep Belief in Cause and Effect.” He insisted that all things and phenomena in the universe are governed by the law of cause and effect, perfectly and without any exception. In accord with this theory, we should deny the existence of indeterminate events. But in our daily life it often seems that such accidents happen. So if Buddhism insists that the law of cause and effect is all-encompassing, it is necessary to explain the apparent existence of accidents. Buddhism explains these apparent accidents with the theory that there are three kinds of time lag between our conduct and the effect of our conduct. The effect of an action sometimes manifests itself at once, sometimes after a short time, and sometimes after a very long time. In the second and third cases, it is often difficult to believe that the whole world is governed completely by the law of cause and effect. But if we affirm that there are three kinds of time lag between conduct and its effect, we can affirm the validity of the law of cause and effect in all cases without exception. Master Dōgen explains the problem in this chapter.

[26] The nineteenth patriarch, Venerable Kumāralabdha, arrives at a country in central India, [where] a mahāsattva called Gayata2 asks, “In my family, father and mother have always believed in the Three Treasures yet they have been beset by ill health and, in general, are disappointed in all their undertakings. My neighbor’s family has long done the work of caṇḍālas,3 yet their bodies are always in sound health and

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their doings harmoniously combine. What is their good fortune? And what is our guilt?” The Venerable One says, “How could there be room for doubt? In short, retribution for good and bad has three times. Generally, people only see that to the good [comes] early death; to the violent, long life; to the evil, fortune; and to the righteous, calamity; whereupon [people] say that there is no cause and effect and no wrongness or happiness. Particularly, they do not know that shadow and sound accord with [their sources], not differing by a thousandth or a hundredth and—even with the passing of a hundred thousand myriad kalpas— never wearing away.”4 Then Gayata, having heard these words, at once relinquishes doubt.5

[28] Venerable Kumāralabdha is, from the Tathāgata, the nineteenthrecipient of the Dharma. The Tathāgata personally recorded his name. [Kumāralabdha] not only clarified and authentically received the Dharma of the one Buddha Śākyamuni; he also clearly realized the Dharma of all the buddhas of the three ages.6 Venerable Gayata, after asking the present question, practiced and learned the Tathāgata’s right Dharma following Venerable Kumāralabdha, and eventually became the twentieth ancestral master. In this case also, the World-honored One, from afar, had recorded that the twentieth patriarch would be Gayata. That being so, above all, we should learn the criteria of the Buddha-Dharma as thus decided by the ancestral masters. We should not mix with people of false views7 in the world today who neither know cause and effect, nor understand karmic retribution, nor know the three ages, nor distinguish between good and bad.8

[29] These words “Retribution for good and bad has three times” mean

1) “retribution is received in the immediate present”; 2) “it is received in one’s next life”; 3) “it is received latterly.”9 These are called “the three times.” In practicing and learning the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, from the very beginning we study and clarify this principle of karmic retribution in three times. Because they are not like that, many make mistakes and fall into the false view. Not only do they fall into the false view; they [also] fall into bad states10 and experience long periods of suffering. While they are failing to continue good roots, they lose much merit and the way to bodhi is long obstructed. Is it not regrettable? This karma in the three times covers [both] good and bad.

[30] 1) Karma in which retribution is received in the immediate present: If, in this life, we produce and promote karma, and in this life we receive differently matured effects,11 this is called “karma in which retribution is received in the immediate present.”

That is to say, a person doing in this life either good or bad and then receiving in this life the corresponding retribution is called “karma in which retribution is received in the immediate present.”

[31] An example of doing bad and receiving in this life bad retribution: Once there was a woodcutter who went into the mountains and lost his way in the snow. The time was approaching dusk; the snow was deep and the cold was freezing: [the woodcutter] would be dead before long. Then he advanced into a dense wood whereupon he saw, already there in the wood, a bear whose body color was deep blue and whose eyes were like two torches. The man was scared half to death. [But] this was really a bodhisattva who had for the present received a bear’s body. Seeing the [woodcutter’s] distress and fear, [the bear] soothed and admonished him, saying, “Now you must not be afraid. A father and mother sometimes are treacherous to a child, [but] I now am completely without ill will toward you.” Then it stepped forward, lifted up [the woodcutter], and carried him into a cave to warm his body. After letting him recuperate, it picked various roots and fruits and encouraged him to eat what he liked, and, afraid lest [the woodcutter’s] coldness would not thaw, it hugged and lay [with him]. It thus tenderly nursed him for six days, until, on the seventh day, the weather cleared and the path became visible. The man had the will to return. The bear, having 274c recognized [this] already, again picked sweet fruits and served these [to the man] until he was satisfied. It escorted him out of the woods and politely bade him farewell. The man dropped to his knees and said in thanks: “How can I repay your kindness?” The bear said, “Now I want no other reward: I only hope that just as, in recent days, I have protected your body, you would act likewise toward my life.” The man respectfully assented and, carrying his wood, he descended the mountain. He met two hunters, who asked him, “What kinds of creatures have you seen in the mountains?” The woodcutter replied, “I have not

seen any other beast at all; I have only seen one bear.” The hunters begged him, “Can you show us, or not?” The woodcutter answered, “If you can give me a share of two-thirds, I will show you.” The hunters thereupon agreed and together they set off. At length they slew the bear and divided its flesh into three. As the woodcutter, with both hands, went to take the bear meat, through the force of his bad karma both arms dropped off—like pearls on a string that is cut, or like chopped lotus roots. The hunters were alarmed [by this] and in astonishment they asked the reason [for it]. The woodcutter, ashamed, related the plot in detail. These two hunters berated the woodcutter, saying, “The other already had for you this great benevolence! How could you have carried out now such evil treachery? It is a wonder that your body has not rotted!” At this, [the woodcutter] and the hunters together took the meat to donate to a saṃghārāma. Then an elder12 among the monks, who had got the fine wisdom [to know others’] wishes, immediately entered into the immovable state [of zazen] and reflected what kind of meat this was. Thereupon he knew that this was the flesh of a great bodhisattva who had produced benefit and joy for all living beings. At length, he left nonmovement and told the monks of this matter. The monks were shocked to hear it. Together, they gathered fragrant firewood to cremate the flesh, collected the remaining bones, erected a stupa, performed prostrations, and served offerings. Bad karma like this must—whether it waits for continuance or skips continuance— inevitably suffer its effect.13

[34]  Such is called “karma in which retribution for bad conduct is received in the immediate present.” As a general rule, when we receive kindness, we should intend to repay it. In being kind to others, [however,] do not seek reward. One who would bring treachery and harm upon a kind person, as in the present [story], will inevitably suffer the corresponding bad karma. May living beings never have the mind of this woodcutter! Out of the woods,

when bidding [the bear] farewell, he says “How can I repay this kindness?” Yet at the foot of the mountain, when he meets the hunters, he greedily seeks two-thirds of the meat and, led by avarice, he slays that [which showed him] great kindness. May laypeople and those who have left home never have this

mind that does not know kindness! Cutting by the force of bad karma, when it severs both hands, is faster than the cutting of a sword.

[35]  An example of doing good in this life and—with retribution being

received in the immediate present—getting a good reward:

Once upon a time, King Kaniṣka of the country of Gandhāra14 retained an androgyne who always supervised internal court affairs. On a temporary excursion beyond the city [walls],15 he saw a herd of bulls, fully five hundred in number, being led into the city. He asked the herder, “What kind of bulls are these?” [The herder] replied, “These bulls are going to be castrated.” At this, the androgyne immediately thought to himself, “I, through long-held karma, have received an emasculate body. Now I shall use my wealth to rescue these bulls from [that] hardship.” Eventually he paid their price and had them all set free. Through the force of good karma, this androgyne was caused at once to recover a male body. He profoundly rejoiced. Then he went back into the city and, standing still at the palace gate, he sent a messenger to inform the king that he wished to enter for an audience. The king summoned him to enter and asked in wonder for an explanation. Thereupon the Andro gene related the aforementioned episode in detail. The king, on hearing of it, was surprised and delighted. He generously bestowed precious treasures, promoted [the androgyne] to high office, and put him in charge of external affairs. Good karma like this must—whether it waits for continuance or skips continuance—inevitably receive its effect.16

[37]       Clearly, though the bodies of bulls and animals are not to be treasured, a person who saves them will receive good effects. How much more, by honoring the field of the kind and honoring the field of the virtuous,17 will we enact many kinds of good! Such is called “karma in which reward for good conduct is received in the immediate present.” There are many episodes like these, arising from good and from bad, but there is not time to quote them all.

[38]       2) Karma that receives [retribution] in the next life: If, in this life, 275b we produce and promote karma, and in a second life we receive differently matured effects, this is called “karma that receives [retribution] in the next life.”

That is to say, if people have committed in this life the five actions [leading to] incessant [hell],18 they will inevitably fall into hell in their next life. “The next life” means the life following this life. For lesser sins, there are those who fall into hell in their next life, and there are also those who, because they have deserved the influence of latterly received [karma], do not fall into hell in the next life; [their karma] becomes karma of latter [retribution]. [But] for these five actions [leading to] incessant [hell], we invariably fall into hell with karma that receives [retribution] in the next life. “The next life” is also called “a second life.” The five actions [leading to] incessant [hell] are “1) to kill one’s father, 2) to kill one’s mother, 3) to kill an arhat, 4) to cause the Buddha’s body to bleed, and 5) to disrupt the sangha of the Dharma wheel.”19 These are called “the five actions [leading to] incessant [hell],” and also called “the five grave sins.” The first three are killing, and the fourth is conduct that applies to killing. There is no way for the Tathāgata to be killed by a person; only to cause his body to bleed is considered a deadly [sin]. Those who are not subject to early death are: “bodhisattvas in their last body, bodhisattvas obstructed by one life in Tuṣita Heaven,20 [the heavenly beings of] the northern continent,21 Jyotiṣka,22 and the Buddha’s doctor.”23 Number five, the sin of disrupting the sangha, is false and deceitful words. For these five deadly [sins] inevitably, with karma that receives [retribution] in the next life, we fall into hell. Devadatta24 committed three of these five actions [leading to] incessant [hell]. That is to say, he killed the bhikṣuṇī Utpalavarṇā,25 and this bhikṣuṇī was a great arhat. This is seen as his killing of an arhat. He attempted to kill the World-honored One by hurling a great boulder; the boulder then was blocked and shattered by a mountain god [but] a splinter flew off and struck the Tathāgata’s toes. The toes were broken and naturally bled.

This was the sin of causing the Buddha’s body to bleed. [Devadatta] exhorted

      five hundred novices and foolish bhikṣus to go [with him] to the peak of Mount Gayā,26 [where] he established separate practices. This was the sin of disrupting the sangha. As a result of these three grave sins, he fell into Avīci Hell. Today he is suffering incessant pain; even Devadatta, who was [formerly like] the four buddhas,27 remains in Avīci. The bhikṣu Kokālika,28 in order to slander Śāriputra and Maudgalyāyana29 in this life, groundlessly invoked the pārājika rule.30 The World-honored One himself cautioned against it, and King Brahmā came down to prevent it, but [Kokālika] did not stop;

he slandered the two venerable ones and fell into hell. When the bhikṣu [who mistook] the fourth dhyāna31 confronted the end of his life, he fell into Avīci Hell as a result of slandering the Buddha. Such is called “karma that receives [retribution] in the next life.”

[42] 3) Karma that receives [retribution] latterly: If, in this life, we produce and promote karma, and consequently in a third life, or even hundred thousands of kalpas beyond that, we receive differently matured effects, this is called “karma that receives [retribution] latterly.”

That is to say, if people, having committed in this life either good or bad, feel the effect of good or bad karma in a third life or in a fourth life or even after hundred thousands of lives, this is called “karma that receives [retribution] latterly.” Most of a bodhisattva’s three asaṃkhya kalpas32 of virtue is “karma that receives [retribution] latterly.” Without knowing such truths as this, practitioners often harbor doubt—as Venerable Gayata does when he is a layman, in the present [story]. If he had not met Venerable Kumāra labdha, it might have been difficult for him to resolve that doubt. When a practitioner’s consideration is good, bad immediately ceases. When consideration is bad, good instantly ceases.

[44] In the country of Śrāvastī33 once upon a time there lived two people, one who always practiced good, and another who always committed bad. The one who practiced good deeds had always practiced good deeds throughout his life and had never committed bad. The one 276a who committed bad deeds had constantly committed bad deeds throughout his life and had never practiced good. When the one who practiced good deeds came to the end of his life, through the influence of bad karma that receives [retribution] latterly, a middle existence34 in hell suddenly appeared before him. Then he thought, “Throughout my life I have always practiced good deeds and have never committed bad. I should be born in a heaven realm. What reason is there for this middle existence to appear before me?” Eventually the following thought arose: “I surely must have bad karma which is receiving [retribution] latterly. Because [bad karma] is now maturing, this middle existence in hell has appeared before me.” Then he remembered the good actions he had practiced through his life and he profoundly rejoiced. Because of his manifestation of [this] excellent consideration, the middle existence in hell disappeared at once and a middle existence in a heaven realm suddenly appeared before him. After this, when his life ended, he was born in the heavens above.35

[45] This person who has always practiced good deeds not only considers“[Karma] that latterly receives [retribution] is present in my own body, which must inevitably suffer [retribution]”; he also considers further “For the good I have practiced throughout my life, also, I will surely receive [retribution] in future.” This is the reason that he profoundly rejoices. Because this notion is true, the middle existence in hell immediately disappears, a middle existence in a heaven realm suddenly appears before him, and, when his life is over, he is born in the heavens above. If this person were a bad person, when his life ended and a middle existence in hell appeared before him he would think, “My practice of good throughout my life has been without merit. If good and bad exist, how could I be looking at a middle existence in hell?” At this time he would negate cause and effect and slander the Three Treasures. If he were like that, his life would end at once and he would fall into hell. Because he is not like that, he is born in the heavens above. We should clarify and know this truth.

[46] When the one who committed bad deeds came to the end of his

life, through the influence of good karma that latterly receives [retribution], a middle existence in a heaven realm suddenly appeared before him. Then he thought, “Throughout my life I have constantly committed bad deeds and have never practiced good. I deserve to be born in hell. What reason is there for this middle existence to appear before me?” At length, the false view arose: he negated good and bad and different maturation of effects. Through the influence of the false view, the middle existence in a heaven realm disappeared at once and a middle existence in hell suddenly appeared before him. After this, when his life ended, he was born in hell.36

[47] This person, as long as he has lived, has constantly committed bad and has never practiced a single act of good. Not only that: when his life ends and he sees a middle existence in a heaven realm appear before him, he does not recognize it as [karma] that latterly receives [retribution, and so he thinks] “All my life I have committed bad but I am going to be born in a heaven realm. Clearly, there was no good and bad at all.” Through the influence of the false view which negates good and bad like this, the middle existence in a heaven realm suddenly vanishes, a middle existence in hell instantly appears before him, and when his life is over he falls into hell. Thus, it was because of the false view that the middle existence in a heaven realm disappeared. Therefore, practitioners, you must never take the false view! Learn, until you use up your body, what is the false view and what is the right view. To begin with, negation of cause and effect, slandering of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, and negation of the three ages37 and of liberation, are all the false view. Remember, our body in this life is not two and not three. If we idly fell into the false view and experienced, to no avail, the effects of bad karma, would that not be regrettable? When, while committing bad, we think that it is not bad, just because we wrongly consider that there will be no bad retribution, this does not mean that we will not experience the bad retribution.

[49] Court Priest38 Kōgetsu asks Master Chōsha [Kei]shin,39 “A past master has said, ‘After we have understood, karmic hindrances are 276c originally void. Before we have understood, we must atone for longheld debts.’ How is it possible that ones such as Venerable Siṃha40 and Great Master the Second Patriarch41 atoned for their debts [so] completely?”

Chōsha says, ‘“Virtuous One! You do not know the original void.”

The other says, “What is the original void?”

Chōsha says, “Karmic hindrances themselves.”

[Kōgetsu] asks again, “What are karmic hindrances?” Chōsha says, “The original void itself.” Kōgetsu is wordless.

Chōsha then teaches him with the following verse:

Supposed existence is fundamentally different from existence.

Termination of the supposed also is different from nonexistence.

The meaning of “nirvana is atonement”

Is that the one essential state is utterly without discrimination.42

[50] Chōsha’s answer is no answer.43 It does not possess the truth that Kumāralabdha teaches to Gayata. We should recognize that [Master Chōsha] does not know the principle of karmic hindrances. When descendants of the Buddhist patriarchs pursue the truth through practice and experience, they must first unfailingly clarify and know, in the manner of Venerable Kumāra- labdha, this karma in three times. This [effort] is, already, the action of the ancestral patriarchs; we should not cease or neglect it. Besides this [karma in three times], there is indefinite karma,44 and there are also eight kinds of karma;45 we should broadly learn them in practice. People who have not clarified this truth of karmic retribution must not randomly call themselves the guiding teachers of human beings and gods. We will inevitably experience retribution in three times for bad karma, but if we confess and repent46 that will transform a heavy [sin] and cause [retribution] to be received lightly; it will also end our wrongdoing and make us pure. Further, if we take delight in good karma, that will promote [good karma] more and more. Everything depends on whether the making of karma is black or white.47

[52] The World-honored One said, “Even with the passing of hundreds of kalpas, the karma that we make does not perish. When causes and conditions come together, effects and results are naturally received.”

“You all should know! If your actions are purely black, you will experience the maturation48 of purely black [effects]. If your actions are purely white, you will experience the maturation of purely white [effects]. If your actions are black and white, you will experience corresponding maturation of miscellaneous [effects]. For this reason, you should abandon actions that are purely black and that are a mixture of black and white. You should be diligent in practicing and learning actions that are purely white.” Then all in the great assembly, having heard the Buddha’s preaching, rejoiced and believed.49

                                 Shōbōgenzō Sanji-no-gō

Finished copying this, in the head monk’s quarters at Eiheiji, on the ninth day of the third  lunar month in the fifth year of Kenchō.50                                     Ejō

Notes

1     karma in current English usage, represents the Sanskrit karman,gō suggests not only conduct itself but also the effectswhich means action or conduct. Like the word generated by conduct. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

2     Gayata became the twentieth patriarch in India. After receiving the Dharma from Master Kumāralabdha, he lived and taught in the city of Rājagṛha.

3     Caṇḍālas are outcastes, charged with such jobs as hunting, slaughter, and execution.

4     These words are also quoted in Chapter Eighty-nine, Shinjin-inga. 5          Keitokudentōroku, chap. 2.

6     here as “three ages” in order to distinguish it from the chapter title. Sanze, usually translated as “three times” (past, present, and future), but translated Sanji, “three times,” of the

7     heresy, or atheism—the view that negates cause and effect. It is the third of the fiveJaken, “false view,” represents the Sanskrit pañca-dṛṣṭayah). See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.mithyā-dṛṣṭi, which means false doctrine, wrong views (Sanskrit:

8     period, that Mahayana Buddhism was not concerned with good and bad conduct.The belief was widespread among people of Master Dōgen’s time, in the Kamakura

9     in a better or worse world according to his or her conduct in this life. The BuddhaIn the Buddha’s time the Brahmanistic belief was widely held that a person is reborn remained in Buddhist explanations of cause and effect. At the same time, one human Six [Vol. I], that the spirit is reborn (see, for example, Chapter One [Vol. I], effect in the real world. Buddhist masters through the ages have criticized the idea used the spiritualistic idea of Brahmanism to emphasize the existence of cause and Soku-shin-ze-butsu), but expressions about past and future lives have Bendōwa; Chapter lifespan may be seen as consisting of a series of lives—as a schoolchild, trainee, worker, retiree, invalid, etc. 10 ghosts, 3) the state of animals. Akudō. San-akudō, the three evil states, are: 1) the state of hell, 2) the state of hungry 11 sizes that different effects follow from different causes. See Volume I, Glossary of Ijuku-ka, from the Sanskrit vipāka-phala (maturation of effects). I, “different,” empha-

Sanskrit Terms.

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12 Jōza, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Lit., “senior seat,” represents the Sanskrit sthavira, “elder.” See Volume I, 13 Daibibasharon said to have been compiled by Master Vasumitra, the seventh patriarch in India, in(Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra), fascicle 114. This is a commentary cooperation with five hundred arhats belonging to the Sarvāstivāda school.

14 A king called Kaniṣka is said to have established the country of Gandhāra in the first C.E. The Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary states that King or second century Kaniṣka became a great patron of Buddhism following conversion by Master mahāvibhāṣā-śāstra Aśvaghoṣa, the twelfth patriarch in India (though this raises a question as to the relative timing of the reign of King Kaniṣka and the compilation of the by the seventh patriarch Master Vasumitra). Abhidharma 15 means “castle” or “city.” Some ancient Indian cities were surrounded by fortified walls.

16    Daibibasharon, fascicle 114.

17    Alludes to shi-fukuden, “four fields of happiness”: 1) shuden, “field of the [animal]kuden, “field ofonden,

“field of the kind,” means happiness produced through repaying the kindness of one’s suffering,” means happiness produced through kindness to needy people; 3) parents; 4) the kindness of the sacred practitioners of the three vehicles. World,” means happiness produced through kindness to animals; 2) to kuden, “field of the virtuous,” means happiness produced through repaying

18    “incessant hell,” which represents the Sanskrit Avīci. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Go-mugen-gō, from the Sanskrit pañcāvīci-karmāṇi. Mugen stands for mugen-jigoku,

19    Ha-hōrin-sō,theories. Ha-katsuma-sō,“disrupting the sangha of the Dharma wheel,” means establishing wrong “disrupting the sangha of practice,” means establishing wrong practices. The sin of disrupting the sangha is divided into these two categories. 20 See, for example, Appendix III, preaching given by a bodhisattva in his last life in Tuṣita Heaven. He then descends Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon, which is based on the to earth for one last life before becoming buddha.

21 In ancient Indian cosmology, human beings live on Jambudvīpa, the continent south enly beings. of Mount Sumeru. The northern continent (Sanskrit: Uttarakuru) is inhabited by heav22 said that he was born when his mother’s body was cremated. Jyotiṣka was a wealthy man and disciple of the Buddha who lived in Rājagṛha. It is

23    by her shortly after birth, but was saved and brought up by a prince. As a young man The Buddha’s doctor was Jīvaka. He was the son of a courtesan and was abandoned a lay disciple of the Buddha. day Taxila in Pakistan). Thereafter he became the king’s physician in Rājagṛha and he studied medicine for seven years at the famous university of Takkasīla (present Chapter Eighty-four

24    the Devadatta was a cousin of the Buddha. In the Lotus Sutra, the Buddha praised him as a good friend and predicted that he would Daibadatta (“Devadatta”) chapter of in this paragraph. become a buddha. Nevertheless, Devadatta turned against the Buddha, as explained 25 See Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Kesa-kudoku, paragraph 87.

26    Short for Gayāśīrṣa. This mountain is the present-day Brahmayoni, one mile west of to have the shape of an elephant’s head. the city of Gayā, which is sixty miles southwest of Patna in Bengal. The Chinese name for the mountain is Zōzu-sen, “Elephant Head Mountain.” The peak was said

27    west of a mandala. These four buddhas attend Vairocana Buddha in the center. Used Shibutsu, “four buddhas,” are the four buddha images in the north, south, east, andshibutsu suggests Devadatta’s attitude, before he went astray,

of service to the Buddha. here as an adjective,

28    Kokālika was a disciple of Devadatta.

29    Śāriputra and Maudgalyāyana were two of the Buddha’s ten great disciples.

30    See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.A pārājika is a violation of the precepts warranting expulsion from the community.

31    Shizen-biku is the title of Chapter Ninety.

32    buddha.A bodhisattva is said to accumulate virtue for three asaṃkhya kalpas before becoming 33 Śrāvastī, the capital of Kośala, was sometimes treated as an independent country. 34 Chū-uing the soul in its middle existence between death and rebirth. See Volume I, Glossary represents the Sanskrit antarā-bhava, originally a Brahmanistic concept describe of Sanskrit Terms.

35    Daibibasharon, fascicle 69.

36    Ibid.

37    Sanze, past, present, and future. See note 6.

38    Gubuthat were devoted to Buddhist practice.is the title of a priest who served the buddha images in those rooms of a palace

39    Master Chōsha Keishin (d. 868), successor of Master Nansen Fugan.

40    the king of Kaśmīra (present-day Kashmir).Master Siṃha, the twenty-fourth patriarch in India, is said to have been executed by

41    Master Taiso Eka. He also is said to have been killed. 42 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 3.

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43    is only real existence, here and now. But Master Dōgen recognized in this a tendency cause and effect as two separate things, so Master Chōsha wanted to suggest undivided to negate cause and effect. reality. His intention was that the priest need not consider past karma, because there priest understood the original state of emptiness and the concrete restrictions of

44    or karma that operates in indefinite periods. Fujō-gō, short for fujō-ju-gō, “karma in which [retribution] is received indefinitely,”

45    indefinite times, and bad karma that operates in the three times and in indefinite times.The eight kinds of karma are: good karma that operates in the three times and in

46    bad actions that I have done in the past,/All have stemmed, since times without begin-kai-yu-mushi-donjinchi, jū-shin-ku-i-shi-shoshō, issai-ga-kon-kai-sange,Sange means, for example, reciting the following verse: ga-shaku-shozō-shoakugō,“The many mind./I now totally confess and repent them all.”Ning, from greed, anger, and delusion./They were produced from body, speech, and

47    “Black or white” means wrong or right, bad or good.

48    Ijuku, short for ijuku-ka, literally, “different maturation of effects.” See note 11. 49 Daihōshakkyō (Sanskrit: Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtra), chap. 57.

50 1253. This is one of the twelve chapters Master Dōgen began in the last years of his longer. of the life. The version translated here is the one included in the ninety-five–chapter edition Shōbōgenzō. The version contained in the twelve-chapter edition is slightly

[Chapter Eighty-five]

Shime

The Four Horses

Translator’s Note: Shi means “four” and me means “horses,” so shime means four horses. An ancient Buddhist scripture, the Saṃyuktāgama, contains a story about four kinds of horses: horses that know the rider’s intention at the sight of the whip, horses that know the rider’s intention when the whip touches their hair, horses that know the rider’s intention when the whip touches their flesh, and horses that know the rider’s intention when the whip reaches their bones. These differences between four kinds of horses are used as a simile for the differences between the levels of intuition that Buddhist students exhibit in studying Buddhism. Studying Buddhism is not based only on intellectual teachings; the ability to intuitively understand the master’s teachings is important, as Master Dōgen explains in this chapter using the simile of the four kinds of horses.

[56] [A story of] the World-honored One: one day a non-Buddhist visited the place where the Buddha was, and he asked the Buddha, “I

do not ask for words. I do not ask for no words.”1

The World-honored One sat on his seat for a while.

The non-Buddhist did generative prostrations and praised him, saying “How excellent, World-honored One! Your great benevolence and great compassion have opened my clouds of delusion, and made me able to enter [the truth].” Then he made a prostration and left. After the non-Buddhist had left, Ānanda said to the Buddha, “Through what attainment did the non-Buddhist say that he had been able to enter [the truth] and [then] praise you and leave?”

The World-honored One said, “It was like a good horse in the

world seeing the form of a whip and running.”2

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[57]          Since the ancestral master’s coming from the west until today, many good counselors have taken up this story and set it before people of learning in practice, at which times—either taking years or taking days and months— many have clarified it and believed and entered the Buddha-Dharma. It is called “the story of the non-Buddhist questioning the Buddha.” We should know that the World-honored One performed the two kinds of establishment of the teaching: sacred silence and sacred preaching. Those who are able to enter through this [story] are all “like good horses in the world seeing the form of a whip and running.” Those who are able to enter through that establishment of the teaching that is beyond sacred silence and sacred preaching, are also like this.3

[58]          The ancestral patriarch Nāgārjuna says, “When I preach to people phrases [of Dharma], it is as if fast horses are seeing the form of a whip and at once entering the right path.” At any moment and in any circumstances, whether listening to the Dharma of appearance and nonappearance [or] listening to the Dharma of the three vehicles and the One Vehicle,4 we often tend toward wrong paths, but when we are frequently able to see the form

of a whip, we then enter the right path. If, following a master, we have met a human being, there is no place that is not the preaching of phrases [of Dharma] and there is no time when we do not see the form of a whip. Those who see the form of a whip at once, those who see the form of a whip after three asaṃkhya kalpas, and those who see the form of a whip after countless kalpas, [all] are able to enter the right path.5 [59] The Saṃyuktāgama Sutra6 says:

The Buddha told the bhikṣus, “There are four kinds of horses. The first sees the form of a whip, is startled at once, and follows the rider’s will. The second is startled when [the whip] touches its hair, and then it follows the rider’s will. The third is surprised after [the whip] touches its flesh. The fourth wakes up only after [the whip] has penetrated to the bone. The first horse is like one who hears of impermanence7 in another community8 and then is able to feel aversion.9 The second horse is like one who hears of impermanence in his or her own community and then is able to feel aversion. The third horse is like one who hears of the impermanence of his or her own parent and then is able to feel aversion. The

Chapter Eighty-five

fourth horse is like one whose own body suffers sickness and only then is able to feel aversion.”10

[60] This is “the four horses” of the Āgama [Sutra]. It is studied whenever the Buddha-Dharma is learned in practice. Those who, as true good counselors, manifest themselves in the human world and in the heavens above and, as emissaries of the Buddha, become ancestral masters, inevitably have learned this [teaching] in practice, and they transmit it for the benefit of their students. Those who do not know it are not good counselors to human beings and gods. Those students who are close with the Buddha’s truth, as living beings who have thickly accumulated good roots,11 are inevitably able to hear this [teaching]. Those who are far from the Buddha’s truth neither hear it nor know it. So masters should plan to preach it without delay, and disciples should hope to hear it without delay. The meaning of this “to feel aversion” is as follows: “When the Buddha expounds the Dharma with a single utterance, living beings each understand according to their type. Some have fear. Some rejoice. Some feel aversion and detachment. Some cut doubt.”12 277c [61] The Sutra of the Great [Demise] says:

The Buddha said, “Good sons! It is like training horses. Broadly there are four kinds [of horses]: Those which 1) are contacted through hair, 2) are contacted through skin, 3) are contacted through flesh, or 4) are contacted through bone, and which, according to those respective places of contact, obey the rider’s will. The Tathāgata also is like that. With four kinds of Dharma, he controls and subdues living beings: 1) he preaches to them of life, and then they accept the Buddha’s words, like [a horse], when its hair is touched, following the rider’s will; 2) he preaches of life and aging, and then [living beings] accept the Buddha’s words, like [a horse], when its hair and skin are touched, following the rider’s will; 3) he preaches of life and also of aging and death, and then [living beings] accept the Buddha’s words, like [a horse], when its hair, skin, and flesh are touched, following the rider’s will; 4) he preaches of life and also of aging, sickness, and death, and then [living beings] accept the Buddha’s words, like [a horse], when its hair, skin, flesh, and bone are touched, following the rider’s will. Good sons! There is no certainty in a rider’s training of a horse, [but] the World-honored

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Tathāgata’s control and subjugation of living beings are assured and are never in vain. For this reason, the Buddha is titled ‘Controller of Humans.’”13

[63] This is called the “the four horses of the Nirvana Sutra.” No students have failed to learn it, and no buddhas have failed to preach it. We hear it by following buddhas; whenever we meet and serve buddhas, we listen to it without fail; and whenever we receive the transmission of the Buddha-Dharma our preaching to living beings of this [teaching] continues, without flagging, through successive kalpas. When we finally arrive at Buddhahood, we preach this [teaching] for bodhisattvas and śrāvakas, and for great orders of human beings and gods, as if it were the time of our first establishment of the will. For this reason, the seed of the treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha is uninterrupted. Because it is like this, the preaching of buddhas is far removed from the preaching of bodhisattvas. Remember, the methods of a horse trainer are broadly of four kinds: to touch hair, to touch skin, to touch flesh, and to touch bone. We cannot read what the object is that is caused to touch hair,

but mahāsattvas of the Dharma transmission understand that it might be a whip. At the same time, among methods of training horses, there may be those that employ a whip and those that do not employ a whip; the training of horses may not always be limited to the whip. [Horses] with a standing height of eight feet are called “dragon horses.” These horses are seldom trained in the human world. Further, there are horses called “thousand-mile horses” that run a thousand miles in a day. While running five hundred miles these horses sweat blood; after five hundred miles they are refreshed and swift. Few people can ride these horses, and few know how to train them. There are no such horses in China [but] there are in other countries.14 We do not read that every one of these horses [must] frequently be given the whip. Nevertheless, a past master has said, “In training horses, we inevitably give them the whip. Without the whip, horses are not trained. Such is the method of training horses.” There are the present four methods: the touching of hair, skin, flesh, and bone. To touch skin and bone but not hair is impossible. To touch flesh and bone but not hair and skin is impossible. We have seen, therefore, that the whip is to be given. That this is not explained here in the present [quotation] is due to a lack in the sentences.15 There are numerous places

Chapter Eighty-five

like this in all sutras. The Tathāgata, World-honored One, Con troller of Humans,16 is also like that [horse trainer]: he uses four kinds of Dharma to control and subdue all living beings, “assuredly and never in vain.” That is to say, he preaches to them of life, whereupon some instantly accept the Buddha’s words; he preaches to [living beings] of life and aging, whereupon some accept the Buddha’s words; he preaches to [living beings] of life, aging, and sickness, whereupon some accept the Buddha’s words; and he preaches to [living beings] of life, aging, sickness, and death, whereupon some accept the Buddha’s words. Those who hear of the last three [can] never avoid the first one,17 just as, in training horses in the world, aside from contact with 278b hair there is no contact with skin, flesh, and bone. “He preaches to them of life, aging, sickness, and death” means that the Tathāgata, the World-honored One, preaches to others of life, aging, sickness, and death.18 This is not in order to cause living beings to depart from life, aging, sickness, and death. He does not preach that life, aging, sickness, and death are just the truth, and he does not preach in order to make living beings understand that life, aging, sickness, and death are just the truth. His purpose is—by this preaching to others of life, aging, sickness, and death—to cause all living beings to grasp the reality of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. Thus “the World-honored Tathāgata’s control and subjugation of living beings are assured and are never in vain.

For this reason, the Buddha is titled ‘Controller of Humans.’”

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shime

                                    On a day of the summer retreat in the seventh                                     year of Kenchō,19 I finished copying this the master’s draft.

                              

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Notes

1 The intention of the non-Buddhist was to ask for teaching that transcends words. 2 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 27.

3     Those who are able to enter the truth through intuitional grasp of the state of just acting are like good horses.

4     (The three vehicles are the ways of the sensual Buddhist), and bodhisattva (practical Buddhist). The One Vehicle is the way śrāvaka (intellectual Buddhist), pratyekabuddha

Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), of the Buddha. The teaching of the three vehicles and the One Vehicle is preached by Gautama Buddha in the third chapter of the Hokke-ten-hokke. Lotus Sutra, Hiyu (“A Parable”). See

5     instruction. Ben-ei, “the form of a whip” or “the image of a whip,” symbolizes the Buddha’s

6     Chinese translation. It was translated in fifty fascicles by Guṇabhadra, during the LiuZōagongyō,Song dynasty (420–479).lit., “Miscellaneous Āgama Sutra,” the third of the four Āgamas in

7     Mujō, “impermanence” or “inconstancy,” in this case means death or disaster.

8     Shūraku, lit., colony or community, represents the Sanskrit jana-kāya or grāma. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

9     unreliability of situations in secular society.En, “aversion,” in this case means aversion to the impermanence, inconstancy, or

10    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, vol. 2, chap. 5.

11    Zenkon means good actions as the roots of happiness.

12    bonYuimakitsushosetsugyō,(“Buddha Land”) chapter. usually shortened to Yuimagyō (Vimalakīrtinirdeśa), Bukkoku-

13    Daihatsunehangyō of Sanskrit Terms. This is one of ten epithets of a buddha, which are listed in Chapter fascicle 18, of stout men,” represents the Sanskrit Eighty-seven, Bongyō-bonKuyō-shobutsu.(Sutra of the Great Demise;(“Pure Conduct”) chapter. puruṣa-damya-sārathi.Sanskrit: Chōgo jōbu, Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra See Volume II, Glossary lit., “controller-rider);

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14    (It is said that in 138 in present-day Uzbekistan) to buy some horses that, according to rumor, ran so fast B.C.E. a Chinese general called Zhang Qian traveled to Fergana parasite. But he also learned that Fergana’s merchants would pay a handsome price that they sweated blood. The general found that in fact they bled because of a skin for silk. His emperor, Wudi, thereupon lifted an export ban that had been in force since the Chinese started weaving silk around 2000 what was to become the Silk Road. B.C.E. and trading began along

15    horse’s hair is a whip: the character In the quotation from the Daihatsunehangyō,ben, muchi,it is understood that what touches the“whip,” does not appear in the quotation.

16    Nyorai-seson-jōgojōbu are three of the ten epithets of a buddha.

17    Buddhist preaching is sometimes about aging, sickness, and death, but it is always about life.

18    The Buddha, while venerated and honored as the most sacred of beings, preaches to others about concrete mundane matters.

19    1255Master Dōgen began in the last years of his life. Master Dōgen died in 1253, two years before his successor Master Koun Ejō added the concluding note.. This is one of the chapters of the twelve-chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō that

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[Chapter Eighty-six]

Shukke-kudoku

The Merit of Leaving Family Life

Translator’s Note: Shutsu means “to get out of” or “to transcend.” Ke means “house,” “home,” or “family life,” and kudoku means “merit.” So shukkekudoku means the merit of leaving family life. In this chapter Master Dōgen praised and emphasized the merit of leaving or transcending family life. Most people are brought up within a family, and the influence that our family has on us is often much stronger than we realize. The aim of studying Buddhism is to realize what the truth is. To achieve this, it is necessary for us to transcend our family life, because the habits we form and the influence that our family has on us tend to prevent us from seeing clearly what the truth is. This is why the merit of the tradition of leaving family life is revered in Buddhism, as Master Dōgen explains here.

[69] Bodhisattva Nāgārjuna1 said: Someone asks, “With the lay precepts,2 we are able to be born in the heavens above, attain the bodhisattva way, and attain nirvana. Why then is it necessary to rely on the precepts of those who have left family life?”3

I reply: Although both [laypeople and monks] can attain salvation, still there is difficulty and ease. Laypeople’s livelihoods have all sorts of jobs and duties; if they want to concentrate their minds on the truth and the Dharma, their trade will deteriorate; and if they concentrate on practicing their trade, matters pertaining to the truth will deteriorate. They should be able to practice the Dharma without selecting and without abandoning [one or the other], which is called “difficult.” If we leave family life and part from secular society, to eradicate miscellaneous irritations and disturbances, and to concentrate the mind solely on practice of the truth, is called “easy.” Further, family life, being disorderly

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and noisy, with many jobs and many duties, is the root of hindrances and the seat of many sins. It is called “very difficult.” If we leave family life, we are like, for example, a person going off to stay in a deserted

place, among empty fields, and making the mind whole so that there is no mind and no concern: we are already rid of inner thoughts, and external

matters also have departed. As a verse says,4

We sit in quietness among the trees of the forest, In the serene state, all evils evaporate.

We placidly get a whole mind.

This pleasure is beyond the pleasure of gods. Others seek gain: wealth and status, Fine clothes and comfortable bedding.

Such pleasures are not peaceful.

In seeking gain there is no satisfaction.

In patched robes we go begging for food,

In movement and in stillness, minds constantly whole.

With our own eyes of wisdom, We reflect on the reality of all dharmas.

The many kinds of Dharma gates,

All, through balance, are entered by reflection.

The mind of understanding and wisdom abides in serenity, It is beyond the triple world.

Thus we see that when we leave family life, to observe the precepts and practice the truth is very easy. Further, leaving family life and observing the precepts gains countless criteria of virtue and regulation and puts us completely in possession of them all. For this reason, ones clothed in white5 should leave family life and receive ordination.6 Further, in the Buddha-Dharma, the Dharma of leaving family life is the most difficult of all to practice, as [illustrated when] the brahman Jambu khādaka asked Śāriputra, “What is the most difficult thing in the Buddha-Dharma?”

Śāriputra answered, “Leaving family life is [most] difficult.”

[The brahman] asked further, “What difficulties are there in leaving

family life?”

[Śāriputra] answered, “In leaving family life, to have inner comfort

is difficult.”

[The brahman asked] “When one has already attained inner com-

fort, what then is difficult?”

[Śāriputra answered,] “To practice good ways is difficult.”

Thus, we should leave family life. Further, when a person leaves family life, the king of demons, in astonishment and sorrow, says, “This person has scarcely any hindrances or wants! [This person] will surely attain nirvana and fall into the numbers of the Sangha treasure!” Further, in the Buddha-Dharma, people who have left family life, even if they break the precepts and fall into sin, after they have expiated their sins, they can attain liberation, as the bhikṣuṇī Utpalavarṇā explains in the Jātaka Sutra:7 When the Buddha is in the world, this bhikṣuṇī attains the six mystical powers and the state of an arhat. She goes into the houses of nobles and constantly praises the Dharma of leaving family life, saying to all the aristocratic ladies, “Sisters! You should leave family life.”

The noblewomen say, “We are young and in our prime and our figures are at the height of beauty. To keep the precepts would be difficult. Sometimes we might break the precepts.”

The bhikṣuṇī says, “If you break the precepts, you break them. Just leave family life!”

They ask, “If we break the precepts we will fall into hell. Why

should we risk breaking them?”

She answers, “If you fall into hell, you fall.”

The noblewomen all laugh at this, saying, “In hell we would have to receive [retribution for our] sins. Why should we risk falling [into hell]?”

                     The bhikṣuṇī says, “I myself remember during a past life I became 279a

a prostitute, wore all sorts of clothes, and spoke archaic words. One day, as a joke, I put on a bhikṣuṇī’s robe, and due to this as a direct and indirect cause, at the time of Kāśyapa Buddha8 I became a bhikṣuṇī. I was proud of my noble pedigree and fine features: vanity and arrogance arose in my mind, and I broke the precepts. Because of the wrongness of breaking the precepts I fell into hell and suffered for my various sins, but after suffering I finally met Śākyamuni Buddha, left family life, and attained the six mystical powers and the truth of an arhat. Thus, I know that when we leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break the precepts, due to the precepts as direct and indirect causes we can attain the truth of an arhat. If I had only done bad, without the precepts as direct and indirect causes, I could not have attained the truth. In the past I fell into hell in age after age. When I got out of hell I became a bad person, and when the bad person died, I went back into hell, and there was no gain at all. Now therefore I know from experience that when we leave family life and receive the precepts, with this as a direct and indirect cause—even if we break the precepts—we can attain the bodhi-effect.”9

[75] Further, when the Buddha was at Jetavana Park, a drunken brahman came to the Buddha’s place and sought to become a bhikṣu. The Buddha instructed Ānanda to give him a shaved head and to clothe him in the Dharma robe. Having woken from his drunkenness, [the brahman] was dismayed that his body had suddenly become that of a bhikṣu, and he ran away at once. All the bhikṣus asked the Buddha, “Why did you permit this brahman to become a bhikṣu?”

The Buddha said, “This brahman for countless kalpas had never had any will at all to leave family life. Now, because of being drunk, he has temporarily established a bit of the will. With this as a direct and indirect cause, in the future he will leave family life and attain the truth.”

In various stories like this, the merit of leaving family life is immeasurable. Thus, those clothed in white, even if they possess the five precepts,10 are not equal to those who have left family life.11 [76] The World-honored One thus permitted the drunken brahman to leave family life and receive the precepts, seeing it as the first planting of the seed of attainment of the truth. Clearly, from ancient times until today, living beings who lack the merit of leaving family life have been forever unable to attain the buddha-state of bodhi. This brahman, because he was slightly12 drunk, momentarily established a bit of the will and, having his head shaved and receiving the precepts, he became a bhikṣu. The period

279b before he sobered up was not so long, but the principle that this merit13 should be preserved, and should be promoted as a good root of attainment of the

truth, is present in the World-honored One’s golden words of true philosophy, and is the Tathāgata’s original wish in manifesting himself in the world. All living beings, in the past, present, and future, definitely should believe and devoutly practice [this principle of leaving family life]. Truly, the establishment of the will and the attainment of the truth inevitably occur relying upon kṣāṇas.14 This brahman’s momentary merit of leaving family life is also like that. Still more, how could the merit of leaving family life and receiving the precepts for the whole of our present human lifetime and life be inferior to [the merit of] the drunken brahman? Sacred wheel-turning kings15 appeared more than eighty thousand years ago and ruled the four continents, being abundantly furnished with the seven treasures. At that time these four continents were all like the Pure Land.16 The pleasure enjoyed by the wheel kings is beyond expression in words. There are some [wheel-turning kings], it is said, who rule a three-thousandfold world. There are distinctions between [kings of] gold, silver, copper, and iron wheels, who rule one, two, three, or four continents,17 [but] the bodies of them all are invariably free of the ten evils.18 Even though such a sacred wheel-turning king is thus abundantly provided with pleasures, when a single white hair grows on his head, he abdicates the throne to the crown prince and with his own body he at once leaves family life, puts on the kaṣāya, and enters the mountains or forest to train, so that when his life ends, he is inevitably born in a Brahmā heaven. He puts this white hair from his own head into a silver casket, to be kept in the royal palace and transmitted to the next wheel[-turning] king. The next wheel[turning] king, when he too grows a white hair, does exactly the same as the previous king. The length of the life remaining to a sacred wheel-turning king after leaving home is beyond comparison with that of people today. A wheel[-turning] king is said to be already over eighty thousand [years old], and his body is endowed with the thirty-two signs;19 people today cannot equal him. Nevertheless, when he sees a white hair and realizes impermanence, 279c he inevitably leaves home and practices the truth, in order to accomplish merit by performing spotless conduct. The kings of today cannot match the sacred wheel-turning kings. If they waste precious time amid greed, and fail to leave family life, they may regret it in future ages. Still more, in a minor nation in a remote land, although there are kings in name they do not have the virtue of kings; they are unable to confine their greed. [But] if they leave

family life and practice the truth many gods will gladly protect them, dragon deities will respectfully guard them, and the Buddha-eyes of the buddhas might definitely authenticate them and rejoice. In her past as a prostitute, [the nun Utpalavarṇā] put on the bhikṣuṇī robe not out of belief, but as a joke. Although this likely carried the sin of making light of the Dharma, by virtue of clothing her body in this robe, she met the Buddha-Dharma in a second age. “The bhikṣuṇī robe” means the kaṣāya. By virtue of jokingly wearing the kaṣāya she met Kāśyapa Buddha in a second life, she left family life and received the precepts, and she became a bhikṣuṇī. Even though, as a result of breaking the precepts, she fell into hell and received [retribution for] her sins, because the merit [of wearing the kaṣāya] had not decayed, she finally met Śākyamuni Buddha. Meeting Buddha, hearing the Dharma, establishing the will, and doing training, she parted from the triple world forever and became a great arhat, equipped with the six powers and the three kinds of knowledge. Undoubtedly [her state] must have been the supreme truth. Therefore when, from the beginning, solely for the sake of the supreme state of bodhi, we distill pure belief and we believe in and receive the kaṣāya, the maturation of that merit will be swifter than [the maturation of] the merit of the prostitute. Still more, when for the sake of the supreme state of bodhi we establish the bodhi-mind, leave family life, and receive the precepts, that merit might be immeasurable. Without a human body, this merit is rarely

280a accomplished. In the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands,20 as monks or as laymen, bodhisattvas and ancestral masters have been many, but none has equaled the ancestral master Nāgār juna. Only the ancestral master Nāgārjuna quoted stories such as those of the drunken brahman and the prostitute, in order to encourage living beings to leave family life and receive the precepts. This is the ancestral master Nāgārjuna’s exact record of the golden speech of the World-honored One.

[81]      The World-honored One said:

On the southern continent21 there are four kinds of supreme excellence: 1) meeting Buddha, 2) hearing the Dharma, 3) leaving family life, and 4) attaining the truth.

Clearly remember, these four kinds of supreme excellence are beyond the northern continent22 and beyond the various heavens. Now that, led by the power of long-accumulated good roots, we have received a supremely excellent body,23 we should rejoicingly leave family life and receive the precepts. Do not waste the supremely excellent body of goodness, leaving its dewdrop life at the mercy of the wind of inconstancy. If we accumulate life after life of leaving family life, that will be the piling up of merit and heaping up of virtue.24

[82]      The World-honored One said:

In the Buddha-Dharma the effects and results of leaving family life are unthinkable. Even if a person erected a stupa of the seven treasures as high as the thirty-three gods,25 the merit gained would be inferior to that of leaving family life. Why? Because a stupa of the seven treasures can be demolished by greedy and malicious stupid people, [but] the merit of leaving family life is indestructible. Therefore if [someone] teaches men and women [of this merit], or sets free male and female servants, or permits citizens, or with his or her own body leaves family life and enters the truth, the merit is immeasurable.26

[83]      The World-honored One, clearly knowing the amount of the merit, made a comparison like this. Śrīvaddhi,27 on hearing it, though he was an old man of a hundred and twenty years, was compelled to leave family life and receive the precepts; he sat alongside children in the end seats, underwent training, and became a great arhat. Remember, the human body of our present life is temporarily formed through direct and indirect combinations of the four elements and the five aggregates, and it always has the eight kinds of pain.28 Furthermore, kṣāṇa by kṣāṇa, it appears and disappears, utterly 280b without cease. Still more, during a click of the fingers sixty-five kṣāṇas appear and disappear, but because we are dull we never know it. Altogether, in the passing of one day and night there are 6,400,099,980 kṣāṇas,29 [in each of which] the five aggregates appear and disappear, but we do not know it. It is pitiful that, even as we appear and disappear, we ourselves do not know it. This duration of the appearance and disappearance of a kṣāṇa was known only by the World-honored Buddha and by Śāriputra; though other saints have been many, not one of them has known it. Again, by virtue of just this fact of instantaneous appearance and disappearance, living beings produce good or bad karma. By virtue of this fact of instantaneous appearance

and disappearance, living beings establish the will and attain the truth. [Our human body] is a human body that appears and disappears like this; even if we treasure it, it cannot stand still. Since time immemorial, there has never been a single person who, by begrudging [the human body], stood still. The human body is thus not our own but if we utilize it to leave family life and receive the precepts, we will experience the buddha-state that is as imperishable as a diamond, the anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi experienced by the buddhas of the three times. What wise person would not gladly pursue [this state]? Hence, the eight sons of the past Buddha Sun Moon Light all renounced a royal position of dominion over four continents and left family life.30 The sixteen sons of the Buddha Universal Surpassing Wisdom each left family life.31 While Universal Wisdom had entered the immovable state, they preached to the assembly the Flower of Dharma,32 and they have now become Tathāgatas of the ten directions. “Eight myriad koṭis of people among the masses led by the sacred wheel-turning king,”33 their royal father, on seeing the sixteen princes leave family life, also sought to leave family life, whereupon the king at once permitted them. The two sons of the King Resplendent,

together with their royal father and his queen, all left family life.34 Remember, it is evident that whenever great saints have appeared, they have inevitably considered leaving family life to be the right Dharma. We should not say that these people left family life out of stupidity; knowing that they left family life out of wisdom, we should hope to do the same. In the time of the present Buddha Śākyamuni, Rāhula,35 Ānanda,36 and so on all left family life. Further, there is [the example of] the thousand Śākyas leaving family life and the twenty thousand Śākyas leaving family life;37 we should call these excellent examples. From the five bhikṣus who left family life at the beginning38 to Subhadra who left family life at the end,39 [all] people who devoted themselves to the Buddha immediately left family life. Remember, its merit is immeasurable. Therefore, if people of the world have compassion for their children and grandchildren, they should let them leave family life without delay. If they have compassion for their fathers and mothers, they should recommend them to leave family life. For this reason, a verse says:

If there were no past ages,

There could be no past buddhas.

If there were no past buddhas,

There would be no leaving family life and receiving ordination.40

This verse is a verse of the buddha-tathāgatas. It destroys the non Buddhist assertion that past ages do not exist. So remember, leaving family life and receiving ordination are the Dharma of the past buddhas. While fortunately meeting a time to leave family life and to receive ordination—which actions are the wonderful Dharma of the buddhas—if we idly fail to leave family life and receive the precepts it would be hard to know what obstacle was the cause. With the subsisting body,41 the lowest kind of thing, we can accomplish the highest kind of merit. It may be the highest kind of merit in Jam budvīpa and in the triple world. While this human body in Jambudvīpa has still not disappeared, we should, without fail, leave family life and receive the precepts.

[88]          An ancient saint42 said:

People who have left family life, even if they break the precepts, still surpass laypeople who receive and keep the precepts. Therefore the 281a sutras solely encourage people to leave family life, and that benevolence is hard to repay. Further, to encourage [people] to leave family life is just to encourage people to practice venerable conduct; the effects and results gained [by this encouragement] surpass King Yama,43 the wheel[turning] kings, and the god Śakra. Therefore the sutras solely encourage people to leave family life, and that benevolence is hard to repay. Such facts do not exist in encouraging people to receive and keep the precepts of a lay follower, and so the sutras do not verify it.44

[89]          Remember, if we have left family life, even if we break the precepts,that is better than not breaking the precepts as a layperson. As [acts of] devotion to the Buddha, leaving family life and receiving the precepts are, in every case, most excellent. The effects and results of encouraging others to leave family life are beyond the excellence of King Yama, beyond the excellence of a wheel[-turning] king, and beyond the excellence of the god Śakra. Even a vaiśya45 or a śūdra,46 by leaving family life, will surpass a kṣatriya,47 and indeed surpass King Yama, surpass the wheel[-turning] kings, and surpass the god Śakra. The lay precepts are not like this; therefore we should leave family life. Remember, what the World-honored One taught, though unfathomable, was widely collected by a World-honored One and five hundred great arhats.48 Truly, [therefore,] we have been able to know that truths in the Buddha-Dharma should be evident. Ordinary teachers of recent ages cannot fathom even the wisdom of the three kinds of knowledge and the six powers of one saint, much less [the wisdom of] the five hundred saints. [The five hundred] have known what ordinary teachers of recent ages do not know, have seen what [ordinary teachers] do not see, and have realized what [ordinary teachers] do not realize, but nothing known by ordinary teachers is unknown to [the five hundred saints]. So do not compare the dismal and foolish explanations of ordinary teachers with the words of saints of the three kinds of knowledge.

[91] The Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra, [fascicle] 120, says:

Even one who establishes the will and leaves family life is already called a sacred being; how much more one who has attained the state of indulgence toward the Dharma.49

Remember, to establish the will and leave family life is to be called a sacred being.

[91] In Śākyamuni Buddha’s five hundred great vows,50 vow number

one hundred and thirty-seven is:

In future, after I have realized the right state of truth, if there are any men who, in my Dharma, want to leave family life, I vow that they will be free of hindrances—namely, infirmity, loss of mindfulness, confusion, pride, lack of awe, being stupid and without wisdom, abundant preoccupations, and distraction of the mind. Otherwise, I shall not realize the right state of truth.

Vow number one hundred and thirty-eight is:

In future, after I have realized the right state of truth, if there are any women who want, in my Dharma, to leave family life, to learn the truth, and to receive the great precepts, I vow that I will cause them to accomplish [this]. Otherwise, I shall not realize the right state of truth.

Vow number three hundred and fourteen is:

In future, after I have realized the right state of truth, if there are any living beings who lack good roots51 but while experiencing a good root feel love and delight in their mind, I shall cause them, in the Buddha Dharma in a future age, to leave family life and learn the truth, and shall cause them peacefully and steadfastly to abide by the sacred and pure ten precepts.52 Otherwise, I shall not realize the right state of truth. [93] Remember, the good sons and good daughters who have left family life today all have been assisted by the power of the great vows made in the ancient past by the World-honored One, and [thus] they have been able, without hindrances, to leave family life and receive the precepts. The Tathāgata already, through his vows, is causing us to leave family life. Clearly we have seen that it is the most valuable and the highest great merit. [94] The Buddha said:

Moreover, if there is anyone who, following me, shaves beard and hair and wears a kaṣāya without receiving the precepts, even those who serve offerings to this person will be able at last to enter the castle of fearlessness. For such reasons do I preach like this.53

Clearly we see that if [a person] shaves his beard and hair and wears the kaṣāya, even without receiving the precepts, those who serve offerings to this [person] will enter the castle of fearlessness.

[95] Further he said, “If, again, there is a person who, for my sake, has left family life and who, even without taking the precepts, shaves his beard and hair and wears a kaṣāya, those who, through non-Dharma, trouble or harm this [person], will even injure the Dharma bodies and reward bodies54 281c of the buddhas of the three times, because they will eventually be filled with the three evil states.”55

[95] The Buddha said:

If there are any living beings who, for my sake, have left family life and who shave beard and hair and wear the kaṣāya, even if they do not retain the precepts, they all have been stamped already by the seal of nirvana.56 Further, if anyone, through non-Dharma, disturbs those who have left family life without retaining the precepts, or reviles and humiliates them, or insults them, or strikes, binds, or cuts them using hand, sword, or stick; or steals their robes and pātra; or steals miscellaneous necessities of life, then such a person injures the real reward bodies of the buddhas of the three times and offends the eyes of all human beings and gods—because this person wants to conceal the seeds that the buddhas possess of the right Dharma and of the Three Treasures; because [this person] prevents gods and human beings from getting benefit and causes them to fall into hell; and because [this person] promotes and replenishes the three evil states.57

Remember, if [people] shave their hair and [wear] the dyed robe, even if they do not retain the precepts, they are stamped by the seal of supreme and great nirvana. If a person troubles them, [this person] injures the reward bodies of the buddhas of the three times. That may be equal to a grave sin. Clearly, we have seen that the merit of leaving family life is directly proximate to the buddhas of the three times. [97] The Buddha said:

In general, those who have left family life should not commit wrong. If they commit wrong, that is not to have left family life. The body and mouth of a person who has left family life should be in mutual accord. If they are not in mutual accord, that is not to have left family life. Forsaking father, mother, brothers, wife and child, relatives, and acquaintances, I left family life to practice the truth. That was just the time [when I was able to] accumulate virtuous realizations; it was never a time to accumulate no virtuous realizations. “Virtuous realization” means having compassion for all living beings, as if they were babies. Nonvirtuous realization is different from this.58

In general, the inherent nature of leaving family life is “to have compassion for all living beings as if they were babies.” This state is just “not committing wrong” and is “body and mouth in mutual accord.” When such behavior is present already in leaving family life, its merit is as described now. [98] The Buddha said:

Furthermore, Śāriputra,59 if bodhisattva mahāsattvas want, on the very day of leaving family life, to realize anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi; and [want], on that very day, to turn the Dharma wheel, so that when they

turn the Dharma wheel countless asaṃkhyas of living beings depart from dust and leave dirt and amidst all dharmas attain purity of the Dharma-eye, and [so that] countless asaṃkhyas of living beings attain the state beyond perception of all dharmas; and [if bodhisattva mahāsattvas want] to attain liberation from the mind of excesses, and [want] to enable countless asaṃkhyas of living beings to attain the state of not regressing or straying from anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi,

[then bodhisattva mahāsattvas] should learn the prajñāpāramitā.”60

This “bodhisattvas who learn the prajñāpāramitā” means the patriarchs. At the same time, [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, in every case, is accomplished “on the very day of leaving family life.” However, when [bodhisattvas] practice and experience [the truth] for three asaṃkhya kalpas or practice and experience it for countless asaṃkhya kalpas, they do not taint it with “limited” and “limitless.” Students should remember this. [100] The Buddha said:

If a bodhisattva mahāsattva thinks, “At some time, I will relinquish a throne and leave family life, on which day I will realize the supreme, right, and balanced state of bodhi; also on that day, I will turn the wonderful wheel of Dharma, causing countless, innumerable sentient beings to depart from dust and leave dirt, and causing them to have the pure Dharma-eye; at the same time, I will cause countless, innumerable sentient beings to end forever all excesses, and to liberate their minds and intuition; further, I will cause countless, innumerable sentient beings all to attain the state of not regressing or straying from the supreme, right, and balanced state of bodhi,” [then] this bodhisattva mahāsattva who wants to realize those things should learn the prajñāpāramitā.61 This is [the Buddha’s] gracious expounding of the merit of his descending to be born in a royal palace, as a bodhisattva in the last body, and his “relinquishing the throne, realizing the right truth, and turning the Dharma wheel to save living beings.”

[101] Prince Siddhārtha62 took from Chandaka’s63 side a sword whose hilt of the seven treasures was adorned with maṇi64 and miscellaneous embellishments. He grasped that sword in his right hand and drew it from its scabbard. With the left hand he at once took hold of the conchlike topknot of his hair, which was deep blue, the color of an utpala.65 Wielding the sharp sword himself in his right hand, he cut off [the topknot]; with his left hand he held it aloft and threw it into the air. At this Śakra-devānām-indra greatly rejoiced, with a mind he had rarely experienced, and held aloft the prince’s topknot, not letting it fall to the ground. 282b With a fine heavenly robe, [Śakra] received [the topknot] and kept it.

Then the gods served to it their most excellent heavenly offerings.66 [102] This is how Śākyamuni Tathāgata, when formerly a prince, scaled the ramparts in the middle of the night, went in the daytime to the mountains, and cut the hair from his own head. At that time, gods of the Heavens of Pure Abiding67 came [down] to shave his head and to offer him the kaṣāya. Such [actions] are always the auspicious omens of a Tathāgata’s manifestation in the world, and [such] are the usual methods of the World-honored Buddhas. There are no buddhas who realized buddha while remaining in family life, [not] even one buddha among all the buddhas of the three times and the ten directions. Because in the past there were buddhas, the merit of leaving family life and receiving the precepts exists. Living beings’ attainment of the truth inevitably depends upon their leaving family life and receiving the precepts. In sum, the merit of leaving family life and receiving the precepts is that they are just the usual method of the buddhas, and therefore their merit is immeasurable. Within the sacred teaching there is explanation of lay realization of buddha, but it is not the authentic tradition. There is explanation of the female body realizing buddha, but this also is not the authentic tradition.68 [The tradition] that the Buddhist patriarchs authentically transmit is to leave family life and realize buddha.

[103] [At the time of] the fourth patriarch, Venerable Upagupta, there is a rich man’s son called Dhītika.69 He comes to bow before the Venerable One, and seeks to leave family life. The Venerable One says,

“Will you leave family life with body or leave family life with mind?”

[Dhītika] replies, “My seeking to leave family life is not for the

sake of body and mind.”

The Venerable One says, “If not for the sake of the body and mind,

who leaves family life at all?”

[Dhītika] replies, “In general, those who leave family life are without me and mine. Because they are without me and mine, the mind does not arise and pass.70 Because the mind does not arise and pass, the state is just the normal state of truth.71 Buddhas, similarly, are normal. Their mind is without shape or form. And their body also is like that.”

The Venerable One says, “You will realize great realization and your mind will naturally penetrate to the ultimate. It is good that, through devotion to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, you will inherit the sacred seeds and cause them to flourish.”72 Then he lets [Dhītika] leave family life and receive ordination.73

[105] Now to meet the Dharma of the buddhas and to leave family life is the most excellent effect and result. Its method is neither for the sake of me, nor for the sake of mine, nor for the sake of body and mind: it is not that body and 282c mind leave family life. The truth that leaving family life is beyond me and mine is like this. Because it is beyond me and mine, it may be the method of the buddhas. It is simply the usual method74 of the buddhas. Because it is the usual method of the buddhas, it is beyond me and mine and beyond body and mind. It is beyond comparison with the triple world. Because it is like this, leaving family life is the supreme method. It is neither sudden nor gradual; it is neither constancy75 nor a state without constancy; it is neither an arrival nor a departure; it is neither to abide nor to become; it is neither wide nor restricted; it is neither great nor small. It is beyond becoming and beyond non-becoming. Ancestral masters of the one-to-one transmission of the Buddha-Dharma, without exception, leave family life and receive the precepts. The truth of Dhītika meeting now, for the first time, with Venerable Upagupta and seeking to leave family life, is like this. He left family life and received ordination, learned in practice under Upagupta, and eventually became the fifth ancestral master.

[107]       The seventeenth patriarch, Venerable Saṃghanandi, is the sonof King Treasure Adornment76 of the city of Śrāvastī.77 Able to speak from birth, he always praises Buddhist matters. At the age of seven he grows averse to worldly pleasures and, in verse, he addresses his parents as follows:

Bowing to the ground before my great benevolent father, With vandana78 to the mother of my bones and blood,

I now desire to leave family life.

Hopefully, I beseech you, because you are compassionate.

His father and mother firmly put a stop to this. At last, when he goes all day without eating, they permit him to leave home at home.79 They name him Saṃghanandi,80 and order the śramaṇa Zenrita81 to be his teacher. [Thus] he accumulates nineteen years without ever regressing or growing weary. [But] the Venerable One is always thinking to himself, “My body resides in the royal palace. How can this be called leaving family life?” One evening a heavenly brightness falls upon [the earth], and [Saṃ gha nandi] sees a path, flat and level. Unconsciously he walks slowly forward. About ten miles on he arrives before a great rock containing a stone cavern, inside which he at once settles into quietness.82 The father, having

283a               missed his son, banishes Zenrita out of the country in search of his son, [but] they do not know where he is. In the following ten years the Venerable One attains the Dharma and receives affirmation, after which he goes, teaching as he travels, to the kingdom of Madai.83

[108]       The term “leaving home at home” was first heard at this time. But,aided by long-accumulated good, [Saṃghanandi] found the level road in the heavenly brightness and he finally left the royal palace and went to the stone cavern—truly an excellent example. Those who dislike worldly pleasures and abhor secular dust are the sacred ones. Those who love the five desires84 and forget about getting free are the common and the stupid. Though the emperors Daisō and Shukusō85 frequently associated with monks, they still were greedy for the royal position, which they never abdicated. Layman Ro,86 having left his parent, became a patriarch; [that] is the merit of leaving family life. Layman Hō87 threw away treasure but failed to throw away dust; [that] might be called extremely stupid. Mister Ro’s bodhi-power and Mister Hō’s emulation of the ancients do not deserve to be compared. Those who are clear inevitably leave family life. Those who are dull end [their lives] at home, which is the cause and conditions of black karma.

[110] Zen Master Nangaku Ejō one day spontaneously speaks the following praise: “In general, leaving family life is Dharma without appearance.88 In the heavens above and in the human world, there is nothing to surpass it.”89

“Dharma without appearance” means the right Dharma of the Tathāgata; therefore, in the heavens above and in the human world, it is supreme. As to the meaning of “the heavens above,” there are the six heavens in the world of desire, there are eighteen heavens in the world of matter, and four kinds [of heavens] in the world of non-matter, [but] none is on a par with the truth of leaving family life.

[111] Zen Master Banzan Hōshaku says:

Zen friends! Appropriate learning of the truth is like the earth holding aloft a mountain without recognizing the mountain’s solitary steepness, or like a stone containing a jewel without recognizing the jewel’s flawlessness. If [learning the truth] is like this, we call it leaving family life.90

The Buddhist Patriarch’s right Dharma is not necessarily connected with recognition and non-recognition. Leaving family life is the Buddhist Patriarch’s

right Dharma, and so its merit is evident. Zen Master Gigen91 of Rinzai-in Temple in Chinshū92 says:

In general, those who have left family life should be able to intuit the normal and true view: to intuit [the state of] buddha, to intuit [the state of] demons, to intuit the true, to intuit the false, to intuit the common, and to intuit the sacred. If they are able to intuit like this, they are called true leavers of family life. If they do not distinguish between demons and buddhas, they have just left one nest and entered another nest, and they are called ordinary beings who are producing karma; they still cannot be called true leavers of family life.93

This “normal and true view” means deep belief in cause and effect, deep belief in the Three Treasures, and so on. “To intuit buddha” means to be clear in mindfulness of the virtues of buddha [both] in the causal process and in the resultant state. We definitely distinguish between the true and the false, and the common and the sacred. If we are unclear with regard to demons and buddhas, we sacrifice learning of the truth and regress and deviate in learning the truth. When we sense the doings of demons, if we do not follow those doings, pursuit of the truth does not regress. This is called the method of a true leaver of family life. Those who randomly consider demon-doings to be the Buddha-Dharma are many; it is a wrongness of recent ages. Students, without delay, should know [the state of] demons and should clarify and practice and experience [the state of] buddha.

[114] At the time of the Tathāgata’s parinirvāṇa,94 Bodhisattva Mahākāśyapa said to the Buddha, “World-honored One! A Tathāgata is perfectly equipped with the power to know the nature of others.95 You surely knew that Sunakṣatra96 would cut off his good roots. Through what causes and circumstances did you permit him to leave family life?”

The Buddha said, “Good son! In the past, when I first left family life, my younger brother Nanda,97 my cousins Ānanda and Devadatta, my son Rāhula, and suchlike98 all followed me in leaving family life and practicing the truth. If I had not allowed Sunakṣatra to leave family life, that man in due course would have been able to inherit the position of king; free to exercise that power, he would have destroyed the Buddha-Dharma. In view of these causes and circumstances, I immediately permitted him to leave family life and practice the truth. Good son! If the bhikṣu Sunakṣatra had not left family life but still cut off his good roots, in countless ages there would have been no benefit at all. Now, after leaving family life, although he has cut off good roots, he has been able to receive and to retain the precepts; to serve and to

venerate aged veterans, eminent patriarchs, and people of virtue; and to practice and to learn from the first dhyāna to the fourth dhyāna.99 These are called good causes. Good causes like these can give rise to good ways. Once good ways have arisen, we can practice and learn the truth. Once we have practiced and learned the truth, we will be able to attain the state of anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. For this reason, I allowed Sunakṣatra to leave family life. Good son! If I had not allowed the bhikṣu Sunakṣatra to leave family life and receive the precepts I could not be called a Tathāgata equipped with the ten powers.100 Good son! A buddha reflects whether living beings possess good ways or no virtuous ways. This man [Sunakṣatra], although he possesses both such ways, before long may cut off all good roots and possess [only] no virtuous roots. For what reasons? [Because] ordinary beings like him do not associate with good friends, do not listen to the right Dharma, do not think of good, and do not act in accord with the Dharma. Due

to such causes and circumstances, he may cut off good roots and possess [only] no virtuous roots.”101

[117]  Remember, although the Tathāgata, the World-honored One, isclearly aware that ordinary beings might become cutters of good roots,102 in order to bestow upon them the causes of good, he permits them to leave family life: it is great benevolence and great compassion. Becoming a cutter of good roots is the result of not associating with good friends, not listening to the right Dharma, not thinking of good, and not acting in accord with the Dharma. Students today, without fail, should associate closely with good friends. “A good friend” means one who maintains that buddhas exist and who teaches that there is wrongness and happiness. One who does not negate cause and effect is called “a good friend” and called “a good counselor.” The preaching of such a person is the right Dharma itself. To think about this truth is “to think good.” To act in this manner may be “to act in accord with the Dharma.” Therefore, irrespective of whether ordinary beings are familiar to us or unfamiliar, we should just encourage them to leave family life and receive the precepts. Do not heed whether or not they will regress in future and do not worry whether or not they will practice. This may truly be Śākyamuni’s right Dharma.

[118]  The Buddha addressed the bhikṣus: “Remember, King Yama once opined, ‘I will some day get free from this suffering. I will be 284a born in the human world. By obtaining a human body, I will then be able to leave family life, shave beard and hair, wear the three Dharma robes, and learn the truth as one who has left family life.’ Even King Yama had this idea. Much more, you all now have obtained a human body and have been able to become śramaṇas. Therefore, bhikṣus, you should mindfully practice the actions of body, speech, and mind and should not cause imperfections to occur. You should eliminate the five fetters103 and cultivate the five roots.104 Bhikṣus such as you are should do such training.” Then the bhikṣus, hearing the Buddha’s preaching, rejoiced and devoutly practiced.105

[119]  Clearly we have seen, the longing for a life in the human world, even of King Yama, is like this. A human being who has already been born should, without delay, shave his beard and hair, wear the three Dharma robes, and learn the Buddha’s truth. These are the merits of the human world that are beyond other worlds. To have been born in the human world yet nonetheless wantonly to pursue a political path or a worldly career, idly spending one’s life as the servant of kings and ministers, encircled by dreams and illusions, and in later ages to proceed toward pitch darkness still without anything upon which to rely, is extremely stupid. Not only have we received the rarely received human body; we have [also] encountered the rarely encountered Buddha-Dharma. We should immediately cast aside all involvements and should swiftly leave family life and learn the truth. Kings, ministers, wives, children, and relatives, inevitably, are encountered everywhere, [but] the Buddha-Dharma, like the uḍumbara flower,106 is hardly ever encountered. In conclusion, when impermanence suddenly arrives, kings, ministers, friends and relatives, servants, wives and children, and precious treasures are of no help; each person simply proceeds to the underworld107 alone. What accompanies us is only our good or bad karma. When we are about to lose the human body, our regret at the loss of the human body might be deep. While

284b we retain a human body we should quickly leave family life. Just this may be the right Dharma of the buddhas of the three times.

[121] For those who have thus left family life there are four kinds of

practice of the Dharma, namely:

“[T]he four reliances”:108 1) throughout one’s life to sit beneath trees, 2) throughout one’s life to wear robes of rags, 3) throughout one’s life to beg for food, 4) throughout one’s life, in case of illness, to take old medicine.109 One who practices each of these methods truly is called one who has left family life, and truly is called a monk. If we do not practice them we are not called monks. For this reason, they are called practices of the Dharma by those who have left family life.

Now, in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, what is authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs is just “practices of the Dharma by those who have left family life.” The state of “a whole life without leaving the temple forest”110 is directly furnished with these practices of the Dharma, the four reliances. This is called “practicing the four reliances.” If [someone] goes against this and establishes five reliances, remember, it is false Dharma: who could believe in it, and who could affirm it? What is authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs is the right Dharma. To leave family life in accordance with this [right Dharma] is the highest and most valuable human happiness. Therefore, in the Western Heavens of India, Nanda, Ānanda, Devadatta, Aniruddha,111 Mahānāma,112 and Bhadrika,113 who were all grandsons of King Siṃhahanu,114 and who were of the most noble kṣatriya caste, quickly left family life. It may be an excellent example for later generations. Those today who are not kṣatriyas should not begrudge their bodies. For those who are not even princes, what could there be to begrudge? [The royal Śākyas], coming from the noblest [position] in Jam budvīpa, arrived at the noblest [position] in the triple world:115 this was just leaving family life. Kings of lesser nations, and the Licchavi116 multitudes, vainly treasuring what did not deserve to be treasured, taking pride in what did not warrant pride, and staying where they should not have stayed, failed to leave family life: who could not see them as inept, and who could not see them as extremely stupid? Venerable Rāhula was the son of the Bodhisattva, and the grandson of King Śuddhodana, who would have bequeathed the throne to him. Nev- 284c ertheless, the World-honored One pointedly caused him to leave family life. Know that the Dharma of leaving family life is supremely valuable. As the disciple foremost in exact observance,117 [Rāhula] even today has not yet entered nirvana, but actually abides in the world as a field of happiness for living beings. Among the ancestral masters of the Western Heavens who transmitted the Buddha’s right Dharma-eye treasury, the princes who left family life have been many. Now the first patriarch in China was the third royal son of the king of Kōshi.118 Not attaching importance to his royal status, he received and retained the right Dharma: we have been able clearly to see that leaving family life is supremely valuable. Having a body that cannot rank alongside those [princes], yet being in a position to leave family life, how could we not hasten [to do so]? For what kind of tomorrow should we wait? If we leave family life in haste, without waiting for [the next] exhalation or inhalation, that might be wise. We should remember also that the benevolence of the master under whom we leave family life and receive the precepts may be exactly equal to that of a father and mother. [125] The Zen’enshingi, fascicle 1, says:

The buddhas of the three times all say that to leave family life is to realize the truth. The twenty-eight patriarchs of the Western Heavens and six patriarchs of the Land of Tang who transmitted the buddhamind-seal were all śramaṇas. Perhaps it was by strictly observing the Vinaya that they were able to become universal models for the triple world. Therefore, in practicing [za]zen and inquiring into the truth, the precepts are foremost. Unless we have already departed from excess and guarded against wrong, how can we realize the state of buddha and become patriarchs?119

Even if a temple forest120 is in decay, still it may be a gardenia grove,121 a place beyond common trees and common grass.122 Or it is like milk diluted with water. When we want to use milk, we should use this milk diluted with water [but] should not use any other substance. Therefore, the authentic tradition, which is that “the buddhas of the three times all say that to leave family life is to realize the truth,” is supremely valuable. There are no buddhas

of the three times who fail to leave family life. Such is the right Dharma-eye treasury, the fine mind of nirvana, and the supreme [truth of] bodhi, which the buddhas and the patriarchs authentically transmit.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shukke-kudoku

                                    A day of the summer retreat in the seventh year                                     of Kenchō.123

Notes

1     The fourteenth patriarch in India.

2     In Master Nāgārjuna’s time, there were two hundred and fifty precepts for monksand three hundred and forty-eight for nuns. Lay Buddhists observed five precepts.

3     Shukke, i.e., monks.

4     Master Nāgārjuna quoted the poem from an older Buddhist sutra or commentary. 5 Laypeople.

6     precepts for a monk or three hundred and forty-eight precepts for a nun. See Volume Gusokukai, from the Sanskrit upasaṃpadā, means taking the two hundred and fifty

I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

7     The Honshōkyō, legendary stories of the Buddha’s past lives as a bodhisattva.

8     Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the seven ancient buddhas, the seventh being Śākyamuni Buddha.

9     viṃśati sāha srikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtraDaichidoronpāramitopadeśa(Sanskrit: is considered to be Master Nāgārjuna’s commentary on the Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa(see notes 60 and 61). This section of the), chap. 30. The Kesa-kudoku, paragraph 87.Mahā prajñā- Pañca -

Daichidoron is also quoted in Chapter Twelve (Vol. I),

10    Gokai (“five precepts”), from the Sanskrit pañca-śīlā: 1) not to kill, 2) not to steal, 3) a standard observed by laypeople in Hinayana Buddhist countries such as Thailand. Not to commit adultery, 4) not to lie, 5) not to drink alcohol. These five precepts are still

11    Daichidoron, chap. 30. See also Chapter Eighty-three, Shukke, paragraph 18.

12    The diminutive wazukani, “slightly,” suggests that, relative to the importance of leaving family life, the fact that the brahman was drunk was not so important.

13    The merit of wanting to leave family life.

14    Moments. It is said that one click of the fingers takes sixty-five kṣāṇas.

15    Tenrinjō-ō, “sacred wheel-turning kings,” from the Sanskrit Lotus Sutra, for example, LS 2.60. See Volume I, Glossary of cakravarti-rāja, feature Sanskrit Terms.in sutras such as the

16    Jōdo (“Pure Land”), from the Sanskrit Sukhāvatī, suggests an ideal realm.

199

17    For example, it was said that a king with a gold wheel rules all four continents; a king the southern continent. With a silver wheel rules the east, west, and south continents; a king with a copper wheel rules the east and south continents; and a king with an iron wheel rules only

18    speech, greed, anger, and wrong views. The ten evils are killing, stealing, adultery, lying, flattery, abusive words, duplicitous

19    Refers to the thirty-two distinguishing marks on the body of a buddha.

20    The Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands refer to India and China, respectively. 21 Nanshū suggests Jambudvīpa, the continent south of Mount Sumeru on which human beings are living; that is, the human world. 22 Hokushū, from the Sanskrit Uttarakuru, the northern continent; an ideal realm of everlasting bliss. 23 I.e., a human body.

24    2.218–220.Shakku-ruitoku. The expression originates in the Lotus Sutra. See, for example, LS

25    Sanjūsan-ten, live on the top of Mount Sumeru in the second of the six heavens in the world of “thirty-three gods,” representing the Sanskrit Trāyastriṃśa, are said to desire. Śakra-devānām-indra is in the center surrounded by eight gods in each of thefour quarters. See Volume III, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

26    Kengukyō, fascicle 4.

27    Fukuzō, lit., “Wealth Increaser,” represents the Sanskrit Śrīvaddhi, the name of a wealthy man from Rājagṛha who appears in fascicle 4 of the he asked Śāriputra if he could become a monk, but Śāriputra refused, saying that Kengukyō.Already a centenarian,

Śrīvaddhi was too old. The Buddha, however, thereafter allowed him to become a monk. 28 a ration from loved ones, 6) association with those one dislikes, 7) seeking what cannot The eight kinds of pain are the pain of 1) birth, 2) aging, 3) sickness, 4) death, 5) septet attained, 8) building up of the five aggregates (strong desire).

29    nine hundred and eighty In a twenty-four hour period there are sixty-four hundred million, ninety-nine thousand, kṣāṇas.

30    Alludes to Lotus Sutra, Jo (“Introductory”). See LS 1.42–44.

31    Lotus Sutra, Kejō-yu (“Parable of the Magic City”). See LS 2.58.

32    Ibid. See LS 2.62.

33    Ibid. See LS 2.60.

34    Lotus Sutra, Myō-shōgon-ō-honji (“The Story of King Resplendent”). See LS 3.302.

35    Rāhula was the Buddha’s son.

36    Ānanda was the Buddha’s cousin and the second patriarch in India.

37    Śākyamuni, “Sage (Śākya was the name of the clan into which the Buddha was born, hence the namemuni) of the Śākyas.”

38    Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya, Aśvajit, Bhadrika, Mahānāma, and Daśabala-Kāśyapa. These five the Buddha in his ascetic practice. They left the Buddha when he abandoned asceticism, were ordered by the Buddha’s father, King Śūddhodana of the Śākyas, to accompany but when they heard his first turning of the Dharma wheel, they became the first monks of the Buddha’s order. 39 the Buddha’s disciples to become a monk. Subhadra was a brahman who, shortly before the Buddha’s death, became the last of

40    Daibibasharon, chap. 76. Also quoted in Chapter Eighty-seven, Kuyō-shobutsu.

41    Eshin. E means “to rely upon,” and shin means “body.” Eshin means the body as the basis of consciousness; that is, the physical body.

42    number of collaborators known as the five hundred arhats, compiled the Refers to the seventh Indian patriarch, Master Vasumitra, who, together with a largemahāvibhāṣā-śāstrafour hundred years after the Buddha’s death.(the Chinese translation is called Daibibasharon in Japan) aboutAbhidharma-

43    In Sanskrit, Yamarāja, the king of the underworld who decides the fate of the deadaccording to their virtue.

44    Daibibasharon,[ni] kyō [ni] to[kafascicle 66. ]zu: “therefore the sutras do not mention it.”Yue [ni] kyō [ni] shō[se]zu. The Daibibasharon has yue 45 A Indian social system. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.vaiśya is a peasant or worker belonging to the third of the four castes in the ancient

46    A was to serve those of the three higher classes: vaiśyaśūdra. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.is a servant belonging to the lowest of the four castes, whose only social role brāhmaṇa (brahman), kṣatriya, and

47    See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. A kṣatriya is a member of the military or ruling class, the second of the four castes.

48    Kaniṣka. Again, this refers to Master Vasumitra and the five hundred arhats who compiled theAbhi dharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra at the Fourth Council, held in the kingdom of

49    “patience, indulgence; the state of saintly abstraction.” At the same time, it can beSanskrit interpreted as representing a different character pronounced See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Of the state in which a person recognizes the Four Noble Truths. Ninpō, “indulgence toward the Dharma,” is traditionally interpreted as an expressionkṣānti, which Monier-Williams’ Sanskrit-English Dictionarynin, meaning “recognition.”Nin represents thedefines as 50 The three hundred and thirty-five vows. In Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Dōgen also quotes vows from the Higekyō (the Chinese translation of the HigekyōKaruṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtraand refers to the five hundred great vows.Kesa-kudoku,) actually lists onlyMaster

51    Zenkon, “good roots,” means good actions as the roots of happiness.

52    observed by monks and the three hundred and forty-eight precepts observed by nunsThe Ten Serious Prohibitions are included in the sixteen bodhisattva precepts which,by Master Dōgen’s time, were taken by both monks and laypeople in China and Japan.These sixteen precepts are a condensed version of the two hundred and fifty preceptsin Hinayana Buddhism. (See Chapter Ninety-four, Jukai).

53    Daishūkyō (Sanskrit: Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra), fascicle 53.

54    seen as an inclusive entity with real value or meaning. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. body”), means the concrete physical body seen as the result of actions and cir-Hōsshin, “Dharma body,” from the Sanskrit Hōjin, “reward body,” from the Sanskrit dharmakāya,saṃbhogakāyameans a buddha’s body(lit., “enjoy substances in the past. See Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

55    The three evil states are the states of beings in hell, hungry ghosts, and animals.

56    actions are inconstant, and 4) the quiet and still state of nirvana. These four Dharma Nehan-in,dharmoddāna“seal of nirvana,” is the fourth of four ), which are 1) all is suffering, 2) all hō-in,dharma“Dharma seals” (Sanskrit:s are without self, 3) all teaching of Buddhism from non-Buddhism. Seals, or concrete characteristics of the Buddha-Dharma, are said to distinguish the

57    Daishūkyō, fascicle 53.

58    Daihatsunehangyō (Sutra of the Great Demise; Sanskrit: Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra), fascicle 23.

59    Heart Sutragreat disciples. The Prajñā pāramitā literature. See Chapter Two (Vol. I), Śāriputra, who died while the Buddha was still alive, was one of the Buddha’s ten) Prajñāpāramitāhṛdaya-sūtra (more commonly known as the  is addressed to Śāriputra, and represents the core teachings of all SanskritMaka-hannya-haramitsu.

60    Makahannyaharamitsukyō,Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra.fascicle 1. The Makahannyaharamitsukyō is Kumārajīva’s translation of the

61    pāramitā-sūtra.literature. The second of these sixteen sutras is the Sanskrit into Chinese by Xuanzang in 659, is a six hundred-fascicle collection ofDaihannyaharamitsukyō,the sixteen Prajñāpāramitā sutras which make up the great bulk of Prajñāpāramitāfascicle 3. The Daihannyaharamitsukyō,Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikāprajñā- translated from

62    given name as a prince. Siddhārtha; lit., “he who has fulfilled the aim (of his coming),” was the Buddha’s 63 ioteer. Chandaka was a servant employed by King Śūddhodana as Prince Siddhārtha’s char-

64 Maṇi are pearls or jewels. 65 Utpala is a blue lotus.

66    of the Buddha translated into Chinese by Jñānagupta. Butsuhongyōjikkyō, fascicle 18. The Butsuhongyōjikkyō is a sixty-fascicle biography

67    (fourth Jōgoten, non-returner) is reborn. There are said to be five of these heavens, located in the dhyana “Heavens of Pure Abiding,” are described as the realm where an heaven in the world of matter. anāgāmin

68    When a person leaves family life and realizes the state of buddha, that person’s socialstanding and gender are irrelevant. 69 Dhītika was a native of Magadha. He eventually succeeded Master Upagupta, becoming the fifth patriarch in India.

70    In other words, the mind is realized in each moment of the present.

71    skrit Jōdō. Jōbodhi,means constant, usual, or normal. which means the Buddhist state of truth. See Volume I, Glossary ofDō, “Way,” frequently represents the San-

Sanskrit Terms.

72    The causes of the state of buddha. 73 Keitokudentōroku, chap. 1.

74    Jōhō. Jō, “usual,” appears in Master Dhītika’s phrase. means method or Dharma. Jōdō, “normal state of truth”; see note 71.

75    Jō, as in notes 71 and 74.

76    vyūha rāja.Hō-shōgon-ō, “Treasure Adornment.” The Sanskrit equivalent is probably Ratna -

77    Śrāvastī was the capital of the ancient Indian kingdom of Kośala.

78    The Sanskrit vandana means to venerate or to perform an act of veneration.

79    Zaike-shukke. He remained at home in the royal palace but formally became a monk. 80 Saṃghanandi means “Sangha Joy.”

81    life history. Zenrita represents the sound of the Sanskrit Rāhulata. Not much is known about his

82    EnEnjakuis used interchangeably with stands for enza-jakujō, “settled sitting in quietness,” an expression for zazen.an, which means peaceful, stable, or settled.

83    dentōroku, The Sanskrit equivalent of Madai is Madhi. This story is quoted from the chap. 2. Keitoku84 and sensations.The five desires correspond to the five senses: desires for sights, sounds, smells, tastes, 85 Daisō and Shukusō were Tang dynasty emperors who lived at the time of MasterNan’yō Echū. See Chapter Eighty, Tashintsū.

86    Ro The story of him leaving his mother is recorded in Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), koji. Ro was the family name of Master Daikan Enō, the Sixth Patriarch in China.koji, which represents the Sanskrit Raihai-tokuzui. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.gṛhaparti, “householder,” is explainedGyōji. in Chapter Eight (Vol. I), The concept

87    5the Dharma from Master Baso Dōitsu, although he never became a monk. See also Layman Hōun (?–808). Originally a disciple of Master Sekitō Kisen, he later received Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, nos.

Chapter Seventy-three, , 88, 99.

88    times used as a synonym for nirvana. In the former meaning, “without appearance” Mushō means “without appearance” or “non-birth.” In the latter meaning, it is some the present moment, which is cut off from the past and future and therefore without describes 1) the eternity of time, which is without a beginning; and 2) the reality of

II), appearance or disappearance. See also the discussion in Chapter Twenty-three (Vol.Gyōbutsu-yuigi.

89    Tenshōkōtōroku, chap. 8.

90    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 7.

91    Master Rinzai Gigen (c. 815–867), successor of Master Ōbaku Kiun.

92    In modern-day Hopeh province in northeast China. 93 Rinzaieshōzenjigoroku.

94 from nirvana, “extinction,” which represents the state of nonattachment that theThe term parinirvāṇa, “complete extinction,” represents the Buddha’s death, as distinct

Buddha realized during his lifetime. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. 95 One of the ten powers of a Tathāgata. See note 100.

96 served the Buddha as an attendant monk but later returned to the secular world and Zenshō, lit., “Good Star,” represents the Sanskrit Sunakṣatra. It is said that Sunakṣatra Daihatsunehankyō cites him as an example slandered the Buddha and his teaching. The of an icchantika (one who pursues personal desires in the extreme), in whom arose

Avīci Hell even during his lifetime. The wrong view that there is no Buddha, Dharma, or nirvana. As a result, he fell into 97 wife, Mahāprajāpatī. The Buddha’s mother, Mahāmāyā, died soon after the Buddha’s Nanda was the son of the Buddha’s father, King Śuddhodana, by Śuddhodana’s second birth.

98    Suggests other members of the Śākya clan who were in line to become king.

99    The four Chapter Ninety, dhyānaShizen-biku.s are a categorization of the state in zazen into four stages. See

100  the Sanskrit Nyorai-gusoku-jūriki,daśa-tathāgata-balāni.“ten powers with which a Tathāgata is equipped,” represents See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. A traditional superior or inferior qualities of others, 5) knowing the desires of others, 6) knowing interpretation of the ten powers is as follows: 1) knowing right and wrong, 2) knowing which karmic effects follow from which causes, 3) knowing the various balanced states (four dhyānas, eight states of liberation, three samādhis, etc.), 4) knowing the knowing the past; 9) knowing life and death, 10) knowing how to end excesses. The states of others, 7) knowing the destinations of others (nirvana, hell, etc.), 8)

101  Daihatsunehankyō, fascicle 33.

102  Dan-zenkon, “cutter of good roots,” represents the Sanskrit icchantika, which means wrong. See Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.who therefore has no belief in the Buddha and no interest in doing good and not doingone who pursues to the end his or her personal wishes, desires, or inclinations, and

103  Sanskrit Terms. Views). Sometimes the former five are regarded as one group, and the five wrong3)conceit, 4) envy, and 5) meanness. At the same time, represents the Sanskrit mūla-kleśaGoketsu. mūḍhapañca dṛṣṭayah, The five fetters, according to one interpretation, are: 1) greed, 2) anger, 3)(confusion), 4) are regarded as a second group. See Volume I, Glossary of “affliction.” The Vijñānavāda school enumerates sixketsu, “that which ties or hinders,” or fundamental afflictions: 1) kleśa,māna (self-conceit), 5) rāga (vehement desire), 2) vicikitsā (doubt), and 6) pratighadṛṣṭi((anger),wrong

views,

104  (Gokon belief), 2) prajñā(“five roots”), from the Sanskrit vīrya(wisdom). See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. These roots of good conduct(diligence), 3) smṛtiSanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,(mindfulness), 4) pañcendriyāṇi.Shōbōgenzō, Ippyakuhachi-hōmyō-In Sanskrit they are: 1) samādhi (the balanced state),and in the penul-śraddhā and 5) are listed in Chapter Seventy-three, timate chapter of the twelve-chapter edition of the mon (see Appendix III).

105  Kiseinhongyō, Occurrences of Causes in the World. “fascicle 4. The literal meaning of ki-se-in-hongyō is “Sutra of Past

106  so it appears to have no flowers. Ancient Indians used the The symbol of something very rare, saying that the flower bloomed only once every three thousand years. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), uḍumbara is a kind of mulberry tree that grows in India. Its flowers form a peel, Udonge. uḍumbara flower as a

107  Ōsen, literally, “Yellow Spring.” In the Daoist tradition in China, yellow represents the earth.

108  Shi-e, “four reliance’s,” are listed in the Daijōgishō, fascicle 2.

109  Chinkiyaku. The Zengaku-daijiten says that this referred to medicines that had fallen cattle. Out of use in secular society, such as compounds made from the feces and urine of 110 Isshō-furi-sōrin.II), Dōtoku. The words of Master Jōshū Jūshin. See Chapter Thirty-nine (Vol. 111 Aniruddha was a cousin of the Buddha and one of the Buddha’s ten great disciples, seeing intuitively. Said to be foremost in supernatural vision. He lost his eyesight but was excellent at

112  Śuddhodana’s brother Droṇodana (but is said not to have become a monk). Or it mayrefer to Mahānāma-Koliya, who was one of the five delivered his first preaching (but was of the Koliya clan, not the Śākya clan).This may refer to Mahānāma, who, like Ānanda and Aniruddha, was a son of Kingbhikṣus to whom the Buddha

113  Bhadrika was one of the five bhikṣus. He belonged to the Śākya clan.

114  King Siṃhahanu, lit., “Having the Jaws of a Lion,” was the name of the father of King Śuddhodana and the grandfather of Gautama Buddha. 115 Sangai, “triple world,” in this case means the whole world or the whole universe. 116 The republic of the Licchavi tribe, with its capital at Vaiśālī, was one of the main republics of the central Gangetic plain in the Buddha’s time.

117  most in exact observance of Mitsugyo-daiichi,great disciples was known as the foremost in some virtue. Rāhula was said to be fore-literally, “number one in exact conduct.” Each of the Buddha’s tenśīla (precepts).

118  Kōshi was an ancient state of southern India. The Sanskrit is probably Kanchipuram.

119  Chapter Ninety-four, Zen’enshingi, fascicle 1. This quotation also appears in Chapter Eighty-three, Jukai. Shukke; 120 monastery as a place where monks are clustered together. See also note 110; Glossary Sōrin, lit., “clump of forest,” from the Sanskrit piṇḍavana, suggests a Buddhist of Sanskrit Terms.

121  Trees and shrubs of the genus Gardenia have fragrant, showy white or yellow flowers.

122  Even in those Buddhist monasteries where the precepts were not obeyed strictly,

Master Dōgen still felt something in the life of Buddhist monks that was valuable and beyond the profane situations of the secular world.

123  1255written by Master Dōgen in the last years of his life. Master Dōgen died in 1253. He had given a short lecture on leaving family life (Chapter Eighty-three, 1246family life, Master Dōgen selected many relevant excerpts from sutras and preparedEjō edited Master Dōgen’s draft and added this concluding note. Comments on them, and that after Master Dōgen’s death his successor Master Koun. It seems likely that, with a view to giving a longer lecture on the merit of leaving. This is one of the chapters of the twelve-chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō Shukke) in

[Chapter Eighty-seven] Kuyō-shobutsu

Serving Offerings to Buddhas

Translator’s Note: Kuyō means “to serve offerings,” shobutsu means “buddhas,” and so kuyō-shobutsu means “to serve offerings to buddhas.” There is a tradition in Buddhism of believers serving offerings to buddhas, that is, people who have attained the truth. It is a very natural action, therefore, to serve offerings to buddhas. People who have a purely spiritual viewpoint may feel it unnecessary to serve material offerings, believing that religious reverence is sufficient. Buddhism, however, is not a spiritual religion but a religion of reality, and so it reveres conduct. Thus Buddhism values the action of making real offerings, and affirms the serving of offerings as a demonstration of sincere belief, whether or not the offerings are materially valuable or not. The value is in the serving of the offering itself, which is just Buddhist conduct.

[127] The Buddha said:

If there were no past ages, There could be no past buddhas.

If there were no past buddhas,

There would be no leaving family life and receiving ordination.1

Clearly remember, in the three ages,2 without fail, buddhas exist. Now, with regard to past buddhas, do not say that they have a beginning, and do not say that they have no beginning. If we falsely suppose the existence or nonexistence of a beginning and an end, we are not learning the Buddha Dharma at all. Those who serve offerings3 to past buddhas and, leaving family life, follow and obey them, inevitably become buddhas. They become buddhas by virtue of serving buddhas. How could living beings who have never served offerings to even a single buddha themselves become buddha? There can be no becoming buddha without cause.

207

[129] The Butsuhongyōjikkyō (chapter 1, “Serving Offerings”)4 says: The Buddha told Maudgalyāyana,5 “I remember in the past, in the orders of countless infinite World-honored Ones, I planted many good roots and sought after anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi.

“Maudgalyāyana! I remember in the past, I assumed the body of a sacred wheel-turning king and met thirty koṭis of buddhas, all who shared one name and were named Śākya. The Tathāgata6 and a host of śrāvakas worshiped them, waited upon them, venerated them, and served offerings to them, furnishing them with the four things: namely, clothes, food and drink, bedding, and medicine. At that time those buddhas did not give me the affirmation that ‘You will attain anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, and [become] Understander of the World, Teacher of Gods and Human Beings, and World-honored Buddha. In a future

age you will be able to realize the right state of truth.’

“Maudgalyāyana! I remember in the past, I assumed the body of a sacred wheel-turning king and met eight koṭis of buddhas, all who shared one name and were named Burning Torch.7 The Tathāgata and a host of śrāvakas worshiped and venerated them and served them offeings of the four things: namely, clothes, food and drink, bedding, and medicine; and banners, canopies, flowers, and incense. At that time those buddhas did not give me the affirmation that ‘You will attain anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, and [become] Understander of the World, Teacher of Gods and Human Beings, and World-honored Buddha.’

“Maudgalyāyana! I remember in the past, I assumed the body of a sacred wheel-turning king, and met three koṭis of buddhas, all who shared one name and were named Puṣya. The Tathāgata and a host of śrāvakas furnished them completely with offerings of the four things. At that time those buddhas did not give me the affirmation that ‘You will become buddha.’”

[131] Besides these, he served offerings to innumerable other buddhas. In the body of a sacred wheel-turning king he would invariably have ruled four continents; materials for serving offerings to buddhas, truly, must have been plentiful. If he was a great wheel-turning king he would have been the king of a three-thousandfold world; the service of offerings at that time would be beyond the imagination of common [people] today. Even if the Buddha explained it, it might be hard to comprehend.

[131] The Butsuzōkyō8 (chapter 8, “The Pure View”) says:

The Buddha told Śāriputra,9 “I remember in the past, seeking after anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, I met thirty koṭis of buddhas, all named Śākyamuni. I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king and throughout a lifetime, for the purpose of seeking after anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, I served to buddha and disciples offerings of clothes, food and drink, bedding, and medicine. Yet those buddhas did not affirm me [by saying,] ‘In a coming age you will be able to become buddha.’ Wherefore? Because I had expectation of gain.10

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past, I was able to meet eight thousand buddhas, all named Constant Light.11 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king and throughout a lifetime, for the purpose of seeking after anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, I served 285c to buddha and disciples offerings of clothes, food and drink, bedding, and medicine. Yet those buddhas did not affirm me [by saying,] ‘In a coming age you will be able to become buddha.’ Wherefore? Because I had expectation of gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past I met sixty thousand koṭis of buddhas, all named Brightness.12 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king and throughout a lifetime, for the purpose of seeking after anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi, I served to buddha and disciples offerings of clothes, food and drink, bedding, and medicine. Yet those buddhas also did not affirm me [by saying,] ‘In a coming age you will be able to become buddha.’ Wherefore? Because I had expectation of gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in a past age I met three koṭis of buddhas, all named Puṣya. I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel turning king and served offerings of the four things. All did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in a past age I was able to meet eighteen thousand buddhas, all named Mountain King.13 The kalpa was called the ‘upper eight.’ In the orders of all these eighteen thousand buddhas, I shaved my hair and dyed a robe, and I trained in anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. All did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in a past age I was able to meet five hundred buddhas, all named Flowers Above.14 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king and served offerings of every kind to the buddhas and their disciples. All did not affirm me— because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past I was able to meet five hundred buddhas, all named Majestic Virtue.15 I served offerings to them all. All did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in a past age, I was able to meet two thousand buddhas, all named Kauṇḍinya.16 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king and served to the buddhas offerings of every kind. All did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in a past age, I met nine thousand buddhas, all named Kāśyapa. I served offerings of the four things to the buddhas and their hosts of disciples. All did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past, for ten thousand kalpas no

buddha appeared. In the first five hundred kalpas of that period, there were ninety thousand pratyekabuddhas. Throughout lifetimes I served them all offerings of clothes, food and drink, bedding, and medicine; and I worshiped and praised them. In the next five hundred kalpas, I served offerings of the four things to a further eighty-four thousand koṭis of pratyekabuddhas, and I worshiped and praised them.

“Śāriputra! After these thousand kalpas there were no more pratyekabuddhas. I then died in Jambudvīpa and was born in a Brahmā world, becoming Great King Brahmā. Thus I proceeded for five hundred kalpas, always being born in a Brahmā world and becoming Great King Brahmā, never being born in Jambudvīpa. After these five hundred kalpas, I was born down in Jambudvīpa, and I governed Jambudvīpa. [But] when my life ended I was born in the Heaven of the Four Quarter Kings.17 When my life there ended, I was born in Trāyastriṃśa Heaven,18 becoming Śakra-devānām-indra. Thus I proceeded, completing five hundred kalpas [before] being born in Jambudvīpa, [then] completing five hundred kalpas being born in a Brahmā world and becoming Great King Brahmā.

“Śāriputra! In nine thousand kalpas, only once was I born in Jambudvīpa. For nine thousand kalpas I was born only in the heavens above. At the time of the holocaust which ends a kalpa, I was born in the Heaven of Luminous Sound,19 [but] once the world was created I was again born in a Brahmā world. For nine thousand kalpas, I was never [again] born among human beings.

“Śāriputra! In these nine thousand kalpas, there were no buddhas or pratyekabuddhas, and many living beings fell into evil ways. “Śāriputra! After the passing of these ten thousand kalpas, there appeared in the world a buddha named Universal Protector Tathāgata,20 One who Deserves Offerings,21 Rightly All-enlightened One,22 One who is Perfect in Knowledge and Action,23 One who has Fared Well,24 Understander of the World,25 Supreme One,26 Controller of Humans,27 Teacher of Gods and Human Beings,28 World-honored Buddha.29 At that time, when my life finished in a Brahmā world and I was born in Jambudvīpa, I became a sacred wheel-turning king named Communal Heaven,30 whose human lifespan was ninety thousand years. I spent [this] lifetime serving offerings of all kinds of comforts to that buddha and to ninety koṭis of bhikṣus for ninety thousand years, for the purpose of seeking after anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. This buddha, Universal Protector, also did not affirm me [by saying,] ‘In a coming age you will be able to become buddha.’ Wherefore? [Because] at that time, I could not fully understand that all dharmas are real form, and I was greedily attached to the gaining view of the calculating self.

“Śāriputra! During that kalpa there appeared a hundred buddhas, each named differently. I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king and spent a lifetime serving offerings to buddhas and disciples, for the purpose of seeking after anuttara samyaksaṃ- 286b bodhi. Yet these buddhas also did not affirm me [by saying,] ‘In a coming age you will be able to become buddha.’ This was because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past, during the seven hundredth asaṃkhya of kalpas, I was able to meet a thousand buddhas, all named Jambūnada.31 I spent lifetimes serving them offerings of the four things. They also did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past, again during the seven hundredth asaṃkhya of kalpas, I was able to meet six hundred and twenty myriad buddhas, each named Seeing All Forms.32 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king, and throughout a lifetime I served offerings of all comforts to buddhas and disciples. They also did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past, again during the seven hundredth asaṃkhya of kalpas, I was able to meet eighty-four buddhas, all named Imperial Form.33 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king, and throughout a lifetime I served offerings of all comforts to buddhas and disciples. They also did not affirm me— because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in the past, again during the seven hundredth asaṃkhya of kalpas, I was able to meet fifteen buddhas, all named Sun Bright.34 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king, and throughout a lifetime I served offerings of all comforts to buddhas and disciples. They also did not affirm me— because I was expecting gain.

“Śāriputra! I remember in a past age, again during the seven hundredth asaṃkhya of kalpas, I was able to meet sixty-two buddhas, all named Good Serenity.35 I then, for every one of them, became a sacred wheel-turning king, and throughout a lifetime I served them offerings of all comforts. They also did not affirm me—because I was expecting gain.

“Thus I proceeded until I met Buddha Constant Light,36 and instantly attained realization of nonappearance.37 Immediately [Buddha Constant Light] affirmed me, saying, ‘In an age to come, after the passing of asaṃkhya kalpas, you will be able to become a buddha named Śākyamuni Tathāgata, One Who Deserves Offerings, Rightly All-enlightened One, One Who Is Perfect in Knowledge and Action, One Who Has Fared Well, Understander of the World, Supreme One, Controller of Humans, Teacher of Gods and Human Beings, Worldhonored Buddha.’”

[141] From meeting in the beginning with thirty koṭis of Śākyamuni

buddhas and serving offerings to them throughout lifetimes until meeting 286c with Constant Light Tathāgata, in all cases he constantly spends lifetimes serving offerings in the body of a sacred wheel-turning king. Sacred wheelturning kings may often be more than eighty-thousand years of age. [His service of offerings] is the service of offerings of all kinds of comforts throughout a lifetime of sometimes ninety thousand years and [sometimes] eighty thousand years. “Constant Light Buddha” means Burning Torch Tathāgata.38 [In both sutras] he meets thirty koṭis of Śākyamuni Buddhas: the preaching of the Butsuhongyōjikkyō and the Butsuzōkyō are the same.

[141]     Śākya Bodhisattva in the first asaṃkhya met, attended, and served offerings to seventy-five thousand buddhas, the first named Śākyamuni and the last named Jewel Topknot.39 In the second asaṃkhya he met, attended, and served offerings to seventy-six thousand buddhas, the first that same Jewel Topknot and the last named Burning Torch.40 In the third asaṃkhya he met, attended, and served offerings to seventyseven thousand buddhas, the first that same Burning Torch and the last named Excellent Reflection.41 While cultivating the signs42 and karma of different maturation43 for ninety-one kalpas, he met, attended, and served offerings to six buddhas, the first that same Excellent Reflection and the last named Kāśyapa.44

[142]     In general, in his service of offerings to buddhas for three greatasaṃkhyas of kalpas, there was nothing spared at all, beginning with [his own] body and life, through kingdoms and cities, wives and children, the seven treasures, male and female [servants], and so on. It is beyond the common intellect. He served offerings of silver bowls filled to the brim with golden millet, or of gold and silver bowls filled to the brim with seven-treasure millet. Or he served offerings of azuki beans, or flowers of water and land, or sandalwood, aloes, and other incense. Or he served to the Buddha Burning Torch offerings of five-stalked blue lotus flowers bought for five hundred pieces of gold and silver.45 Or he served this [buddha] with the offering of a deerskin robe.46 As a general rule in making offerings to buddhas, it is not that we serve offerings of what might be essential to buddhas: without delay, 287a while life remains to us, without passing any time in vain, we serve offerings.

Of what benefit to buddhas are even gold and silver? Of what benefit to buddhas are even incense and flowers? Rather, that [buddhas] accept is due to great kindness and great compassion in allowing living beings to increase merit.

[144] The Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra47 (fascicle 22) says:

The Buddha preached, “Good sons! I remember countless infinite nayutas of kalpas ago, when the world was called sahā, there was a Worldhonored Buddha named Śākyamuni Tathāgata, One Who Deserves Offerings, Rightly All-enlightened One, One Who Is Perfect in Knowledge and Action, One Who Has Fared Well, Understander of the World, Supreme One, Controller of Humans, Teacher of Gods and Human Beings, World-honored Buddha. For many great assemblies he expounded the Great Nirvana Sutra like this. I at that time, turning from a place of good friends, heard that that the Buddha was going to preach the Great Nirvana Sutra to a great assembly. After I had heard this, my heart rejoiced, and I wanted to prepare a service of offerings. Being of humble abode and without possessions, I intended to barter my own body. Unfortunately it did not sell. Then, intending to return home, I met a man on the road and told him, ‘I want to sell my body. Could you not buy me, sir?’

“The man replied, ‘The work I have at my home is beyond human

endurance. If you could do it, I would buy you.’

“I then asked him, ‘What work is there that is beyond human

endurance?’

“Veritably, that man replied, ‘I have a terrible illness, for which a good doctor has prescribed [the following] medicine: I am to take, daily, three pounds of human flesh. If you can really supply me with three pounds of your body’s flesh every day, I will give you five gold coins.’

“Then, having heard this, I rejoiced in my heart. I told him further, ‘If you give me the coins and allow me seven days, when I have finished my own business, I will be obliged to return at once and work for you.’

“Veritably, that man replied, ‘Seven days is impossible. If you are able to do exactly as [I have] described, I will permit you one day.’ “Good sons! I then took those coins and returned to the place of   287b

the Buddha. I bowed my head and face to his feet and offered to him all that I possessed. After that, with a sincere mind, I listened to this sutra. At this time, being dull and stupid, although I was able to hear the sutra, I was only able to receive and retain the words of one verse:

The Tathāgata experienced nirvana,

And forever eradicated life and death. If, with sincerity, you listen,

Constantly you will attain boundless joy.

“After receiving this verse, I went straight back to the home of that sick man. Good sons! Although then I indeed gave him three pounds of flesh every day, with remembrance of the verse as a direct and cooperating cause, I completed a month without feeling pain and without missing a day. Good sons! Due to this direct and cooperating cause, the illness was cured and my own body healed without even a scar. At that time, seeing that my body was perfectly sound, I instantly established the will to anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. The power of even a single verse can be like this; how much more might be [the power] of completely receiving, retaining, reading, and reciting [the sutra]! Seeing that this sutra has such efficacy, I established the will over and over, and vowed that in future, if I were able to realize the Buddhist truth, I would be named Śākyamuni Buddha. Good sons! It is by virtue of the direct and cooperating influence of this single verse that I am today caused to expound [the sutra] completely to the gods and human beings in the great assembly. Good sons! Therefore this heavenly state of nirvana is unthinkable. It accomplishes countless and infinite merits.

Just this is the profound secret treasury of the buddha-tathāgatas.” [148] The bodhisattva of that age who sold his body is the antecedent of the Śākyamuni Buddha of the present age. By referring to other sutras [we can know that] the beginning of the first asaṃkhya of kalpas was the time when he served offerings to the old Śākyamuni Buddha. In that age he was a tiler, and his name was Great Brightness. When he served offerings to the old Śākyamuni Buddha and disciples, he made offerings of three kinds: straw cushions,48 sugared drinks, and torches.49 At that time he made the following vow: “[My] national land, name, lifespan, and disciples shall be exactly the same as those of this Śākyamuni Buddha.” The vow he made then has already

287c been realized today. Therefore, when thinking of serving offerings to buddhas, never say that your body is destitute, and never say that your household is destitute. [This story of] selling one’s own body in order to serve offerings to buddhas is the right Dharma of the present Great Master Śākyamuni. Who could not be overjoyed by it? In it [the bodhisattva] meets a taskmaster who every day slices off three pounds of body flesh: [this] would be beyond the endurance of any other person, even a friend in virtue. Yet aided by a profound will to serve offerings, [the bodhisattva] possesses the virtue [described] now. Our listening now to the Tathāgata’s right Dharma may be body flesh from that distant age being distributed. The present four-line verse is beyond being traded for five gold coins. During three asaṃkhyas [of kalpas] or one hundred great kalpas, in the reception of lives and the relinquishment of lives, it has not been forgotten; and in the orders of that buddha and this buddha it has continued to be substantiated: truly, it may possess unthinkable virtue. Disciples to whom the Dharma has been bequeathed should receive and retain it with profound humility. The Tathāgata himself has already proclaimed that “The power of even a single verse can be like this.” [The virtue of the verse] may be immensely profound. [150] The Lotus Sutra says:

If people, to stupas and shrines,

To jewel images and painted images,

With flowers, incense, banners, and canopies Reverently serve offerings;

[Or] if they cause others to make music,

To beat drums, to blow horns and conchs,

[To play] panpipes, flutes, lutes, lyres, Harps, gongs, and cymbals, And many fine sounds such as these

They bring forth entirely as offerings; Or [if] with joyful hearts,

They sing the praises of the Buddha’s virtue,

Even in one small sound,

They all have realized the Buddha’s truth.

If people whose mind is distracted

With even a single flower

Serve offerings to a painted [buddha] image,

They will gradually see numberless buddhas.

Again, people who do prostrations Or who simply join palms,

Even those who raise a hand

               Or slightly lower the head,                                                                            

And thus serve an offering to an image Will gradually see countless buddhas, Will naturally realize the supreme truth,

And will widely save numberless multitudes.50

[151]        This is the very brains and eyes of the buddhas of the three times, and we should strive headlong to meet the sages and emulate them. Do not pass time in vain! Great Master Sekitō Musai says, “Do not pass time in vain!”51 Virtue like this, in every case, realizes buddha. Past, present, or future, it must be the same: there can never be two or be three.52 People who, due to the cause of serving offerings to buddhas, realize the effect of becoming buddha, are like this.

[152]        The ancestral master Nāgārjuna53 said:

When we are pursuing the buddha-effect,

To praise a single verse,

To chant a single “namas,”54 To burn a single pinch of incense, To offer a single flower:

Small actions like these,

Without fail, enable us to become buddha.55

Although this is the preaching of the ancestral master and Bodhisattva Nāgārjuna alone, we should devote our life to it. Still more, it is the preaching of Great Master Śākyamuni Buddha, as authentically transmitted and upheld by the ancestral master Nāgārjuna. That we now, climbing the treasure mountain of the Buddha’s truth and entering the treasure ocean of the Buddha’s truth, fortunately have obtained treasure, is most joyful. It may be the influence of vast kalpas of offerings to buddhas. We must not doubt that without fail, we are able to become buddha: it is assured. The preaching of Śākyamuni Buddha is like this.

[153] Furthermore, there are cases of a small [direct] cause having a great effect, and of small circumstantial causes having great results. When we are pursuing the Buddha’s truth, to praise one verse, to chant “namas buddha” once, or to burn one pinch of incense, inevitably enables us to become buddha. Still more, if we hear and know that all dharmas are real form,56 beyond appearance and disappearance and beyond nonappearance and nondisappearance, then whatever causal and circumstantial karma we enact, we will never fail at all.57

The ancestral master Nāgārjuna has intimately received the authentic transmission of the World-honored One’s preaching, which is as conspicuous as this. [This preaching] possesses the right and traditional transmission of the golden words of genuine truth. Even if it is the preaching of ancestral

288b master Nāgārjuna himself, it should not be compared with the preaching of other masters. That we have been able to meet his authentic transmission, and propagation, of that which the World-honored One displayed, is most joyful. Do not randomly compare these sacred teachings with the empty elaborations of common teachers of the Eastern Land. [154] The ancestral master Nāgārjuna said:

Furthermore, because buddhas revere Dharma, they serve offerings to Dharma and make the Dharma their teacher. Why? [Because] the buddhas of the three times all make “all dharmas are real form” into their teacher.

[Someone] asks, “Why do they not serve offerings to the Dharma within their own bodies, but [only] serve offerings to the Dharma in others?” [I] answer: They follow the way of the world. When a bhikṣu wants to serve offerings to the treasure of Dharma, he does not serve offerings to the Dharma within his own body, but serves offerings to others who are retaining Dharma, who know Dharma, and who understand Dharma. Buddhas also are like this. Even though the Dharma is present in their own bodies, they serve offerings to the Dharma in other buddhas.

[Someone] asks, “Given that buddhas do not seek to gain merit, for what reason do they serve offerings?” [I] answer: Buddhas, for countless asaṃkhyas of kalpas, cultivate all virtues and constantly practice all forms of good, but not in pursuit of reward. Because they revere virtue [itself], therefore they perform the service of offerings. For instance when the Buddha was living there was a blind bhikṣu who, though his eyes saw nothing, sewed robes by his own hand. Once his needle came unthreaded and he said, “Is there any lover of merit who will thread the needle for me?” Then the Buddha came there and told the bhikṣu, “I am a person who loves merit, so I have come to thread your needle for you.” This bhikṣu recognized the Buddha’s voice. He promptly stood up, put on a robe, and bowed at the Buddha’s feet. He said to the Buddha, “The Buddha has already fully accomplished virtue. Why did you say that you love merit?” The Buddha replied, “Although I have accomplished virtue already, I profoundly know the causes of virtue, the effects and results of virtue, and the power of virtue. That I now have attained preeminence among all living beings stems from this virtue. For this reason, I love it.” The Buddha, having praised virtue for this bhikṣu, then spontaneously preached to him the Dharma. This bhikṣu attained purity of the Dharma-eye whose clarity was beyond eyes of flesh.58

[157] I heard this story long ago during a nighttime talk in the room of

my late master. Thereafter I was able to check it against sentences of [the 288c Dai]chidoron. The instruction of the ancestral master of the Dharma transmission had been clear and he had left nothing out. These sentences are in [the Dai]chidoron [fascicle] number 10. That the buddhas invariably treat “all dharmas are real form” as their great teacher is evident. Śākyamuni also approved the usual method of all the buddhas. Their treating “all dharmas are real form” as their great teacher means their service of offerings to and veneration of the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Buddhas, for countless asaṃkhyas of kalpas, accumulate innumerable virtues and good roots without seeking any reward at all; they simply serve offerings in veneration of virtue itself. Having arrived at the state that is the buddha-effect of bodhi, they still love small [acts of] virtue, and so [the Buddha] threads the needle for the blind bhikṣu. If we hope to clarify the virtue that is the buddha-effect, the present story is an exact account of it. Therefore, the virtue

that is the buddha-effect of bodhi, and the truth that is “all dharmas are real form,” are not as in the thoughts of common people in the world today. Common people today think that “all dharmas are real form” might apply to the commitment of wrongs, and they think that the buddha-effect of bodhi might only relate to gain.59 False views like these, even if they see eighty thousand kalpas, never escape the essentialist view of past kalpas60 and the trivialist view of future kalpas.61 How can they perfectly realize the “all dharmas are real form” that “buddhas alone, together with buddhas”62 perfectly realize? The reason [they cannot] is that what “buddhas alone, together with buddhas” perfectly realize is just “all dharmas are real form.”

[159]          Broadly there are ten kinds of service of offerings, namely: 1) serving offerings to a person, 2) serving offerings to a caitya, 3) serving offerings to what is actually present, 4) serving offerings to what is not actually present, 5) service of offerings performed by oneself, 6)

service of offerings performed by others, 7) serving offerings of prop-

erty, 8) serving offerings of excellence, 9) untainted service of offerings, 10) serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth.63

[160]          Among these, “Number 1, serving offerings to a person,” is[explained] as follows: “Performing the service of offerings to a buddha’s physical body is called serving offerings to a person.”

[160] Number 2: making offerings to a buddha’s shrine is called serving offerings to a caitya.64 The Sōgiritsu65 says, “One containing bones66 is called a stupa.67 One without bones is referred to as a caitya.” Some say that both are called caityas. Further, the Sanskrit word stupa,68 pronounced “chuba,”69 is here70 translated as “square tomb” or “shrine.” The Āgamas say “shicha.”71

Whether we call it a stupa or whether we call it a caitya, it appears to be the same. On the other hand, Great Zen Master Nangaku [E]shi’s72 Hokkesenbō73 says: “Wholeheartedly we bow in veneration to the śarīras, to the images of honored ones, to the caityas, to the wonderful stupas, and to the Tathāgata Abundant Treasures and the treasure stupa that is his whole body,74 of worlds in the ten directions.” Clearly, [in these words] caityas and stupas, śarīras and images of honored ones, seem to be separate.

[162] The Sōgiritsu (fascicle 33) says:   

Dharma regarding stupas: The Buddha was staying in the kingdom of Kośala and wandering. On one occasion a brahman who was plowing the earth saw the World-honored One going by. Holding his ox-stick on the ground for support, he bowed to the Buddha. The World-honored One, having seen this, smiled. The [accompanying] bhikṣus said to the

Buddha, “For what reason did you smile? We solely desire to hear.”

The Buddha then told the bhikṣus, “This brahman now has bowed

to two World-honored Ones.”

The bhikṣus said to the Buddha, “Which two buddhas?”

The Buddha told the bhikṣus, “In his bowing to me, right under

his stick there was a stupa of Kāśyapa Buddha.”

The bhikṣus said to the Buddha, “We beg to see the stupa of Kāśyapa Buddha.”

The Buddha told the bhikṣus, “You must request from this brahman

this plot together with its mass of earth.”

The bhikṣus at once requested it, whereupon the brahman at once donated it. Having obtained [the land], the World-honored One then manifested a seven-treasure stupa of Kāśyapa Buddha. Its height was one yojana, and the width of its front was half a yojana. The brahman, upon seeing it, immediately said to the Buddha, “World-honored One! My family name is Kāśyapa. This will be my Kāśyapa’s stupa.”

Then the World-honored One, at that same abode, fashioned a

stupa for Kāśyapa Buddha. The bhikṣus said to the Buddha, “World- 289b honored One! May we contribute mud and earth, or not?”

The Buddha said, “You may contribute them.” Then he preached

the following verse:

Hundreds of thousands of pounds of pure gold,75 Brought for almsgiving,

Do not equal a single ball of mud

Used, with devout mind, to build a Buddha’s stupa.

[164]           At that time the World-honored One himself constructed thestupa for Kāśyapa Buddha. Its base was four-sided and was surrounded by a handrail. [The mound] was of circular construction, in two layers, with square tusks protruding in the four [directions]. The top, which was decked with banners and canopies, showed a long spire of rings.76 The Buddha said, “The method of building a stupa should be like this.” The stupa had been completed. The World-honored One, because he venerated the buddhas of the past, then personally performed prostrations. The bhikṣus said to the Buddha, “World-honored One! May we perform prostrations, or not?” The Buddha said, “You may.” Then he preached the following verse:

People’s hundreds of thousands of [gifts of] gold,

Brought for almsgiving,

Do not equal one good mind

Bowing in veneration to a Buddha’s stupa.

[165]           At that time people of the world, hearing that the World honored One had built the stupa, came bearing incense and flowers to offer to the World-honored One. The World-honored One, because he served offerings to the buddhas of the past, then received the incense and flowers and took them to serve as offerings to the stupa. The bhikṣus said to the Buddha, “May we serve offerings, or not?” The Buddha said, “You may.” Then he preached the following verse:

Hundreds of thousands of carts of pure gold, Brought for almsgiving,

Do not equal one good mind

With flowers and incense serving offerings to a stupa.

[165]  At that time a great gathering came together like a cloud.The Buddha told Śāriputra, “You will preach the Dharma for [these] people.” The Buddha then preached the following verse:

Hundreds of thousands of Jambudvīpas, Filled with alms of pure gold, Do not equal one gift of Dharma77

That causes others accordingly to train.

At that time, among those seated in the assembly, there were some who attained the truth. The Buddha then preached the following verse:

Hundreds of thousands of worlds, Filled with alms of pure gold,

Do not equal one gift of Dharma

According to which we see the genuine truth.

[166]  At that time the brahman attained indestructible belief. At once he set before the stupa a meal for the Buddha and the sangha. Then King Prasenajit,78 upon hearing about the World-honored One building Kāśyapa Buddha’s stupa, ordered seven hundred carts to be loaded with tiles and he visited the Buddha’s place. He bowed his head and face to the [Buddha’s] feet and said to the Buddha, “World-honored One! I desire to extend this stupa. May I do so, or not?” The Buddha said, “You may.” The Buddha told the great king, “During a past age, at the time of Kāśyapa Buddha’s parinirvāṇa, there was a king named Good Fortune79 who intended to build a stupa of the seven treasures. Then a retainer said to the king, ‘In a future age people who are against the Dharma will appear and will destroy this stupa, acquiring heavy 289c sin. Solely I beseech you, Great King, make [the stupa] out of tiles, and cover the surface with gold and silver. If someone takes the gold and silver, the stupa will still be able to remain intact.’ The king, as the retainer advised, built [the stupa] out of tiles and covered it with gold leaf. Its height was one yojana, and the width of its front was half a yojana. The handrail was made of copper. After seven years, seven months, and seven days [the stupa] was built. After its completion, [the king] served offerings of incense and flowers to [Kāśyapa] Buddha and to the sangha of bhikṣus.” King Prasenajit said to the Buddha, “That king was abundant with merit and he possessed rare treasures. Now I shall build, but I will not be able to equal that king.” Immediately he started building and after seven months and seven days [the stupa] was complete. After completing [the stupa], [King Prasena jit] served offerings to the Buddha and to the sangha of bhikṣus.

[168] The method of building a stupa: The base is four-sided and surrounded by a handrail. [The mound] is of circular construction, in two layers, with square tusks protruding in the four [directions]. The top is decked with banners and canopies, and shows a long spire of rings. If [people] say that the World-honored One, having dispelled greed, anger, and delusion, [still] has recourse to such a stupa, for that they will acquire a sin [equal to] transgressing the Vinaya, because the karmic retribution will be heavy. This is called “the method of building a stupa.”

[168] Stupa construction: When building a saṃghārāma,80 first survey in advance good land to make into the site for a stupa. Stupas must not be located in the south and must not be located in the west. They should be located in the east or should be located in the north. The monks’ land must not encroach on the Buddha’s land, and the Buddha’s land must not encroach on the monks’ land. If a stupa is close to a forest [containing] corpses, and if dogs might carry in leftovers and desecrate the site, a perimeter fence should be built. Monks’ quarters should be built in the west or in the south. Water from the monks’ land must not be allowed to run onto the Buddha’s land, [but] water from the Buddha’s land may run onto the monks’ land. A stupa should be built on a high and prominent site. It is not permissible, within the stupa perimeter, to wash or to dye robes or to dry them in the sun, or to wear leather shoes, or to cover the head, or to cover the shoulder,81 or to hack and spit on the ground. If [people] speak as follows: “Does the World-honored One, already having dispelled greed, anger, and delusion, [still] need such a stupa?” then they will acquire a sin [equal to] transgressing the Vinaya, because the karmic retribution will be heavy. This is called “stupa construction.”

[170] Stupa niches: At that time King Prasenajit visited the Buddha, bowed head and face at his feet, and said to the Buddha, “Worldhonored One! In building the stupa for Kāśyapa Buddha, may we make niches, or not?” The Buddha said, “You may. During a past age, after

Kāśyapa Buddha’s parinirvāṇa, King Good Fortune erected a stupa for [Kāśyapa] Buddha, and in its four aspects he built niches. For their upper parts he fashioned images of lions and all sorts of colorful paintings; for their fronts he made railings. [The niches] were a place to put flowers. Inside the niches he hung banners and canopies.” If people say that the World-honored One, having dispelled greed, anger, and delusion, still takes pleasure in his own glorification, they will acquire

a sin [equal to] transgressing the Vinaya and the karmic retribution will be heavy. This is called “stupa niches.”

[171]           Clearly we have seen that, in the state beyond the buddha effect of bodhi, to erect a stupa to eternal buddhas and to perform prostrations and offerings to it, is the usual method of the buddhas. Episodes like this are numerous, but for the present I shall just quote this one. With respect to the Buddha-Dharma, the Existence school82 is supreme, and within that [school] the Vinaya83 is most fundamental. The Vinaya was first brought [to China] by Hokken,84 after he had cleared a way through brambles and thorns to India and climbed Vulture Peak. The Dharma that has been authentically transmitted from patriarch to patriarch is exactly in conformity with the doctrine of existence.

[172]           Number 3, to serve offerings to what is actually present, means directly to face the bodies of buddhas and caityas, and to perform the service of offerings.

[172]           Number 4, to serve offerings to what is not actually present,means widely to perform the service of offerings to buddhas and caityas that are not actually present. That is to say, both in their presence and not in their presence, we serve offerings to buddhas and to caityas and stupas: we also make offerings to buddhas and to caityas and stupas that are not actually present. Serving offerings to what is actually present acquires great merits. Serving offerings to what is not actually present acquires great great merits, because the state is magnanimous and wide. Serving offerings to the present and the non-present [alike] acquires the greatest of great merits.

[173]           Number 5, service of offerings performed by oneself, means serving offerings with one’s own body to buddhas and to caityas.

[173]           Number 6, service of offerings performed by others to buddhas and to caityas, means causing others, if they have some small possession, not to be lazy in offering it. That is to say, regarding service of offerings by self and by others, we do either one, equally. Service of offerings performed by oneself acquires great merits. Causing others to serve offerings acquires great great merits. Serving offerings [in the state of unity] of self and others acquires the greatest of great merits.

[174]           In number 7, serving offerings of property to buddhas and

290b to caityas, stupas, and śarīras, there are said to be three kinds of property: 1) offerings of necessity goods,85 namely clothing, food, and so on; 2) offerings of generative goods, namely incense, flowers, and so on; and 3) offerings of decorative goods, namely all other treasures, adornments, and so on.

[174]      In number 8, serving offerings of excellence, there are three kinds of excellence: 1) just devotedly to perform the service of miscellaneous offerings; 2) with pure believing mind, to believe in the weight of the Buddha’s virtue and to serve offerings accordingly; and 3) while experiencing the will to transfer merit and the will to pursue the state of buddha, to perform the service of offerings.

[175]      In number 9, untainted service of offerings, there are two kinds of untaintedness: 1) the mind being untainted, being free from all transgressions; and 2) property being untainted, being free from violations of the Dharma.

[175]           Number 10 is serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth. That is to say, service of offerings following [realization of] the effect is called “serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth.” The buddha-effect is the state to be attained, and the practice of serving offerings, which can attain that state, is [itself] called “attainment of the state of truth.” Serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth is either called serving offerings of Dharma or called serving offerings of deeds. Within it there are three [categories]: 1) serving offerings of property may be serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth, 2) serving offerings of joy may be serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth, and 3) serving offerings of practice may be serving offerings of attainment of the state of truth.

The service of offerings to Buddha includes these ten services of offerings [listed] already. For Dharma and for Sangha similar categories also apply. Namely, to serve offerings to Dharma means to serve offerings to the teaching of principles and the methods of practice that the Buddha expounded, and also to serve offerings to volumes of the sutras. To serve offerings to Sangha means to serve offerings to all sacred beings of the three vehicles, and to their caityas, statues, and stupas, and to monks who are common people.

[177]      Next, the mind in serving offerings is of six kinds: 1) thesupreme mind of the field of happiness;86 within the field of happiness, it produces the greatest excellence; 2) the supreme mind [that recognizes] benevolence; all virtuous joys have appeared by virtue of the Three Treasures; 3) the appearance of the mind that is supremely excellent among all living beings; 4) the mind that is as hard to meet as the uḍumbara flower;87 5) the singular and independent undivided mind [that is one with] the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world; 6) the mind that, in all worldly areas and areas beyond the world, is completely equipped with reliable criteria—for example, the Tathāgata, being in complete possession of worldly and world-transcendent methods, is able to provide for living beings a basis upon which to rely: this is called being completely equipped with reliable criteria. If with these six minds we serve offerings to the Three Treasures, even if it is only something small, we will be able to secure countless and infinite merits, how much more if that [offering] is plentiful?

[178]      Such service of offerings we should perform unfailingly with sin-    290c

cere mind. It has been performed without fail by the buddhas. Stories about it are evident throughout the sutras and Vinaya. At the same time, the Buddhist patriarchs themselves have personally handed down its authentic transmission. Days and months of waiting in attendance and doing work are just times of serving offerings. The standards for placement of statues and śarīras, for serving offerings and doing prostrations, and for building stupas and building caityas, have been authentically transmitted only in the house of the Buddhist patriarchs. They are not authentically transmitted to anyone other than the descendants of the Buddhist patriarchs. Further, if [standards] are not authentically transmitted in accordance with the Dharma, they will contravene the Dharma standards. When the service of offerings contravenes the Dharma standards, it is not genuine. If the service of offerings is not genuine, its merit is spare. Without fail we should learn, and receive the authentic transmission of, the method of serving offerings which accords with the Dharma. Zen Master Reitō88 spent years and months tending to the site of Sōkei’s stupa; and the temple servant Ro,89 not resting day or night, pounded rice to serve to the assembly: [these instances] were entirely the service of offerings in accordance with the Dharma. They are a small sample of such [instances], which I do not have time to quote extensively. We should serve offerings like this.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kuyō-shobutsu

                                    A day during the summer retreat in the seventh                                     year of Kenchō.90

Notes

1 kudoku.Daibibasharon, chap. 76. Also quoted in the preceding Chapter Eighty-six, Shukke2 Sanze, “three times”; past, present and future; eternity.

3     Kuyō,Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.“serving offerings,” in Buddhist sutras represents the Sanskrit pūjana. See

4     The words in parenthesis are in small characters in the source text; they may havebeen added by a later editor.

5     One of the Buddha’s ten great disciples, foremost in mystical power. 6      The Buddha is referring to himself.

7 Nentō, “Burning Torch,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Dīpaṃkara, the name of a mythical buddha. 8 Butsuzōkyōha-sūtra. Translated from Sanskrit into Chinese by Kumārajīva.(Buddha’s Treasury Sutra), from the Sanskrit Buddhapiṭakaduḥśīlanirgra-

9      One of the Buddha’s ten great disciples.

10 or “grasping” (though it is not necessarily confined to grasping for material posses-Ushotoku means “gain,” or “to be after gain” (out to get something), or “expectation,”

appears in the antonym sions). In this case, it means having an ulterior motive other than just serving offerings. mushotoku, Heart Sutra .“non-gaining,” “nonattainment,” or “non expectation, “See Chapter Two (Vol. I), Maka-hannya-haramitsu.

11    Jōkō is another rendering of the Sanskrit name Dīpaṃkara. See note 7.

12    Kōmyō, representing the Sanskrit Prabhā.

13    San-ō. The Sanskrit name is Girirāja, or Śailendrarāja.

14    Kajō. The Sanskrit name is Padmottara.

15    Itoku. The Sanskrit name is probably Ādityateja.

16    ṛṣi The Sanskrit Kauṇḍinya means “coming from Kuṇḍina.” Kuṇḍina is the name of a(a legendary patriarchal Indian sage), and of a place.

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17    Shi-ten-ō-den,heavens in the world of desire. It is said to be located halfway down the side of Mount from the Sanskrit Cāturmahārājakāyikā, the first and lowest of the six

Sumeru.

18    Trāyastriṃśa Heaven is the second of the six heavens in the world of desire. The San-skrit in the center of the heaven and the thirty-two gods who surround him.trāyastriṃśa means “thirty-three,” referring to Śakra-devānām-indra who lives

19    Kō-on-ten,belongs in the world of matter, it may be interpreted as a less idealistic place than aheavens in the world of matter. Legend says that when gods in this heaven speak,pure light shines from their mouths and turns into words. However, because Ābhāsvarafrom the Sanskrit Ābhāsvara, is one of the second group of eighteen

Brahmā heaven.

20    follow.“Thus Come” or “One Who Has Arrived at the State of Reality,” represents the SanskritTathāgata, which is the first of the ten epithets of a buddha. The other nine epithetsFushu-nyorai. Fushu represents the meaning of an untraced Sanskrit name. Nyorai,

21    Ōgu, from the Sanskrit arhat.

22    Shōhenchi, from the Sanskrit samyaksaṃbuddha.

23    Myōgyōsoku, from the Sanskrit vidyā-caraṇa-saṃpanna.

24    Zenzei, from the Sanskrit sugata.

25    Sekenge, from the Sanskrit lokavit.

26    Mujōji, from the Sanskrit anuttara.

27    Chōgo-jōbu, from the Sanskrit puruṣa-damya-sārathi. 28 Tenninshi, from the Sanskrit śāstā-deva-manuṣyānām.

29    Butsu-seson, or “One in the State of Truth Who Is Honored by the World,” from the Sanskrit buddha-bhagavat.

30    Guten. The Sanskrit name has not been traced.

31    representing the Sanskrit Jambūnada-suvarṇa.In China and Japan this buddha is usually called Enbudan-gon, “Jambūnada Gold,”

32    Ken-issai-gi. The Sanskrit name is probably Sārvathadarśa.

33    Teiso. The Sanskrit name is Indradhvaja.

34    Nichimyo. The Sanskrit name is Sūryacandra.

35    Zenjaku. The Sanskrit name is probably Śānta.

36    Dīpaṃkara Buddha.

Chapter Eighty-seven

37    of, the Dharma that is without appearance. “indulgence”; at the same time, Mushōnin stands for nin, meaning “recognition” or “realization.” mushō-hō-nin, which means indulgence toward, or realizationNin represents the Sanskrit ksānti, or pronounced “nonappearance” or “non-birth,” expresses the state, or teaching, or fact, of boththe Dharma,” is a traditional expression of the state in which a person realizes theFour Noble Truths. See Chapter Eighty-six, nin can be interpreted as representing another characterShukke-kudoku,Ninpō, paragraph 91. “indulgence toward Mushō, instantaneousness and eternity.

38    Master Dōgen identified the names Constant Light (the rendering of Dīpaṃkara usedin the hongyōjikkyōButsuzōkyō). See notes 7 and ) and Burning Torch (the rendering of Dīpaṃkara

39    Hōkei represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Ratnaśikhin. 40 Dīpaṃkara.

41 Kōsetsu, “Universal Preaching. “seven ancient buddhas. In Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Shōkan represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Vipaśyin. Vipaśyin is the first of theBusso, Vipaśyin Buddha is called 42 refers to sanjūnisō, the thirty-two signs that distinguish the body of a buddha. 43 Ijuku-gō, i.e., performing various good deeds. See Chapter Eighty-four, Sanji-no-gō.

44 Kusharon The sixth of the seven ancient buddhas, the last being Śākyamuni Buddha himself.(Abhidharmakośa-śāstra), fascicle 18. 45 The blue lotus flowers to Buddha Burning Torch.”Butsuhongyōjikkyō says “For two asaṃkhya kalpas he served offerings of seven

46    and his own hair, over the mud. Ibid. “He served offerings to Buddha Burning Torch by spreading a deerskin robe,

47    Daihatsunehankyō (Sutra of the Great Demise).

48    Sōza, lit., “seats of grass,” from the Sanskrit tṛṇa-śayyā, lit., “bed of grass.”

49    Buddha), in this case suggests small paper torches, tapers, or candles.Nentō, lit., “burning torch” (as in the Chinese rendering of the name of Dīpaṃkara

50    Lotus Sutra, Hōben (“Expedient Means”). See LS 1.116.

51    Kōin muna[shiku] wata[ru koto] naka[re] appears at the end of the verse Sandōkai by Master Sekitō Kisen (700–790), successor of Master Seigen Gyōshi.

52    an expression in another part of In other words, one law applies in the past, present, and future. The expression mirrorsLotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.106.

53    The fourteenth patriarch in India, to whom the Daichidoron is attributed.

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54    case it suggests the reciting of devotions to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. See Chapter The Sanskrit namasKie-sanbō. means “bowing,” “obeisance,” or “reverential salutation.” In this

Eighty-eight,

55    Daichidoron, fascicle 7.

56    Shohō-jissō, from LS 1.68, is the title of Chapter Fifty (Vol. III).

57    Daichidoron, fascicle 7.

58    Daichidoron, fascicle 10. 59 Ushotoku. See note 10.

60 gedō,nine, dictional expression of idealism. This view is more commonly represented as Hongō-honken,Shinjin-ingaliterally, “eternity-view non-Buddhism” (see, for example, Chapter Eighty-the view that essences are eternal (e.g., the Platonic view)            jōken-

61    Matsukō-makken represents the materialist view, which is trivial because it does not into the future of the moral cause-and-effect relation. In the compound hon recognize that good actions in the present will produce good effects in the future. This view is more commonly represented as non-Buddhism,” that is, the nihilistic or materialistic view, which denies continuation and Matsu form a pair of opposites: beginning and end, substance and detail, danken-gedō, lit., “cutting-off–view honmatsu, essence, and 2) past; hongō-honken origin and future, essence and trivialities, etc. Therefore the parallel expressions and matsukō-makkenmatsu means 1) trivialities, and 2) future. Include a double play on words: hon means 1)

62    Yui-butsu-yo-butsu, again from LS 1.68, is the title of Chapter Ninety-one. 63 Daijōgishō, fascicle 14.

64 (Sanskrit-English DictionaryShidai is a purely phonetic transliteration of the Sanskrit defines a caitya as “a funeral monument or stupa or pyram-The Threefold Lotus Sutracaitya.as a pagoda in which Monier-Williams’ idal column containing the ashes of deceased persons.” In

sutras are deposited, and a stupa as a pagoda in which sacred relics are deposited. LSW), on the other hand, a distinction is drawn between a caitya

65 Mahāsaṃghika school (“School of the Great Sangha”), one of the two principal Sōgiritsu, short for Makasōgiritsu, a forty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya of the

Theravāda). The Chinese translation of the Buddha bhadra and Hokken during the Eastern Qin dynasty (317–419).Hinayana schools, the other being the Sthavira school (“School of the Elders”; Pāli:Makasōgiritsu was accomplished by

66 Shari Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. represents the sound of the Sanskrit śarīra, which means bones or relics. See 67 pagoda, or stupa. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Tōba represents the sound of the Sanskrit stupa. At the same time, means tower, Chapter Eighty-seven

68    Tōba, as in the preceding note.

69    Chuba, meaning is not relevant. a closer transliteration of the Sanskrit stupa, using Chinese characters whose

70    China.

71    Shichōacters in the source text indicates that in this case, but as is a purely phonetic transliteration of the Sanskrit cha. chō should be pronounced not ascaitya. A note in small charchō

72    Master Nangaku Eshi (515–577), the second patriarch of the Tendai sect in China.“Great Zen Master” is his title in the Tendai sect. 73 Hokkesenbō, short for Hokkezanmaisengi, which is said to have been written by Master Tendai Chigi, the third patriarch of the Tendai sect.

74 Alludes to the Lotus Sutra, Ken-hōtō (“Seeing the Treasure Stupa”). See LS 2.172. 75 A or sixty kilos.tan is a unit of weight approximately equal to one hundred and thirty-two pounds,

76    and pagodas in China and Japan; a vertical pole on which are suspended a row of Rinsō. This refers to an ornament still often seen on top of stupas in Tibet and Nepal, rings (usually nine) that decrease in size as they go higher.

77    kinds of giving (Hōse,āmiṣa-dāna, “giving of the Dharma,” from the Sanskrit and dānamuise,). The other two are “giving of fearlessness,” from the Sanskrit zaise, “giving of goods,” from the Sanskritdharma-dāna, is one of the threeabhaya-dāna.

78    Prasenajit was the king of Kośala, and a lay disciple of the Buddha.

79    from Sanskrit. The original Sanskrit name has not been traced. Kitsuri may represent the meaning of a Sanskrit name or it may be a transliteration

80    A saṃghārāma is a monastery or temple.

81    The kaṣāya is usually worn over the left shoulder, with the right shoulder bared. 82 UbuIn a narrow sense, this represents the Sarvāstivāda school. In a broader sense, it may stands for setsu-issai-u-bu, literally, “School that Preaches that All Things Exist.” be interpreted as the lineage which, through zazen, affirms real existence.

83    which was the name of the Vinaya of the Mahāsaṃghika school (see note 65). In a Sōgiritsu, lit., “Sangha Discipline,” in a narrow sense, stands for Sōgiritsu may simply be interpreted as the authentically transmitted Makasōgiritsu, and the Sarvāstivāda school are opposed. The notes: “According to the Sarvāstivādin tradition, the Buddhist order split into two Vinaya of the Buddha. From a scholarly point of view, the Mahāsaṃghika school broader sense,   Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary school, while the more conservative monks who rejected his new theories formed schools as a result of Mahādeva’s heresy: his followers formed the Mahāsaṃghika

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the Sthavira. In the third century after the demise of the Buddha, the Sarvāstivādatwo schools may not have been recognized in Master Dōgen’s time. On the other school emerged from the Sthavira.” On the one hand, this historical opposition of the that affirms the existence of this world and at the same time he strongly revered the hand, it may be argued that Master Dōgen strongly revered the true Buddhist lineage traditional Vinaya which belongs to that lineage, without discriminating between one sect and another.

84    year journey filled with hardships (“brambles and thorns”), he traced the history of Hokken became a monk in his childhood and departed for India in 399. After a six-

Vinaya, and Abhidharma), before returning to China via Sri Lanka in 414. Back in the Buddha, learned Sanskrit, and obtained Sanskrit texts of the Tripiṭaka (Sutra,Makasōgiritsu, together with Buddhabhadra, and other works.

China, he translated the He died at the age of eighty-two (one account says eighty-six).

85    The latter expression appears in Chapter Eighty-six, Shigu stands for shishōgu, lit., “contributing-to-life goods,” i.e., necessities of life.Shukke-kudoku, paragraph 95.

86    Fukuden suggests the state in zazen. The kaṣāya is called fukuden-e, “field of happiness robe.”

87    uḍumbara The uḍumbara flower, is rarely encountered. See Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), flower is a symbol of the Buddha’s state of mind, which, like theUdonge.

88    five. His posthumous title was Master Daigyō. Master Daikan Enō’s several times, staying on Sōkei Mountain until his own death at the age of ninety-Master Sōkei Reitō (666–760). He became a monk under Master Daikan Enō, whom he served until Master Daikan Enō’s death. Then he took care of a pagoda in which kaya was preserved. He declined the emperor’s invitation

89    Master Reitō lived. Master Daikan’s family name was Ro. Before formally becoming Master Daikan Enō (638–713). Sōkei is the name of the mountain on which he and See Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), a monk he worked on the temple grounds as a servant, pounding rice for the monks. Gyōji.

90    1255The structure of this chapter is similar to that of Chapter Eighty-six, . This is one of the chapters of the twelve-chapter edition of the Shukke-kudoku,Shōbōgenzō. with Master Dōgen adding brief comments to excerpts from sutras. Master DōgenKoun Ejō.died in 1253, two years before this concluding note was added, presumably by Master

[Chapter Eighty-eight] Kie-sanbō

Taking Refuge in the Three Treasures

Translator’s Note: Kie means “devotion to” or “taking refuge in,” and sanbō means “Three Treasures”: Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Buddha means Gautama Buddha and other people who have attained the same state as Gautama Buddha. Dharma means reality. Sangha means the Buddhist community of monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen. The Three Treasures are of supreme value in Buddhism and Master Dōgen emphasized the importance of devoting ourselves to them. He says that devotion to the Three Treasures is the beginning and the end of Buddhism.

[181] The Zen’enshingi (One hundred and twenty, question one) says, “Do you revere Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, or not?”

Clearly, in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, what the Buddhist patriarchs have authentically transmitted is reverence for Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. If we do not take refuge in them,1 we do not revere them; and if we do not revere them, we cannot take refuge in them. We accomplish the merit of this taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha whenever sympathetic communication of the truth2 takes place. Whether we are in the heav- 291a ens above, the human world, hell, or states of demons and animals, if sympathetic communication of the truth occurs, we take refuge without fail. Once we have taken refuge, we develop [merit] in every life, in every age, in every location, and at every place; we pile up merit and heap up virtue, and we accomplish [the truth of] anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. Even if we happen to be led by bad friends and encounter hindrances of demons, so that we temporarily become one who cuts off good roots, or become an icchantika,3 eventually we will continue with good roots, whose merit will develop. The merit of taking refuge in the Three Treasures is, in the end, not subject to decay. This “taking refuge in the Three Treasures” means, with concentrated

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pure belief—whether the age is one in which the Tathāgata is alive or whether it is after the Tathāgata’s extinction—holding the palms together, lowering the head, and orally reciting the following:

I, So-and-so,

From my present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body,

Take refuge in Buddha,

I take refuge in Dharma, I take refuge in Sangha.

I take refuge in Buddha, most honored of bipeds.

I take refuge in Dharma, honored as beyond desire.

I take refuge in Sangha, honored among communities.

I have taken refuge in Buddha, I have taken refuge in Dharma, I have taken refuge in Sangha.4

[184] Resolving upon the distant buddha-effect of bodhi, we should thus bring into being a saṃnāha.5 Then, although [this] body and mind, kṣāṇa by kṣāṇa, even now is appearing and disappearing, the Dharma body will long continue to thrive and will accomplish the state of bodhi, without fail. As for the meaning of “to take refuge” (literally, “to return to and to depend upon”), “to return” is “to devote oneself to,” and “to depend upon” is “to submit to”; for this reason, we call it “taking refuge.” The form of “devotion” is, for example, like a child belonging to its father. “Submission” is, for example, like a people depending upon their king. These are words for, in another word, “salvation.” Because the Buddha is our great teacher, we take refuge in him. Because the Dharma is good medicine, we take refuge in it. Because the Sangha is excellent friends, we take refuge in it.

[Someone] asks: “For what reason do we take refuge solely in these

                      three?” The answer is; “Because these three kinds [of treasure] are ultimate places of refuge and they can cause living beings to get free from life and death and to experience the great state of bodhi. Therefore we take refuge in them. These three kinds [of treasure], in conclusion, are of unthinkable merit.”6

“Buddha”7 in India is pronounced buddaya8 and in China is translated as “the state of truth”9—the supreme, right and balanced state of truth. Dharma in India is pronounced daruma10—or pronounced donmu,11 which is a variant of the Sanskrit sound—and in China is translated as “the Law.” All dharmas, good, bad, and indifferent, are called “dharmas,” but the present Dharma as an object of devotion within the Three Treasures is Dharma as the Law. Sangha in India is pronounced sōgya12 and in China is translated as “harmonious community.” [The Three Treasures] have been praised like this.

[186] “The Three Treasures as what abides and is maintained”: statues and stupas are the Buddha Treasure; yellow paper on a red rod is the transmitted Dharma Treasure; shaving of the head, dyeing of robes, and the conventional form of the rules of discipline are the Sangha Treasure.

“The Three Treasures as [related to the Buddha’s] teaching forms”: Śākyamuni, the World-honored One, is the Buddha Treasure; the Dharma wheel he turned, and the sacred teachings that he propagated, are the Dharma Treasure; the five men, Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya and the others,13 are the Sangha Treasure.

“The Three Treasures as the body of theory”: the Dharma body of five divisions14 is called the Buddha Treasure; the truth of cessation,15 the state without intention, is called the Dharma Treasure; and the merits of students and those beyond study16 are the Sangha Treasure.

“The Three Treasures [each] as a totality”: experience and understanding of the great state of truth is called the Buddha Treasure; purity, being beyond taintedness, is called the Dharma Treasure; and ultimate principles making harmony, being without hesitation and without stagnancy, is called the Sangha Treasure.17

[Past Buddhists] took refuge in the Three Treasures [as described] like this. Living beings of scant good fortune and small virtue do not hear even the names of the Three Treasures; how much less are they able to take refuge? [188] The Sutra of the Flower of Dharma says:

These living beings of many sins,

With their bad conduct as direct and indirect causes, Even if they pass asaṃkhyas of kalpas

Do not hear the name of the Three Treasures.18

The Sutra of the Flower of Dharma is “the one great purpose”19 of the buddha-tathāgatas. Of all the sutras preached by Great Teacher Śākyamuni, the

Sutra of the Flower of Dharma is the great king and is the great teacher. Other

291c sutras and other Dharmas are all the subjects and the retinue of the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma. What is preached in the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma is just the truth; what is preached in other sutras always includes an expedient means, which is not the Buddha’s fundamental intention. If we evoked preaching contained in other sutras in order to compare and appraise the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma, that would be backward. Without being covered by the influence of the merit of the Flower of Dharma, other sutras could not exist. Other sutras are all waiting to devote themselves to the Flower of Dharma. In this Sutra of the Flower of Dharma there is the present preaching. Remember, the merits of the Three Treasures are supremely valuable and are supreme. [189] The World-honored One said:

Ordinary people, fearing oppression, often seek refuge in mountains and parks and in forests, solitary trees, caityas,20 and so on. Such seeking for refuge is not excellent and such seeking for refuge is not valuable. It is not possible, through such seeking for refuge, to be liberated from the many kinds of suffering. If beings take refuge in Buddha and take refuge in Dharma and Sangha, they will, in the reality of the Four Noble Truths, constantly observe with wisdom, knowing suffering, knowing the accumulation of suffering, knowing eternal transcendence of the many kinds of suffering, and knowing the eightfold noble path21 that leads to the balanced and peaceful state of nirvana. This taking refuge is most excellent and this taking refuge is supremely valuable. It is always possible, by thus taking refuge, to be liberated from the many kinds of suffering.22

[190] The World-honored One clearly set it out for all living beings: living beings should not, fearing oppression, vainly seek refuge in mountain deities, demon deities, and the like, or seek refuge in non-Buddhist caityas. [Living beings] are never liberated through such seeking for refuge. Typically, following the wrong teachings of non-Buddhism, [people adhere to] “the ox precepts,23 the deer precepts, the rākṣasa24 precepts, the demon precepts, the mute’s precepts, the deaf person’s precepts, the dog precepts, the chicken precepts, or the pheasant precepts; or they coat the body with ash; or they make their long hair into forms;25 or they sacrifice a sheep26—at which time they first recite dhāraṇīs and then kill it—or they perform fire rituals for four months;27 or they take air for seven days;28 or they serve to various gods offerings of hundred thousand koṭis of flowers; and all their desires by this means they [strive to] accomplish. There is no affirmation that such methods can become the cause of liberation. [Such methods] are not praised by the wise; they are 292a to suffer in vain without good results.”29 Because it is so, we must definitely be clear that we are not idly devoted to wrong ways. Even if a method is different from these precepts, if its principle corresponds to the principle of [seeking refuge in] “solitary trees, caityas, and so on,” do not seek refuge through it. The human body is hard to receive, and the Buddha-Dharma is rarely met. If we idly spent a lifetime as the follower of a demon deity, or if we passed many lives as beings descended from the false view, that would be lamentable. By swiftly taking refuge in the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, we should not only be liberated from the many kinds of suffering: we should accomplish the state of bodhi. [193] The Sutra of Rare Occurrences30 says:

Teaching the four continents and the six heavens in [the world of] desire, so that all attain the fourth effect, does not equal the merit of one human being’s reception of the Three Devotions.31

“The four continents” are the eastern, western, southern, and northern continents. Of these, the northern continent cannot be reached by the teaching of the three vehicles:32 to teach all living beings in that place, and to make them into arhats, would be seen as a very rare occurrence indeed. Even if such benefit existed, it could never equal the merit of guiding one human being to receive the Three Devotions. The six heavens, also, are imagined to be a place where living beings who can attain the truth are rare. Even if we caused those [living beings] to attain the fourth effect, that could never equal the greatness and the profundity of the merit of one human being’s reception of the Three Devotions.

[194] The Ekottarāgama Sutra33 says:

There was a god of Trāyastriṃśa34 whose laments—when the five signs of decay35 appeared—that it would be born as a wild boar, were heard by Śakra-devānām-indra. Śakra, upon hearing this [god], summoned it and told it; “You should take refuge in the Three Treasures.” It immediately did as it had been instructed and thereby escaped birth as a wild boar. The Buddha preached the following verse:

Beings that take refuge in Buddha,

Do not fall into the three evil states.36

                             They end excesses and live [in the world] of humans and gods.

They will arrive at nirvana.

After [the god] had received the Three Devotions it was born into a wealthy man’s family. Further, it was able to leave family life and to realize the state of one beyond study.

In sum, the merit of taking refuge in the Three Treasures is beyond con-

sideration: it is inestimable and infinite.

[195]       When the World-honored One was in the world, twenty-six koṭis of hungry dragons came together to the Buddha’s place and, all of them shedding tears like rain, they addressed him:

“Solely we beseech you! Have pity and save us, All-compassionate World-honored One! We remember during a past age, although we were able to leave family life in the Buddha-Dharma, we perpetrated to the full various bad actions like these,37 and because of the bad actions we expended countless bodies in the three evil states. Further, because of residual retribution, we have been born in the world of dragons, and have suffered extremely great agonies.” The Buddha told the dragons, “Now you must all receive the Three Devotions and single mindedly perform good. By virtue of this cause you will meet, during the kalpa of the wise,38 the last buddha therein, whose name will be Tower Arrival.39 In the age of that buddha you will be able to expiate your sins.” Then, when the dragons had heard these words, they all exhausted their lives with utmost sincerity, and each received the Three Devotions.40

[196]       The Buddha himself, in saving the dragons, possessed no other method and no other technique: he simply imparted to them the Three Devotions. [The dragons] had received the Three Devotions in a past age when they left family life but, as a result of karmic retribution, they had become hungry dragons, at which time no other method could save them. Therefore [the Buddha] imparted to them the Three Devotions. Remember, the World honored One already has certified, and living beings should duly believe, that the merit of the Three Devotions is supremely valuable and is supreme, profound, and unthinkable. [The Buddha] did not cause them to recite the names of the buddhas of the ten directions: he simply imparted to them the Three Devotions. The Buddha’s intention is profound: who can fathom it? Living beings today, rather than vainly reciting the name of every single 292c buddha, should swiftly receive the Three Devotions. Do not be so dull as to squander great merit.

[197]       At that time in the gathering there was a blind dragon woman.The inside of her mouth was swollen and inflamed and filled with all kinds of grubs, as if it were excrement; it was as foul as the uncleanness within a female organ—the stink of fish being hard to bear—and all kinds of things were feeding off it so that pus and blood oozed out. All parts of her body were constantly being bitten by mosquitoes, wasps, and various poisonous flies. The stinking organs of her body hardly bore perceiving. At that time, the World-honored One, with great compassion, seeing that dragon woman’s blindness and her suffering of such distress, asked her, “Little sister! What circumstances caused you to acquire this wretched body? In past ages what actions have you done?” The dragon woman answered, “World-honored One! This body of mine is now beset with all kinds of suffering, and I do not have a moment of respite. Even if I wanted to describe [the suffering], it would be impossible to explain. I remember the past thirty-six koṭis [of years]. For hundreds of thousands of years I have been suffering like this in the state of a wretched dragon, without so much as a kṣāṇa of respite, day or night. The reason is that in the distant past, during the ninetyfirst kalpa, I became a bhikṣuṇī in the Dharma of Vipaśyin Buddha41 but I thought about matters of desire more than would a drunken man; even though I had left family life, I was unable to accord with the Dharma: I spread bedding in a saṃghārāma42 and committed any number of impure acts in order to indulge in passion and to feel great pleasure; or sometimes, greedily seeking the property of others, I appropriated an abundance of the offerings of the faithful. For such reasons as these, during the ninety-first kalpa I was always unable to receive the body of a god or a human being. I constantly stewed in the fires of the three evil states.” The Buddha asked further, “If it is so, at the end of these middle kalpas, little sister, where will you be born?” The dragon woman answered, “With the force of my past karma as causes and conditions, even if I am born in another world, when that kalpa finishes I will be blown back by the winds of bad karma and reborn in this state.” Then that dragon woman, having spoken these words, made the following plea: “All-compassionate World-honored One! Please save me! Please save me!” At that time the World-honored One scooped some water in his hand and told the dragon woman, “This water is called the medicine of wish-fulfilling joy.43 Now, honestly speaking, I say to you: In

            the distant past I cast aside body and life in order to save a dove, and to the end I did not waver in resolve or feel stinginess arise in my mind. If these words [of yours] are true, you will be completely cured of your terrible affliction.” Then the World-honored Buddha took the water in his mouth and showered the body of that blind dragon woman. All her terrible afflictions and stinking organs were totally cured. Already cured, she pleaded as follows: “I now beg the Buddha that I may receive the Three Devotions.” At this the World-honored One at once imparted to the dragon woman the Three Devotions.

[200]       This dragon woman, in the distant past in the Dharma of Vipaśyin Buddha, became a bhikṣuṇī: although she broke the precepts, she may have seen and heard what is penetrable and what is impenetrable in the Buddha Dharma. Now she personally meets with Śākyamuni Buddha and begs that she might [again] receive the Three Devotions. Receiving the Three Devotions from the Buddha must be said to be [due to] densely accumulated good roots. The merit of [her] meeting the Buddha must inevitably have derived from the Three Devotions.44 We are not blind dragons and are not in the bodies of animals, but we neither see the Tathāgata nor receive the Three Devotions under the Buddha. [Our] meeting Buddha is distant, and we should be ashamed. The World-honored One himself imparted [to the dragon woman] the Three Devotions: remember the merit of the Three Devotions is profound and immeasurable. When the god-king Śakra did prostrations to a wild fox and received the Three Devotions, everything rested upon the profundity of the merit of the Three Devotions.45

[201]       When the Buddha was staying in a banyan46 grove by the city of Kapilavastu,47 Śākya-Mahānāma48 came to the Buddha’s place and spoke thus: “What is an upāsaka?”49 The Buddha then explained to him, “If any good son or good daughter is in sound possession of their faculties and receives the Three Devotions, this person is then called an upāsaka.” Śākya-Mahānāma said, “World-honored One! What is a one-part upāsaka?” The Buddha said, “Mahānāma! If [a person] receives the Three Devotions and also receives one precept,50 this person is called a one-part upāsaka.”51

Becoming a disciple of the Buddha invariably rests upon the Three Devotions. Whichever precepts we receive, we invariably receive the Three Devotions [first] and after that receive the precepts. Therefore, [only] through the Three Devotions is it possible to obtain the precepts.

[203]     The Dhammapada52 says: Once upon a time the god-king [Śakra], inwardly knowing that when his life ended he would be reborn as a donkey, lamented interminably and said, “The only one who can save me from this agony and misfortune is the Buddha, the World-honored One.” Then he went to the Buddha’s place, bowed his head to and prostrated himself upon the ground, and took refuge in the Buddha. His life ended there and then, before he had risen, and he was reborn in the womb of a donkey. The mother donkey broke her bit and smashed some clay pots at a china shop. The potter struck her. In due course this caused injury to her womb and [Śakra] reentered the body of a god-king. The Buddha said, “As you let go of life, you were taking refuge in the Three Treasures; returns from your sins have already ceased.” The god-king [Śakra], on hearing this, attained the first effect.53

[204]     In general, in saving us from the agonies and misfortunes of the world, the Buddha, the World-honored One, is unsurpassed. For this reason the god-king [Śakra] hastens to the place of the World-honored One. While he is still prostrate on the ground his life ends and he is reborn in the womb of a donkey. Due to the merit of [Śakra’s] devotion to the Buddha, the mother donkey breaks her bit and tramples on some pots at a China shop. The potter strikes her. This injures the body of the mother donkey, and the donkey in the womb is destroyed, whereupon [Śakra] reenters the body of a god-king. That upon hearing the Buddha’s preaching [Śakra] attains the first effect is the influence of the merit of taking refuge in the Three Treasures. Therefore, the [power] that swiftly frees us from the agonies and misfortunes of the world, and which causes us to grasp in experience the supreme [truth of] bodhi, may be, in every case, the power of taking refuge in the Three Treasures. In general, the power of the Three Devotions not only frees us from the three evil states: it [also] reenters the body of the god-king Śakra. It not only attains effects and rewards in the heavens above: it [also] becomes sacred beings who are srotāpannas. Truly, the ocean of the merit of the Three Treasures is immeasurable and infinite. When the World-honored One was in the world human beings and gods experienced such happiness. Now, in a latter five hundred-year period following the extinction of the Tathāgata, how can human beings and gods do anything? At the same time, the Tathā293c gata’s statues, śarīras, and so on, are still abiding in the present in the world. By taking refuge in these, we also will gain the kind of merit described above. [206] The Mizōukyō54 says: The Buddha said, “I remember numberless kalpas ago, on Mount Śita in the great kingdom of Vima,55 there was a wild fox being chased by a lion, about to become prey. While running away, [the fox] fell into a well. It could not get out and spent three days there until, resigning itself to death, it spoke the following verse:

What a miserable fate!

Beset today by hardships,

I will lose my life in a hillside well.

All myriad things are inconstant.

I regret that my body was not eaten by the lion.

Namas! I take refuge in the buddhas of the ten directions. May they be notified that my mind is pure and unselfish.

Then the god-king Śakra heard the naming of the buddhas. Awed, his hair standing on end, he became mindful of eternal buddhas. He thought to himself, “I am alone and unprotected and without a guiding teacher; and addiction to the five desires is drowning me.” At once, accompanied by a host of eighty thousand gods, he flew down to the well intending to investigate in full. Then he saw the wild fox at the bottom of the well, paws clawing the earth, unable to get out. The godking [Śakra] again thought to himself, and said, “Saintly person, perhaps you consider that you are without ways or means. Although I now see the figure of a wild fox, you are assuredly a bodhisattva, not a common instrument; for, kind gentleperson, [the verse] you spoke previously was not common words. I beg you to preach for the gods the pivot of the Dharma.” At this the wild fox called up in reply, “Though you are a god-king, you are uneducated. While a teacher of Dharma is down below, you yourself remain up above: entirely failing to practice courtesy, you ask [to hear] the pivot of the Dharma! The water of Dharma is pure and is able to save people. How can you intend to obtain for yourself [such a] tribute?” The god-king [Śakra] on hearing this was greatly ashamed. [But] the gods in attendance laughed in surprise, [saying,] “If the heavenly king alighted there would be no benefit at all.” The god-king [Śakra] thereupon addressed the many gods: “Pray, do not harbor surprise or fear at this. It is [due to] my being stubborn and closed and lacking in virtue. Without fail we must hear from this [fox] the pivot of the Dharma.” Then [Śakra] hung down a heavenly precious robe, taking hold of which the wild fox emerged above. The gods served to it a meal of nectar. The wild fox, taking sustenance, gained the will to live. Unexpectedly, in the midst of calamity, it had come upon such good fortune that its mind was set dancing and its joy was boundless. The wild fox widely preached, for the god-king [Śakra] and all the gods, the pivot of the Dharma.

           [208] This is called the story of the god-king [Śakra’s] doing prostrations       

to an animal and making it his teacher. Clearly we have seen, the god-king [Śakra’s] making a wild fox into his teacher may be proof of how hard it is to hear the name of Buddha, the name of Dharma, and the name of Sangha. The present fact that, aided by long-accumulated good, we are meeting the Dharma bequeathed by the Tathāgata, and that, night and day, we are hearing the precious appellations of the Three Treasures, will not regress with [the passing of] time. Just this may be the pivot of the Dharma. Even heavenly māra-pāpīyas56 may escape affliction by taking refuge in the Three Treasures. How much more may other beings be able, in respect of the merit of the Three Treasures, to “pile up merit and heap up virtue”? How could we fail to ponder it? In sum, in practicing the truth as disciples of the Buddha, we first, without fail, make venerative prostrations to the Three Treasures of the ten directions, request the presence of the Three Treasures of the ten directions,57 burn incense and scatter flowers before them, and we then, in due course, perform all practices. This is just an excellent vestige of the ancestors and an eternal convention of the Buddhist patriarchs. If any have never practiced the convention of taking refuge in the Three Treasures, know that theirs is the Dharma of non Buddhists, and know that it may be the Dharma of heavenly demons. The Dharma of the buddhas and the patriarchs inevitably has, at its beginning, a ceremony of taking refuge in the Three Treasures.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Kie-sanbō

                                    On a day of the summer retreat in the seventh                                     year of Kenchō,58 I finished copying from the                                     late master’s initial draft. He had yet to reach                                     the stage of an intermediate draft, a fair copy,                                     and so on. Doubtless during the master’s revision                                     there would have been additions and deletions.                                     Now such procedures are impermissible and so                                     the master’s draft reads as it is.59

Notes

1     means “refuge” or “taking refuge.” See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.Kie, lit., “returning to and depending upon,” represents the Sanskrit śaraṇa, which

2     bodaishin,between the universe and living beings. See also Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), Kannō-dōkōparagraph 196.means mystical communication between buddhas and living beings, orHotsu-

3     Eighty-six, roots,” or by to the end. See Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. The meaning of the SanskritThe Sanskrit was represented in Chinese either by Shukke-kudoku.icchantika,shin-fugusoku,here represented phonetically, means one who pursues desires“one who does not possess belief.” See also Chapterdan-zenkon, “one who cuts off good icchantika

4     Quoted from the Zen’enshingi, pt. 9. See also Chapter Ninety-four, Jukai.

5     The Sanskrit saṃnāha means a suit of armor. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

6     From the in China during the Sui dynasty (589–618).Daijōgishō, a twenty-fascicle commentary on Mahayana Buddhism written

7     Hotoke is the Chinese character meaning “buddha.”

8     Buddaya is a transliteration of the Sanskrit Buddha.

9     Kaku concludes the phrase mujō-shōtō-kaku, “supreme, right and balanced state ofanuttara samyaksaṃbodhi. See

Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.truth,” which represents the meaning of the Sanskrit

10    Daruma is a transliteration of the Sanskrit Dharma.

11    Donmu is a transliteration of the Pāli Dhamma.

12    Sōgya is a transliteration of the Sanskrit sangha.

13    The five bhikṣus: Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya, Aśvajit, Bhadrika, Mahānāma, and Daśabalamonks of the Buddha’s order.Kāśyapa, who accompanied the Buddha in his ascetic practice and became the first

14    Gobun-hōsshinpañca-skandha.body; the body of liberation; and joshin, the body of the balanced state; (The five divisions are represented in Chinese as “Dharma body of five divisions”), from the Sanskrit gedatsu-chiken-shin,eshin,the body of knowledge of liberation.the body of wisdom; kaishin,gedatsu-shin,asamasama-the precepts

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15    Mettai, the third of the Four Noble Truths.

16    of the Small Vehicle (one who studies Buddhism intellectually).Mugaku,Later in this chapter, the Sanskrit word arhat is represented phonetically and also byshika,lit., “no study,” means one who has nothing more to study; that is, an arhat.“fourth effect.” Arhathood is the fourth and final stage of a śrāvaka the term

17    shin gaku myōgu.Quoted from an untraced sutra, but a different redaction can be found in the Risshū -

18    Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō (“The Tathāgata’s Lifetime”). See LS 3.32.

19    Ichidaiji-innen. Lotus Sutra, Hōben (“Expedient Means”). See LS 1.88–90. 20 In this case (as is clarified in Master Dōgen’s commentary) shrines.       caityas means non-Buddhist

21    Hasshi [no] shodo. See Chapter Seventy-three, Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō.

22    Kusharon (Sanskrit: Abhidharmakośa-śāstra), fascicle 14.

23    Adherence to the ox precepts means imitating the life of an ox in one’s daily life— a kind of ascetic practice.

24    A rākṣasa is a demon that feeds on human flesh.

25    Refers to the matted-hair ascetics (Sanskrit: jaṭila) of the Buddha’s time.

26    Blood sacrifices were common in ancient India. It is credited to the historical influenceof Buddhism that the ritual sacrifice of animals is no longer widely practiced in India.

27    Other fire ritualists tried to purify their own souls by burning their impurities in sacred Various forms of fire cults existed in ancient India. For example, a Vedic-Brahmanism fire sacrifice was carried out by professional brahmans, who observed elaborate cultic prescriptions in order that the fire god Agni would carry the sacrifice up to the gods. Flames. (See The History of Buddhism.)

28    [o] fuku[su], “take air [as medicine],” probably suggests fasting. At the same time, an air cult is included in a list of twenty kinds of non-Buddhism.

29    Doron. Quotation from an untraced Chinese text, but some passages are found in the Daichi-

30    Preaching on Comparison of the Merits of Rare Occurrences.” The sutra was translated Keukyō, short for Bussetsukeukōryōkudokukyō, literally, “Sutra of the Buddha’s does not contain the exact words quoted here; it is likely that this quotation was takenfrom Sanskrit by Jñānagupta (522–600) during the Sui dynasty (589–618). The sutra from a summary of the sutra.

31    SankiDharma, and Sangha at the beginning of the precepts ceremony. Receiving the precepts[o] ukuru, “to receive the Three Devotions,” means to take refuge in Buddha, Chapter Eighty-eight

means receiving these Three Devotions, followed by the Three Summarized Pure Precepts, followed by the Ten Bodhisattva Precepts. See Chapter Ninety-four, Jukai. 32 buddha The continent north of Mount Sumeru is inhabited only by heavenly beings, and is śrāvakas, pratyekathus out of bounds to Buddhists of the three vehicles; namely, s, and bodhisattvas.

33 have been first translated into Chinese by Dharmanandi in 384. The Dharmanandi  The Ekkottarāgama-sutra is one of the four Āgamas in the Chinese version, said to

Sangha deva in 397.translation, however, is lost. A later translation, which survives, was made by Gautama

34    Trāyastriṃśa means the heaven of thirty-three gods, the second highest of the six heavens in the world of desire, situated on top of Mount Sumeru. Śakra-devānām-indra presides there, surrounded by eight gods in each of the four directions. See Volume III, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

35    glow, and 5) it becomes reluctant to sit in its original place. The five signs that a heavenly being is about to die are: 1) its crown of flowers fades, sweat flows from under its arms, 3) its clothes become soiled, 4) its body loses its

2)

36    San-akudōanimals. (“three evil states”) are hell, the state of hungry ghosts, and the state of 37 Refers to an account earlier in the sutra.

38    Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Kengōbecause many buddhas will manifest themselves within its duration. See Volume I,represents the Sanskrit bhadra-kalpa, which is the present kalpa, so called

39    be a transliteration of the Sanskrit sound. The original Sanskrit has not been traced.Roshi, lit., “Tower Arrival,” may represent the meaning of a Sanskrit name or it may

40    Daishūkyō (Sanskrit: Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra), fascicle 44.

41    The first of the seven ancient buddhas. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso. 42 Saṃghārāma, lit., “a resting place for the sangha”; that is, a temple.

43       often rendered in Chinese characters as Shindarushi-yakuwa. Shindacintāmaṇi,Yakuwa “wish-fulfilling gem”). means medicine or medicinal compound. The phrase is represents the Sanskrit nyo-i-raku-sui,Rushi cintā,represents a Sanskrit term that“water of wish-fulfilling joy. “which means thought or has not been traced. wish (as in

44       That is, her devotions to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha when becoming a bhikṣuṇī in the Dharma of Vipaśyin Buddha.

45       The story of Śakra and the wild fox is recorded later in this chapter (see paragraph 206).

46       downward” and thus represents the banyan, or Indian fig tree, whose fibers descend from its branches to the earth, where they take root and form new stems. Nikūda is a transliteration of the Sanskrit nyagrodha, which literally means “growing

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47       Śākya clan, into which Gautama Buddha was born. Kapilavastu was the name of the kingdom, and the capital thereof, inhabited by the

48       to the Buddha’s order as a layman. Mahānāma was a member of the Buddha’s family (the Śākyas) who devoted himself

49       Upāsaka means a (male) lay Buddhist.

50       at a time. The five precepts taken by laypeople in the Buddha’s time were sometimes taken one 51 Daihatsunehangyō, fascicle 34.

52       daka-nikāya,Hokkukyō (Sutra of Dharma Phrasesand the fifth of the five Nikāyas in the Pāli canon. The ). This is the first of fifteen books in the DhammapadaKhudcomprises four hundred and twenty-three verses.

53       Shoka, stage of a “first effect,” means the stage of the śrāvaka on the way to the fourth effect of arhathood. See Volume I, Glossary srotāpanna (stream-enterer), the first of Sanskrit Terms.

54       Mizōukyō stands for Mizōuinnenkyō (Sutra of Unprecedented Episodes).

55       Mount Śita and the kingdom of Vima are legendary places in Jambudvīpa, the continent south of Mount Sumeru where human beings live. 56 Māra-pāpīyas are idealistic demons who inhabit the world of desire and deprive Buddhist practitioners of life.

57    pusa. For example, by walking around in a circle three times at the place of a ceremony, while reciting namu susubusa”In Japan, traditionally pronounced, nan wu futuo ye, nan wu damo ye, nan wu seng jia ye, nan wu zushu(“Namas Buddha! Namas“namu fudoya, namu taboya, namu sūgyaya, Dharma! Namas Sangha! Namas the ancestral masters and bodhisattvas!”).

58    1255; two years after Master Dōgen’s death.

59    compiled by Master Dōgen in his last years.The final comment was almost certainly added by Master Dōgen’s successor, MasterShōbōgenzō

Koun Ejō. This chapter is included in the twelve-chapter edition of the

[Chapter Eighty-nine]

                                             Shinjin-inga                                         

Deep Belief in Cause and Effect

Translator’s Note: Shin means “deep” and shin (in this case pronounced jin) means “belief.” In means “cause,” and ka (in this case pronounced ga) means “effect.” So shinjin-inga means “deep belief in cause and effect.” It is clear that Buddhism believes in cause and effect. But many so-called Mahayana Buddhists say that the Buddhist theory of belief in cause and effect belongs to Hinayana Buddhism, and that Mahayana Buddhists are able to transcend the rule of cause and effect. This belief, however, is wrong. Master Dōgen emphasizes in this chapter that to understand Buddhism it is very important to believe in the law of cause and effect. Chinese Buddhism contains a widely known story about a Buddhist priest who fell into the body of a wild fox because he denied the law of cause and effect, but who was saved by the words of Master Hyakujō Ekai. Many Buddhist students thought mistakenly that this story illustrates transcendence of cause and effect. But Master Dōgen points out their mistakes in this chapter. He explains clearly the true meaning of the story, and he affirms Buddhism’s profound belief in the rule of cause and effect.

[3] When Master Ekai, Zen Master Daichi of Hyakujō,1 gives his informal preaching, generally present there is an old man. He always listens to the Dharma along with the assembly, and when the people in the assembly retire, the old man also retires. Then suddenly one day he does not retire. The master eventually asks him, “What person is this, standing before me?”

The old man answers, “I am not a person. In the past age of Kāśyapa Buddha,2 I used to preside on this mountain. Once a student asked me, ‘Do even people in the state of great practice fall into cause and effect, or not?’ I answered, ‘They do not fall into cause and effect.’ Since then I have fallen into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives. Now I beg you, Master,

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to say for me words of transformation.3 I long to be rid of the body of a wild fox.” Then he asks, “Do even people in the state of great practice fall into cause and effect, or not?”

The master says, “Do not be unclear about cause and effect.”

The old man, under these words, realizes the great realization. He does prostrations and says, “I am already rid of the body of a wild fox, and would like to remain on the mountain behind this temple. Dare I ask the master to perform for me the rites for a deceased monk?”

The master orders the supervising monk4 to strike the block5 and to tell

the assembly, “After the meal, we will see off a deceased monk.”

All the monks discuss this, [saying,] “The whole sangha is well and there is no sick person in the nirvana hall.6 What is the reason for this?”

After the meal, the master is simply seen leading the monks to the foot of a rock on the mountain behind the temple, and picking out a dead fox with a staff. They then cremate it according to the formal method. In the evening the master preaches in the hall and discusses the preceding episode.

Ōbaku7 then asks, “The man in the past answered mistakenly with words of transformation, and fell into the body of a wild fox for five hundred lives. If he had gone on without making a mistake, what would have become of him?”

The master says, “Step up here. I will tell you.”

Ōbaku finally steps up and gives the naster a slap. The naster claps his hands and laughs, and says, “You have just expressed that a foreigner’s8 beard is red, but it is also a fact that a red-beard is a foreigner.”9

[6]     This story is in the Tenshōkōtōroku.10 Still, people of learning in practice are not clear about the truth of cause and effect, and they make the mistake of idly negating cause and effect. It is pitiful that, with a wind of decay blowing all around, the Patriarch’s truth11 has slipped into decline. “They do not fall into cause and effect” is just the negation of cause and effect, as a

294c result of which [the negator] falls into bad states. “Do not be unclear about cause and effect” evidently is deep belief in cause and effect, as a result of which the listener gets rid of bad states. We should not wonder [at this], and should not doubt it. Among people of recent generations who profess to be “students of the Way of Zen practice,” most have negated cause and effect. How do we know that they have negated cause and effect? Namely [because]

they have considered that “do not fall” and “do not be unclear” amount to the same and are not different. Hence, we know that they have negated cause and effect.

[7]     The nineteenth patriarch, Venerable Kumāralabdha, says:

In brief, retribution for good and bad has three times. Common people only see that to the good [comes] early death; to the violent, long life; to the evil, fortune; and to the righteous, calamity; whereupon [common people] say that cause and effect is nonexistent and that “wrongness” and “happiness” are meaningless. Particularly, they do not know that shadow and sound accord with [their sources], without a discrepancy of a thousandth or a hundredth and—even with the passing of a hundred thousand myriad kalpas—never wearing away.12

Clearly we have seen that the ancestral patriarch never negates cause and effect. That present students of later ages do not clarify the ancestral founder’s benevolent instruction is [due to] negligence in emulating the ancients. Those who are negligent in emulating the ancients and yet randomly call themselves good counselors to human beings and gods, are great nuisances to human beings and gods and are the enemies of practitioners. You people before and behind me! Never preach, with the purport of negating cause and effect, to junior students and late learners. That is false doctrine. It is not the Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs at all. It is due to sparse study that you have fallen into this false view.

[9] Patch-robed monks and the like of present-day China often say:

Though we have received the human body and have met the Buddha Dharma, we do not know even the facts of one life or two lives. The former Hyakujō who became a wild fox has been able to know five hundred lives. Clearly, he might be beyond falling down as the result of karma. It may be that “Even if held by golden chains and black barriers, he does not abide. He goes forward among alien beings and, for

               the present, lets the wheel turn.”13                                                                                                   295a

The views and opinions of those who are called great good counselors are like this. But it is difficult to place such views and opinions inside the house of the Buddhist patriarchs. There are those among human beings, or among foxes, or among other beings, who innately possess the power to see a while back into former states,14 but it is not the seed of clear understanding: it is an effect felt from bad conduct. The World-honored One has broadly expounded this principle for human beings and gods; not to know it is the utmost negligence in study. It is pitiful. Even knowing a thousand lives or ten thousand lives does not always produce the Buddha’s teaching. There are non-Buddhists who already know eighty thousand kalpas [but their teaching] is never esteemed as the Buddha’s teaching. To know barely five hundred lives is no great ability. The greatest ignorance of recent Zen practitioners of the Song dynasty lies just in their failure to recognize that “not falling into cause and effect” is a doctrine of the false view. It is pitiful that, in a place where the Tathāgata’s right Dharma has spread, and while meeting the authentic transmission from patriarch to patriarch, they form wrong groups who negate cause and effect. Zen practitioners should urgently clarify the truth of cause and effect. The truth of the present Hyakujō’s “not being unclear about cause and effect” is “not to be ignorant of cause and effect.”15 So the principle is evident that if we initiate a cause we will feel the effect. [This] may be the assertion of the buddhas and the patriarchs. As a general rule, before clarifying the Buddha-Dharma, do not randomly preach the Dharma to human beings and gods.

[11] The ancestral master Nāgārjuna16 says:

If we deny the existence of cause and effect in the world, as do people of non-Buddhism, then there is no present or future; and if we deny the existence of cause and effect beyond the world,17 then there are no

Three Treasures, Four [Noble] Truths, or four effects of a śramaṇa.18

Clearly we should know that to deny the existence of cause and effect,

295b whether in the world or beyond the world, must be non-Buddhism. “Denial of the present” means: “The physical form exists at this place, but the spiritual essence since time immemorial has belonged to the state of enlightenment. The spiritual essence is just the mind, for the mind is not the same as the body.” Such understanding is just non-Buddhism. Some say: “When human beings die, they unfailingly return to the ocean of spiritual essence;19 even if they do not practice and learn the Buddha-Dharma, they will naturally return to the ocean of enlightenment, whereupon the wheel of life and death

will turn no more. For this reason, there will be no future.” This is the nihilistic view of non-Buddhism.20 Even if in form they resemble bhikṣus, those who hold such wrong opinions are not the Buddha’s disciples at all. They are just non-Buddhists. In sum, because they negate cause and effect, they wrongly opine that the present and the future do not exist. Their negation of cause and effect is the result of failing to learn in practice under a true good counselor. One who has long studied under a true good counselor can never hold wrong opinions such as the negation of cause and effect. We should profoundly believe in and admire, and should humbly receive upon the head21 the benevolent instruction of the ancestral master Nāgārjuna.

[13] Master Genkaku, Great Master Shinkaku of Yōka,22 is an eminent disciple of Sōkei.23 Previously he has studied the Flower of Dharma of the Tendai [sect],24 sharing a room with Great Master Sakei Genrō.25 While he is reading the Nirvana Sutra,26 golden light floods the room and he attains forever the realization in which there is no birth. He proceeds to visit Sōkei [Mountain] and reports his experience to the Sixth Patriarch. The Sixth Patriarch in time gives his seal of approval. Later [Master Genkaku] produces “The Song of Experiencing the Truth,”27 in which he says; “‘Emptiness28 run wild negates cause and effect; and, in a morass of looseness, invites misfortune and mistakes.”29 Clearly we should know, “the negation of cause and effect” is “the invitation of misfortune and mistakes.” Past masters in former ages all were 295c clear about cause and effect. Late learners in recent ages all are deluded about cause and effect. [But] even in the present age, those who, with a dauntless bodhi-mind, learn the Buddha-Dharma for the sake of the Buddha-Dharma, will be able to clarify cause and effect as did the masters of the past. To say that there are no causes and no effects is just non-Buddhism.

[15] The eternal buddha Wanshi30 comments on the aforementioned

instance of cause and effect, in a eulogy to the ancients, as follows: One foot of water and a one-fathom wave.31

[What happened] five hundred lives ago is of no consequence. Even as [people] discuss “not falling” and “not being unclear,”

Still they are forcing themselves into nests of entanglement.32 Ha! Ha! Ha!

Do you understand, or not?

If you are free and easy,

There is nothing to prevent me going “Ta! Ta! Wa! Wa!”33 Gods sing, spirits dance, and music naturally plays. In between hand claps, a chorus of hoorays.

The present words “Even as [people] discuss ‘not falling’ and ‘not being unclear,’ still they are forcing themselves into nests of entanglement” just mean that “not falling” and “not being unclear” may amount to the same. In short, this instance of cause and effect has not completely expressed the theory thereof. The reason, if asked, is that although [Wanshi] has manifested before us the shedding of the body of a wild fox, he does not say that [the former Hyakujō], after escaping the body of a wild fox, will then be born in the human world, he does not say that [the former Hyakujō] will be born in the heavens above, and he does not say that [the former Hyakujō] will be born in any other state. [But these] are the areas of people’s doubt. If he deserves, once rid of the body of a wild fox, to be born in a good state, he will be born in the heavens above or the human world; if he deserves to be born in an evil state he will be born in a state such as the four evil states.34 After getting rid of the body of a wild fox, he cannot emptily exist without a place of appearance. The assertions that when living beings die they return to the ocean of spiritual essence, or that they return to the universal self, are both the views of non-Buddhists.

[17] Master Kokugon,35 Zen Master Engo of Kassan Mountain, in a

eulogy to the ancients, says:

Fishes swim and water gets muddy, Birds fly and feathers fall.

The supreme mirror36 is inescapable,

Great space is desolate and wide open.

Once a thing has passed, it is utterly distant.

296a                Five hundred lives originate solely from the great practice that is     cause and effect.

A thunderbolt breaks the mountain and wind shakes the ocean,

[But] pure gold forged a hundred times does not change its color.37

Even this poem of praise has a tendency toward negation of cause and

effect. At the same time, it has a tendency toward the eternity view.38

[18] Master Sōkō,39 Zen Master Daie of Kinzan Mountain in Kōshū,40

in a poem of praise, says:

“Not falling” and “not being unclear”:

Are stones and clods,

Met along the path by any rice paddy.

Having crushed the silver mountain,

I clap my hands and laugh, ha! ha!, in every situation. In Minshū41 there lived that foolish Happy Buddha.42

People of the Song dynasty today consider someone like this to be an instructing patriarch. But the view and understanding of Sōkō has never arrived [even] at the idea of bestowing the Buddha-Dharma through expedients. If anything, he has a tendency toward the view and understanding of naturalism. In all, for this [one] story, there are eulogies to the ancients and discussions of the ancients by more than thirty people. Not even one of them has suspected that “they do not fall into cause and effect” is the negation of cause and effect. It is pitiful that these fellows, without clarifying cause and effect, have uselessly idled away a lifetime in a state of confusion. In learning in practice the Buddha-Dharma, the first priority is to clarify cause and effect. Those who negate cause and effect are likely to beget the false view that craves profit, and to become a cutter of good roots.43 In general, the truth of cause and effect is vividly apparent and is not a personal matter: those who commit evil fall down, and those who practice good rise up, without a thousandth or a hundredth of a discrepancy. If cause and effect perished and became void, buddhas could not appear in the world and the ancestral master could not come from the west. In sum, it would be impossible for living beings to meet Buddha and to hear the Dharma. The truth of cause and effect is not understood by the likes of Confucius and Laozi.44 It is clarified and transmitted only by the buddhas and the patriarchs. Students in [this] degenerate age, being of sparse good fortune, do not meet a true teacher and do not hear the right Dharma, and for this reason they do not clarify cause and effect. If 296b we negate cause and effect, as a result of this error, in a “morass of looseness,” we will suffer “misfortune and mistakes.” Even before we have committed any evil other than negating cause and effect, the poison of this view, to begin with, will be terrible. Therefore, if people of learning in practice, seeing the bodhi-mind as foremost, wish to repay the vast benevolence of the Buddhist patriarchs, they should swiftly clarify causes and effects.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shinjin-inga

                                    On a day of the summer retreat in the seventh                                     year of Kenchō,45 I copied this from the master’s                                     rough draft. He had yet to reach the stage of an                                     intermediate draft or a fair copy. Doubtless                                     there would have been revisions.

                                    Ejō46

Notes

1 monk’s name used during his lifetime. Zen Master Daichi is his posthumous title. HeMaster Hyakujō Ekai (749–814), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. Ekai was his lived on Mount Hyakujō in Kiangsi province in southeast China. 2 Kāśyapa Buddha is the sixth of the seven ancient buddhas, and so the time of Kāśyapa Buddha suggests the eternal past.

3             to transform another. See Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), Ichitengo, lit., “one-turn words” or “turning words,” means words that have the power Kenbutsu, note 9. 4       Inō, the supervisor of monks in the zazen hall, or rector; one of the six main officers. 5         block (Byaku-tsuitsui)means to beat the top of an octagonal wooden pillar with a small wooden in order to call the monks together.

6     “Nirvana hall” is what the temple infirmary was called.

7     Master Ōbaku Kiun (d. between 855 and 859), successor of Master Hyakujō.

8     Koent-day Russia. originally indicated a person from the area to the northwest of China; that is, pres9   Tenshōkōtōroku,  enty-six, Dai-shugyō.chap. 8; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 2. Also quoted in Chapter Sev-

10       pleted in the Tenshō era of the Song dynasty, about thirty years after the The Tenshōkōtōroku, second of the Gotōroku (Five Records of the TorchKeitokuden-), was comtōroku. Its thirty chapters were compiled by Ri Junkyoku.

11       In this case the Patriarch’s truth means Master Bodhidharma’s Buddhism, centered in zazen.

12       Keitokudentōroku, chap. 2. Also quoted in Chapter Eighty-four, Sanji-no-gō.

13       his poems quoted in the These are the concluding two lines of a poem by Master Dōan Jōsatsu, one of ten of to a side lineage of Master Seigen Gyōshi. These lines suggest that our efforts to Keitokudentōroku, chap. 29. Master Dōan Jōsatsu belongs worrying about cause and effect. order our lives are always in vain, so we should live freely and independently without

14       Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Shukutsū stands for shuku-jū-tsū,Jinzū.the power to know former states of existence. See

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15       Master Dōgen explained the Chinese character word kurashi, which means unclear, dark, or ignorant. mai, “unclear,” with the Japanese

16       The fourteenth patriarch in India.

17       Shusse, “out of the world,” means the Buddhist area as opposed to the secular world. 18 dā gāminMakashikan,(“once-returner”), 3) chap. 33. The four effects are 1) anāgāmin (“non-returner”), and 4) arhat. See Volume srotāpanna (“stream-enterer”), 2) sakṛ -

I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

19    Shōkai, “spirit world.” The same term appears in Chapter One (Vol. I), Bendōwa.

20    from the Sanskrit śāśvata-dṛṣṭi.Danken-gedō,dṛṣṭi. This view denies continuation into the future of the moral cause and effect rela-lit., “cutting-off–view non-Buddhism,” represents the Sanskrit jōken-gedō, “eternity-view non-Buddhism,” from the Sanskrithenken, “extreme views,” It is opposed to These two opposing views are known as antagrāha-dṛṣṭi. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms and note 38. 21 upon the head, as a sign of reverence. See Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Chōdai literally means humbly to receive some revered object (such as the Kesa-kudoku.kaṣāya) 22 name of the city where he was born. The information about him recorded here is con-Master Yōka Genkaku. Great Master Shinkaku is his posthumous title. Yōka is trained in the Keitokudentōroku, chap. 5.

23    Master Daikan Enō (638–713), the Sixth Patriarch in China.

24    Tendai is the name of a mountain, of Master Tendai Chigi who lived there, and of the Tendai sect which he founded. The Tendai sect is based on the study of the (Sutra of the Flower of Dharma).      Lotus

Sutra

25    Sakei Genrō is the eighth patriarch of the Tendai sect. He died in 754 at the age of eighty-two. 26 That is, the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra (Sutra of the Great Demise).

27 Shōdōka. This work is still commonly recited in Sōtō sect temples in Japan today. 28 interpretations: the view that all is nothing; indifference, vacuity. See Volume I, Glos-Kū, “emptiness,” in this case suggests the concept of śūnyatā as understood in idealistic say of Sanskrit Terms.

29    Ka, “mistakes,” in the original Shōdōka is ka, wazawai, “calamity.”

30    Master Wanshi Shōgaku (1091–1157), a successor of Master Tanka Shijun. See also, for example, Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), Zazenshin.

31    Concrete things here and now.

32    Kattō. See Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), Kattō.

33    The sounds of a baby, suggesting Master Wanshi’s unworried state.

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34    and the world of The four evil states are hell, the world of asuras (angry demons).pretas (hungry ghosts), the world of animals,

35    Chapter Seventy-four, Master Engo Kokugon (1063–1135), successor of Master Goso Hōen, and editor ofHekiganroku (Blue Cliff RecordTenbōrin. ). See also Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), Shunjū; the

36    simile for the law of cause and effect. A mirror symbolizes a standard, a criteria, or a law—in this case, used as a concrete 37 This world is very changeable, but at the same time, it has an immutable essence. Engozenjigoroku, chap. 19.

38    also note 20.interpreted as traditional expressions of the two extreme views that modern philosophically idealism (championed by Hegel) and materialism (championed by Marx). SeeJōken. In general, jōken, “eternity view,” and danken, “cutting-off view,” may be

39    Zen of Sōkō’s contemporary, Master Wanshi Shōgaku. Master Dōgen often praised a leading proponent of so-called Master Daie Sōkō (1089–1163), successor of Master Engo Kokugon. Master Sōkō waskōan Zen, as opposed to mokushō (“silent illumination”) Zazenshin eight [Vol. III], Master Wanshi as an eternal buddha (see, for example, Chapter Twenty-seven [Vol. II],), but strongly criticized Master Daie Sōkō (see, for example, Chapter Forty Sesshin-sesshō; Chapter Seventy-five, Jishō-zanmai). 40 Present-day Hangzhou, the capital city of Zhekiang province at the head of Hangzhou Bay. 41 A district in the east of present-day Zhekiang province.

42    Tang dynasty (901–903). Quoted from the Hōtai (“Canvas Bag”), so called because he wandered through China from temple totemple carrying a big bag containing all his belongings. He is the original “HappyBuddha” portrayed in statues with a fat belly and a big smile. According to oneaccount, he died in 916. Another account dates his death as in the Tenpuku era of theDaiezenjigoroku, chap. 10.

43    Dan-zenkon,one who is interested only in selfish ends. See Volume II, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. “cutter of good roots,” represents the Sanskrit icchantika, which suggests 44 Confucious and Laozi are the founders of Confucianism and Daoism, respectively. 45 1255.

46 before Master Ejō wrote this. This chapter is one of the chapters of the twelve-chapter Master Dōgen’s successor, Master Koun Ejō. Master Dōgen died in 1253, two years Shōbōgenzō, which Master Dōgen compiled in the final years of his life. edition of the

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[Chapter Ninety] Shizen-biku

The Bhikṣu in the Fourth Dhyāna

Translator’s Note: Shi means four. Zen represents the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which means zazen or “the state in zazen.” Biku represents the Sanskrit word bhikṣu, which means a Buddhist monk. Shizen-biku, or the bhikṣu who had attained the fourth state in zazen, refers to a monk who mistakenly thought that his own state was the state of the arhat, a Buddhist practitioner who has reached the fourth and ultimate stage of practice. When he was dying, an apparition appeared before him, something not usually seen by someone who has attained the fourth state in zazen, so he felt that Gautama Buddha had deceived him. And because of his mistaken idea, he fell into hell. Master Dōgen quotes this story as an example of the wrong approach to Buddhism. In addition, in this chapter he warns strongly against the serious mistake of believing that Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism all teach the same thing. [23] The fourteenth patriarch, the ancestral master Nāgārjuna, said: Among the Buddha’s disciples there was one bhikṣu who, on attaining the fourth dhyāna, became highly self-conceited1 and thought he had attained the fourth effect.2 When he first attained the first dhyāna he thought he had attained the state of a srotāpanna;3 when he attained the second dhyāna he thought it was the state of a sakṛdāgāmin;4 when he attained the third dhyāna he thought it was the state of an anāgāmin;5 and when he attained the fourth dhyāna, he thought it was arhathood. He thus became proud of himself and did not seek to progress further. When his life was about to end, he saw coming to him the form of a middle netherworld6 for [one who has] the fourth dhyāna, and there arose in him the false view. He thought, “There is no nirvana. The

Buddha has deceived me.” Because of [this] evil false view, he lost

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the middle netherworld for the fourth dhyāna and saw the form of a middle netherworld in Avīci-niraya.7 When his life ended, he was at once born in Avīci-niraya. The bhikṣus asked the Buddha, “When the life of [this] araṇya bhikṣu8 ended, where was he born?” The Buddha said, “This person was born in Avīci-niraya.” The bhikṣus were greatly surprised: Could sitting in zazen and keeping the precepts lead to that?

The Buddha answered as before, and said, “Everything stemmed from his conceit. When he attained the fourth dhyāna he thought he had attained the fourth effect. [Then] when he came to the end of his life and saw the form of a middle netherworld for the fourth dhyāna, there arose in him the false view. He thought, ‘There is no nirvana. I am an arhat; now, nonetheless, I am to be reborn. The Buddha has committed a deceit.’ He thereupon saw the form of a middle netherworld to Avīciniraya and as soon as his life ended he was born in Avīci-niraya.” Then the Buddha preached in verse, saying:

Even with abundant knowledge, observance of precepts, and     dhyāna,

He had yet to attain the Dharma by which excesses are ended. Although he possessed this virtue,

This fact was hard for him to believe.

That he fell into hell was because he slandered the Buddha.

It was not connected with the fourth dhyāna.9

[26] This bhikṣu is called “the bhikṣu in the fourth dhyāna,” and is also called “the bhikṣu of no knowledge.” [The story] warns against mistaking attainment of the fourth dhyāna for the fourth effect, and it also warns against the false view that slanders the Buddha. All in the great order of human beings and gods have known [this story]: from the time when the Tathāgata was in the world until today, both in the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, in order to warn against attaching to what is wrong as if it were right, [human beings and gods] say in derision, “That is like attaining the fourth dhyāna and thinking it is the fourth effect!” The wrongs of this bhikṣu, if I now briefly summarize them, are threefold.10 First, although he is somebody of no knowledge who cannot distinguish between the fourth dhyāna and the fourth effect, he vainly departs from teachers and idly lives alone in the araṇya. Happily, this is the time when the Tathāgata is in the world. If [this bhikṣu] regularly visited the place of the Buddha, so that he were constantly meeting the Buddha and hearing the Dharma, the mistakes described here could never be. Instead, living alone in the araṇya, he does not visit the place of the Buddha and does not meet Buddha and hear the Dharma at last, which is why he is like this. Even if he fails to visit the place of the Buddha, he should go to the orders of the great arhats and receive their instruction. Vainly to live in solitude is a mistake born of self-conceit. Secondly, when he attains the first dhyāna he thinks it is the first effect, when he attains the second dhyāna he thinks it is the second effect, when he attains the third dhyāna he thinks it is the third effect, and when he attains the fourth dhyāna he thinks 297a it is the fourth effect. This is his second mistake. The forms of the first, second, and third dhyānas, and the forms of the first, second, and third effects, are beyond comparison: how could we draw [a comparison]? This [mistake] derives from the fault of being without knowledge, a fault which [itself] derives from not serving a teacher and from ignorance.

[28] Among the disciples of Upagupta11 there is a bhikṣu who, with devout mind, has left his family life and got the fourth dhyāna, but he thinks it is the fourth effect. Upagupta, using expedient means, causes him to go to a distant place and makes a band of robbers materialize on the road thereto. He also materializes five hundred merchants. The robbers attack the merchants and there is a massacre. Seeing it, the bhikṣu becomes afraid. At once he thinks to himself, “I am not an arhat. This must be the third effect.” After the merchants are dead, there [only] remains the daughter of a wealthy [merchant]. She says to the bhikṣu, “Solely I beg you, virtuous monk, take me with you!” The bhikṣu replies, “The Buddha does not permit me to walk with a woman.” The girl says, “I will follow you from a distance, virtuous monk.” The bhikṣu takes pity on her; in sight of each other they walk on. The Venerable One then materializes a big river. The woman says, “Virtuous monk, will you cross with me?” The bhikṣu is downstream, the woman upstream. The girl suddenly falls into the water and calls, “Virtuous monk, save me!” Then the hands of the bhikṣu reach to her and rescue her. He thinks about her smoothness and lust arises in his mind—at once he recognizes that he is not an anāgāmin. But feeling intense love for this woman, he leads her to a secluded place, wanting to have intercourse with her. On seeing that this is the master, he is greatly ashamed and stands with head bowed. The Venerable One says, “You considered yourself to be an arhat. How could you want to do such a bad deed?” He led [the bhikṣu] into the sangha, made him confess, explained to him the pivot of the Dharma, and caused him to attain the state of arhat.12

[31]  This bhikṣu initially makes the mistake of having views, but on witnessing the massacre he becomes afraid. At that time he thinks, “I am not an arhat.” Still, he is mistaken in thinking that he might be in the third effect.

After that, because of thinking about the [woman’s] smoothness, he causes

lust to arise in his mind and knows that he is not an anāgāmin. He has no thought of slandering the Buddha, no thought of slandering the Dharma, and no thought of turning against the sacred teachings; he is not the same as the bhikṣu in the fourth dhyāna. This bhikṣu possesses the ability of one who has learned the sacred teachings, and so he knows himself that he is not an arhat and not an anāgāmin. People without knowledge today neither know what arhat is nor know what buddha is; therefore they do not know themselves that they are not arhats and not buddhas. That they just randomly think and say, “I am buddha,” may be a great mistake and a profound fault. Students first should learn what buddha is.

[32]  A master of the past said, “Therefore we know that those who learn the sacred teachings know the proper order from the beginning; and transgressions, even if they occur, are easily resolved.”13

How true are the words of the master of the past! Even if they make the mistake of having views, people who have learned even a bit of the Buddha Dharma will never be deceived by themselves and will never be deceived by others.

[33]  I have heard; there was a person who thought that he had become a buddha, and when the sky did not clear as he expected, he thought it must be due to the hindrances of demons. [The sky] did clear, but after that he did not see King Brahmā requesting him to preach the Dharma. He knew that he was not a buddha; he thought that he must be an arhat. But then when others spoke ill of him his mind became temperamental, and he knew that he was not an arhat; so he thought he must be in the third effect. But then when he saw a woman and thought lewd thoughts he knew that he was not a sacred person. Here also, because [a person] honestly recognized the form of the teachings, he was [able to be] like this.14

[34]  Now, those who know the Buddha-Dharma sense their own wrongness like this and swiftly get rid of mistakes. Those who do not know idly remain for their whole lives in stupidity; and even if they receive life after 297c life, still it will be so. This disciple of Upagupta, having attained the fourth dhyāna, thinks he is in the fourth effect, but thereafter he has the wisdom that “I am not an arhat.” If the bhikṣu of no knowledge, on coming to the end of his life and being able to see the middle netherworld for the fourth dhyāna, had the recognition “I am not an arhat,” then he could not be guilty of slandering the Buddha. Still more, it has been a long time since he attained the fourth dhyāna; why has he failed to recognize, by reflecting upon himself, that he is not in the fourth effect? If he were aware already of not being in the fourth effect, how could he fail to correct himself? [Instead,] he vainly sticks to his wrong consideration, hopelessly sunk in a false view. Thirdly, when his life ends, he makes an enormous mistake, the wrongness of which is so grave that he has duly fallen into Avīci Hell. [Monk of no knowledge,] even if you have spent your whole life thinking that the fourth dhyāna is the fourth effect, if you are able, when your life is ending, to see the middle netherworld for the fourth dhyāna, you should confess your lifelong mistake and consider that you were never in the fourth effect. How could you think, “The Buddha has deceived me; though nirvana does not exist, he has fabricated that nirvana exists”? This is a wrongness [born of] no knowledge. This sin, already, is to have slandered the Buddha. Because of this, the middle netherworld to Avīci appears to him and, when his life ends, he falls down into Avīci Hell. How could anyone, even a saint of the fourth effect, equal the Tathāgata? Śāriputra has long been a saint of the fourth effect. Collect [all] the wisdom that exists in a three-thousand-great-thousandfold world, see [the wisdom] of others—excluding the Tathāgata—as one division, and compare a sixteenth of Śāriputra’s wisdom with the wisdom that remains in the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world: [that remaining wisdom] will not 298a equal the one-sixteenth of Śāriputra’s wisdom. Nevertheless, on hearing the Tathāgata preach Dharma that he has never preached before, Śāriputra does not think, “This is different from the Buddha’s preaching at former and latter times; [the Buddha] is deceiving me.” He says in praise, “Pāpīyas has nothing like this.”15 The Tathāgata delivers Wealth Increaser,16 Śāriputra does not deliver Wealth Increaser: the great difference between the fourth effect and the buddha-effect is like this. If the world in the ten directions were full of the likes of Śāriputra and the other disciples, and together they tried to fathom the Buddha’s wisdom, it would be impossible.17 Kongzi and Laozi18 have never had such virtue. Who among students of the Buddha-Dharma could fail to fathom Confucius and Laozi? [But] no student of Kongzi and Laozi has ever fathomed the Buddha-Dharma. People today of the great kingdom of Song mostly uphold the principle of agreement between Kongzi and Laozi and the Buddha’s truth. It is the gravest of wrong views, as later I shall expand. When the bhikṣu in the fourth dhyāna, seeing his own wrong view as true, considers that the Buddha has deceived him, he turns his back on the Buddha’s truth forever. The enormity of his stupidness may be equal to that of the six

[non-Buddhist] teachers.19

[38] A master of the past said, “Even when the Great Master was inthe world, there were people of wrong consideration and views. How much worse, after [the Tathāgata’s] extinction, are those without a teacher who are unable to attain any dhyāna.”20

The present “Great Master” means the World-honored Buddha. Truly, even those who left family life and received ordination when the World-honored One was in the world had difficulty, due to lack of knowledge, in avoiding the mistake of wrong consideration and the holding of views. How much less could we, in a remote and inferior time and place, in the fifth five hundredyear [period] after the Tathāgata’s extinction, be without mistakes? Even one

who established the fourth dhyāna was like this. How much less deserving of discussion are those who are not up to establishing the fourth dhyāna and who idly sink into greed for fame and love of gain, or those who crave official promotion or secular careers. In the great kingdom of Song today there are many ill-informed and foolish people. They say that the Buddha-Dharma and the methods of Kongzi and Laozi are in accord and not divergent.

[39] In the Great Song era of Katai,21 there was a monk Shōju22 who edited and presented23 the record Futōroku24 in thirty volumes. He said, “Your subject has heard the words of Kozan Chien25 that, ‘My truth is like a three-legged cauldron, and the three teachings are like its legs. If one leg were missing, the cauldron would tip up.’ Your subject has long since admired this person and contemplated his preaching, whereupon I have recognized that the essence of what Confucianism teaches is integrity, the essence of what the Dao teaches is detachment, and the essence of what Śākyamuni teaches is seeing the nature.26 Integrity, detachment, seeing the nature: different in name, same in substance. When we master the point at which they converge, there is nothing that does not concur exactly with this truth. . . .”27

[40] People like this of wrong consideration and views are very many; they are not only Chien and Shōju. The mistake of these people is more grave than that of one who has attained the fourth dhyāna and thinks it is the fourth effect. They are slandering the Buddha, slandering the Dharma, and slandering the Sangha. Already, they are negating salvation, negating the three times, and negating cause and effect. That “in a morass of looseness, they invite misfortune and calamity”28 is beyond doubt. They are equal to those who have thought that there are no “Three Treasures, Four [Noble] Truths, or four effects of a śramaṇa.”29 The essence of the Buddha-Dharma is never seeing the nature. Where has any of the Seven Buddhas or the twenty-eight patriarchs of India said that the Buddha-Dharma is only “seeing the nature”? The Sixth Patriarch’s Platform Sutra30 contains the words “seeing the nature,” but that text is a fake text; it is not the writing of one to whom the Dharma treasury was transmitted, and it is not the words of Sōkei. It is a text upon which descendants of the Buddhist Patriarch absolutely never rely. Because Shōju and Chien never knew one corner of the Buddha-Dharma, they produced 298c this wrong consideration about one cauldron with three legs.

[42] A master of the past said, “Even Laozi and Zhuangzi31 themselves never recognized the subject of attachment and the object of attachment or the subject of detachment and the object of detachment of the Small Vehicle;32 much less actual attachment and actual detachment33 within the Great Vehicle. For this reason, they are not even slightly similar to the Buddha-Dharma. Yet the stupid people of the secular world are deluded by concepts and forms, and people of indiscriminate Zen stray from the true theory. They would like to equate the concepts of ‘the merit of the Dao’34 and ‘the amble,’35 with the preaching of salvation through the Buddha-Dharma; but how could that be possible?”36 Since olden times those deluded by concepts and forms and those who do not know the true theory have equated the Buddha-Dharma with Zhuangzi and Laozi. Of those who possess, with respect to the Buddha-Dharma, even slight esteem for the ancients, not one person since olden times has attached importance to Zhuangzi or Laozi.

[43] The Shōjōhōgyōkyō37 says, “Bodhisattva Moon Light38 there they

Bodhisattva Kāśyapa there they call Laozi. . . .”call Gankai;39 Bodhisattva Light and Purity40 there they call 42                                           Chūji;41

Since olden times, quoting the preaching of this sutra, [people] have said that Kongzi, Laozi, and so on are bodhisattvas and so their preaching may be, at heart, equal to the Buddha’s preaching, and they may be, moreover, the Buddha’s emissaries, whose preaching might naturally be the Buddha’s preaching. These opinions are all wrong. “A master of the past said, ‘Those who have referred to the catalogues [of the sutras], all consider this sutra to be a fake. . . .’”43 Relying now upon this preaching, [we can say that] the Buddha-Dharma and Kongzi and Laozi may be ever more widely divergent. [Kongzi and Laozi] are bodhisattvas already; they cannot compare with the buddha-effect. Furthermore, the virtue of “softening one’s light and harmonizing one’s traces”44 is the Dharma only of the buddhas and bodhisattvas of the three times. It is not an ability of common people in [the world of] secular dust. How can a common person occupied in his business be free to harmonize traces? Kongzi has never had any saying about harmonizing traces. Still less do Kongzi and Laozi know causes in the past or explain effects in the present. They see as the aim the art

of serving a lord and managing a household through the loyalty and filial piety of merely one age; they have no preaching at all about future ages. They may be, already, the descendants of nihilists. Those who, despising Zhuangzi and Laozi, have said, “They know not even the Small Vehicle, much less the Great Vehicle,” are the clear teachers of antiquity. Those who say that the three teachings are at one are [as] Chien and Shōju; they are the dimwitted common people of

a later degenerate age. You [Chien and Shōju], what excellence do you have to disregard the preaching of the ancestral masters of antiquity and to claim at random that the Buddha-Dharma might be equal to Kongzi and Laozi? Your views are never fit for discussing the penetrable and the impenetrable in the Buddha Dharma. Carrying your packs, you should go to learn under a clear teacher. Chien and Shōju! You have never known either the Great [Vehicle] or the Small Vehicle. You are more ignorant than [the monk] who, having attained the fourth dhyāna, thought it was the fourth effect. It is sad that where winds of decay are blowing there are many demons like this.

[46] A master of the past said, “According to the words of Kongzi45 and Kitan46 and the writings of the three emperors and the five rulers,47 a household is regulated through filial piety, a nation is regulated through loyalty, and the people benefit through assistance. But this is limited within one age; it does not extend into the past or the future. It never compares with the Buddha-Dharma’s benefiting of the three times. How could [such a comparison] not be mistaken?”48

How true they are, the words of the past master. They have nicely arrived at the ultimate principle of the Buddha-Dharma, and they are clear with regard to the principles of secular society. The words of the three emperors and the five rulers can never equal the teachings of the sacred wheel[-turning] kings and should never be discussed alongside the preachings of King Brahmā or the god Śakra. The areas [Chinese emperors] govern, and the effects and results they attain, may be far inferior. [But] not even the wheel kings, King Brahmā, and the god Śakra equal a bhikṣu who has left family life and received ordination. How much less could they equal the Tathāgata? The writings of Kongzi and Kitan, moreover, cannot equal the eighteen great scriptures of India,49 and they do not bear comparison with the four books of the Vedas.50 299b

The Brahmanism teaching of the Western Heavens is never equal to the Buddha’s teaching, nor even equal to the teachings of śrāvakas of the Small Vehicle. It is pitiful that in the minor and remote nation of China there is the false doctrine that the three teachings are at one.

[48] The fourteenth patriarch, Bodhisattva Nāgārjuna, said, “The great arhats and pratyekabuddhas know eighty thousand great kalpas. The great bodhisattvas and [buddhas] know countless kalpas.”51

The likes of Kongzi and Laozi never know past and future within one generation. How could they have the power to know one past life or two past lives? How much less could they know one kalpa? How much less could they know a hundred kalpas or a thousand kalpas? How much less could they know eighty thousand great kalpas? And how much less could they know countless kalpas? Compared with the buddhas and bodhisattvas who illuminate and know these countless kalpas more clearly than one looking at the palm of a hand, the likes of Kongzi and Laozi do not even deserve to be called dim. Covering the ears, do not listen to the words that the three teachings are at one. It is the most wrong doctrine among wrong doctrines. [49] Zhuangzi said, “Nobility and lowliness, suffering and joy, right and wrong, gain and loss: all these are just the natural state.”52

This view, already, is the descendant of non-Buddhists of the naturalistic view in the Western Kingdom.53 Nobility and lowliness, suffering and joy, right and wrong, gain and loss, are all the effect of good or bad conduct. Because [Zhuangzi] neither knows “fulfilling karma”54 and “pulling karma”55 nor understands the past and the future, he is ignorant of the present; how could he be equal to the Buddha-Dharma? Some say:

The buddha-tathāgatas widely substantiate the worlds of Dharma. Therefore Dharma worlds of atoms56 are all substantiated by the buddhas. That being so, both forms of [karmic] result, circumstances and the subject,57 amount to the preaching of the Tathāgata, and therefore mountains, rivers, and the earth, sun, moon, and stars, the four illusions58 and the three poisons,59 all are what the Tathāgata preached. To see the mountains and rivers is to see the Tathāgata. The three poisons and the

Fo ur illusions are nothing other than the Buddha-Dharma. To see atoms is the same as seeing the world of Dharma, and every instant is the state of saṃbodhi.60 This is called “the great liberation.” This is called “the directly transmitted and immediately accessible truth of the patriarchs.”

Fellows who speak like this are as [common as] rice, flax, bamboo, and reeds; the government and the people are full of them. It is not clear, however, whose descendants these fellows are, and they do not know the truth of the Buddhist patriarchs at all. While [mountains, rivers, and the earth] may be what the buddhas preach, it is not impossible for mountains, rivers, and the earth momentarily to be what the common person sees. [Those fellows] do not learn and do not hear the principle of what constitutes the preaching of buddhas. For them to say that seeing atoms is the same as seeing the world of Dharma is like subjects saying they are the same as a king. Moreover, why do they not say that seeing the world of Dharma is the same as seeing atoms? If the view of these fellows could be esteemed as the great truth of the Buddhist patriarchs, the buddhas need not have appeared in the world, the ancestral master need not have manifested himself, and living beings would not be able to attain the truth. Even if [those fellows] physically realize that “appearance is just nonappearance,”61 [the truth] is beyond this principle.

[52] Paramārtha Sanzō62 said, “In China there are two blessings. The first is that there are no rākṣasas.63 The second is that there are no nonBuddhists.”64

These words were in fact imported by a non-Buddhist brahman from the Western Kingdom. Even if there is no one able to penetrate non-Buddhism, that does not mean there cannot be people who beget non-Buddhist views. Rākṣasas have never been seen, but that does not mean there are no descendants of non-Buddhists. The reason [China] is a minor nation in a remote land, and therefore not the same as India, the center,65 is that although [the Chinese] have learned the Buddha-Dharma a little, there is no one who has grasped the state of experience as [it was grasped] in India.

[53] A master of the past said, “Today there are many who have returnedto secular society.66 Afraid of having to perform king’s service,67 they enter into non-Buddhism but steal the principles of the Buddha-Dharma  300a in order secretly to understand Laozi and Zhuangzi. They duly create confusion, deluding beginners about which is true and which is false, calling this the view that is able to unfold the Dharma of the Vedas.”68

Remember, those who cause confusion, not knowing which is true and which is false between the Buddha-Dharma and Laozi and Zhuangzi, and those who delude beginners, are just the present Chien and Shōju and their like. Not only is it the grossest stupidity: it is the utmost lack of esteem for the ancients. [This] is obvious and is evident. Among the monks of the Song dynasty in recent days, there had not been even one who knew that Kongzi and Laozi are inferior to the Buddha-Dharma. Although people who had become descendants of the Buddhist Patriarch,69 like rice, flax, bamboo, and reeds, filled the mountains and fields of the nine states, there was not one person or half a person upon whom it had dawned that, beyond Kongzi and Laozi, the Buddha-Dharma is outstanding in its excellence. Only my late master Tendō, the eternal buddha, clearly understood that the Buddha-Dharma and Kongzi and Laozi are not one. He instituted this teaching day and night. Though [others] were famous as teachers of sutras and commentaries or as lecturers, it had not dawned on any of them that the Buddha-Dharma far surpasses the areas of Kongzi and Laozi. For the last hundred years or so many lecturers have studied the conventions of people who practice [za]zen and learn the state of truth, hoping to steal their understanding. We can say that they are utterly mistaken. In the writings of Kongzi there is the “person of innate intelligence.”70 In the Buddha’s teaching there are no people of innate intelligence.71 In the Buddha Dharma there is explanation of the śarīras.72 Kong zi and Laozi do not know of the existence or nonexistence of the śarīras. Even if they intend to make [the three teachings] into one and mix them up, penetration or nonpenetration of a detailed explanation will be beyond them at last.

[56] [The] Rongo73 says, “[Those] who know it from birth are the best. Those who know through study are next. Those who learn it with difficulty are after that. Those who fail to learn even with difficulty, the people will see as the lowest.”74

If [this says] there is inborn intelligence, it is guilty of negating causality.

In the Buddha-Dharma there is no doctrine that negates causality. When the

bhikṣu in the fourth dhyāna comes to the end of his life, he falls into the sin of slandering the Buddha momentarily. If [students] think that the Buddha Dharma is equal to the teachings of Kongzi and Laozi, their sin, to slander the Buddha through a lifetime, must be grave indeed. Students should swiftly throw away the opinion that falsely considers the Buddha-Dharma and Kongzi and Laozi to be at one. Those who harbor this view and fail to discard it will eventually fall into an evil state. Students, you must clearly remember: Kongzi and Laozi neither know the Dharma in the three times nor know the truth of

cause and effect. They do not know the peaceful establishment of one continent;75 how much less could they know the peaceful establishment of the four continents.76 They do not even know about the six heavens; how much less could they know the Dharma of the triple world of nine realms?77 They do not know a small thousandfold world and they are not able to know a middle thousandfold world; how could they see and how could they know the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world? Even in the solitary realm of China [Kongzi and Laozi] are only minor retainers who have not ascended to the rank of emperor; they cannot be compared with the Tathāgata, who is the king of the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world. In the Tathāgata’s case, Brahmadeva, the god Śakra, and sacred wheel-turning kings, day and night are venerating him and standing guard over him and perpetually requesting him to preach the Dharma. Kongzi and Laozi are without such merit; they are only common people wandering in the mundane circuit. They have never known the truth of transcendence and salvation; how could they perfectly realize, in the manner of the Tathāgata, that “all dharmas are real form.” If they have never perfectly realized [this] how could they be seen as equal to the World-honored One? Kongzi and Laozi are without inner virtue and without outer usefulness; they can never arrive at the level of the World-honored One. How could we disgorge the false doctrine that the three teachings are at one? Kongzi and Laozi cannot penetrate the existence of boundaries and the nonexistence of boundaries of the world. Not only do they fail to see and fail to know the wide and fail to see and fail to know the great; they [also] fail to see the smallest material forms and fail to know the length of a kṣāṇa.78 The World-honored One clearly sees the smallest material forms and knows the length of a kṣāṇa; how could we liken him to Kongzi and 300c Laozi? Kongzi, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Huizi,79 and suchlike are just common people. They could not reach the level of even a srotāpanna80 of the Small Vehicle; how much less could they reach the level of the second [effect] or the third [effect] or an arhat of the fourth [effect]? That students, however, out of ignorance, put them on a par with the buddhas, is “in the midst of delusion, deepening delusion.” Kongzi and Laozi are not only ignorant of the three times and ignorant of the many kalpas; they are not able to know one instant of mindfulness and not able to know one moment of the mind. They do not bear comparison even with the gods of the sun and the moon and they cannot

equal the four great kings81 and the hosts of gods. Whether in the secular sphere or beyond the secular sphere, [seen] in comparison with the World honored One, they are straying in delusion.

[59] The Biographies82 say: “Ki was a great man of the Zhou [dynasty].83 He was skilled in astrology and once saw a heavenly anomaly. Following it eastward, he met, as he had expected, Laozi, whom he asked to write a book of five thousand words. Ki wished to go forth84 so that he could follow Laozi.85 Laozi said, ‘If you are determined to go forth, bring the heads of seven people including your father and mother, and then you will be able to go forth.’ Ki immediately did as he had been told, whereupon the seven heads all turned into the heads of pigs.” A master of the past said, “In contrast, Confucianists who are [versed in] secular scriptures and dutiful to their parents honor even [their parent’s] wooden images. [But] when Laozi established his instruction, he made Ki kill his parents. In the lineage of the Tathāgata’s teaching, great benevolence is the foundation. How could Laozi make a grave sin the starting point of his instruction?”86

[61]   In the past there were wrong groups who compared Laozi with the World-honored One, and today there are stupid fellows who say that both Kongzi and Laozi compare with the World-honored One. How could we not pity them? Kongzi and Laozi cannot equal even the sacred wheel-turning kings who, through the ten kinds of good,87 govern the secular world. How could the three emperors and the five rulers be equal to the wheel-turning kings of the gold, silver, copper, and iron [wheels], who are furnished with the seven treasures and a thousand things and who either govern four continents or rule a three-thousandfold world? Kongzi and Laozi can never be compared with even these [three emperors and five rulers]. The buddhas and the patriarchs of the past, present, and future have each considered the starting

301a point of instruction to be dutiful obedience to parents, teacher-monks, and the Three Treasures; and service of offerings to sick people and so on. They have never, since time immemorial, considered harming one’s parents to be the starting point of instruction. So Laozi and the Buddha-Dharma are not one. To kill one’s father and mother, in every case, is karma [felt] in the next life, in which falling into niraya is assured. For all Laozi’s random discussion

of “the void,” those who harm their father and mother will not escape the arising of retribution.

[62]   The Dentōroku says: The Second Patriarch88 constantly lamented, saying, “The teachings of Kongzi and Laozi are [only] the art of decorum and criteria for behavior, and the writings of Zhuangzi and the Yijing89 are imperfect in regard to exquisite truths. Recently I have heard that the great man Bodhidharma is residing at Shaolin. A consummate human being may not be far away. [Under him] I shall mold the profound state.”90

People today should definitely believe that the authentic transmission into China of the Buddha-Dharma was solely due to the Second Patriarch’s power of learning in practice. Though the First Patriarch had come from the west, without the Second Patriarch, the Buddha-Dharma would not have been transmitted. If the Second Patriarch had not transmitted the Buddha Dharma, in the Eastern Lands today there would be no Buddha-Dharma. In general the Second Patriarch must not be grouped among others.

[63]   The Dentōroku says: The monk Shinko91 was a man of broad accomplishments. For a long time he lived in Yiraku.92 He was widely read in many texts, and was well able to discuss profound truths.93 The Second Patriarch’s wide reading of many texts in former days may be far beyond the reading of [a few] volumes by people today. After he attained the Dharma and received the transmission of the robe, he had no words to the effect that, “In former days when I thought the teachings of Kongzi and Laozi were [only] the art of decorum and criteria for behavior, that was a mistake.” Remember, the Second Patriarch had clearly realized that Kongzi and Laozi are unable to equal the Buddha-Dharma. Why do his distant descendants today turn their backs on their ancestral father and say that [Kongzi and Laozi] and the Buddha-Dharma are at one? Just know that it is a false doctrine. Among distant descendants of the Second Patriarch, who could rely upon the explanations of Shōju and the like? If you want to be a descendant of the Second 301b Patriarch, never say that the three teachings are at one.

[65] When the Buddha was in the world, there was a non-Buddhist called Debating Power94 who thought that in debate there was no one who could equal his learning, his power being the greatest; for this reason, he was called Debating Power. At the request of five hundred Licchavīs,95 he compiled five hundred salient enigmas and came to pester the World-honored One. Coming to the Buddha’s place, he asked the Buddha, “Is there one ultimate truth, or are there many ultimate truths?”

The Buddha said, “There is only one ultimate truth.”

Debating Power said, “We teachers each assert that we have the ultimate truth. Among non-Buddhists, we each consider ourself to be right and disparage the ways of others; we find in each other rightness and wrongness: therefore there are many truths.”

The World-honored One at that time had already converted Deer Head,96 who had realized the effect of one beyond study.97 He was standing by the Buddha. The Buddha asked Debating Power, “Among

the many truths, whose is foremost?”

Debating Power said, “Deer Head is foremost.”

The Buddha said, “If he is foremost, why has he discarded his own truth,98 become my disciple, and entered my state of truth?”

Seeing this, Debating Power hung his head in shame. He took refuge and entered the truth. Then the Buddha preached a philosophic verse, saying:

Everyone claims the ultimate,

Each attaching to themselves,

Each seeing themselves as right and others as wrong:

This is never the ultimate.

Such people enter controversies, And strive to elucidate intellectual nirvana. Disputing with each other right and wrong, Winners and losers feel sadness or joy.

The winners fall into the pit of conceit; The losers fall into a hell of gloom. Therefore, those who have wisdom Do not fall into these two ways.

Debating Power, you should know:

In the Dharma of my disciples

There is neither nothingness nor substance.

What are you after?

If you want to destroy my arguments, There is, at last, no basis for this. It is impossible to clarify total knowledge;

By this [effort] you will only ruin yourself.99

[67] Now the golden words of the World-honored One are like this. The stupid and dull living beings of the Eastern Lands must not indiscriminately turn their backs on the Buddha’s teaching and say that there are truths equal to the Buddha’s truth. That would just be slandering the Buddha and slandering the Dharma. [People] of the Western Heavens, from Deer Head and Debating Power to the brahman Long Nails,100 the brahman Senika,101 and so on: these were people of wide learning, [such as] have never existed since ancient times in the Eastern Lands. Kongzi and Laozi could never equal them at all. All of them discarded their own truths and took refuge in the Buddha’s truth. 301c

If we were now to compare the secular people Kongzi and Laozi with the Buddha-Dharma, even those who listened would be guilty of a sin. Furthermore, even arhats and pratyekabuddhas will all eventually become bodhisattvas: not one of them will finish in the Small Vehicle. [But] as for Kongzi and Laozi, who never entered the Buddha’s truth, how could we say that they are equal to the buddhas? That would be an enormously wrong view. In conclusion, the fact that the World-honored Tathāgata far surpasses all is praised and known unanimously by the buddha-tathāgatas, the great bodhisattvas, Brahmadeva, and the god Śakra. The twenty-eight patriarchs of India all know it. In sum, all those who have the power of learning in practice know it. Living beings of the present degenerative age must not heed the mad utterance of the dimwits of the Song dynasty, that the three teachings are at one. It is the utmost ignorance.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shizen-biku

                                    On a day during the summer retreat in the                                     seventh year of Kenchō,102 I finished the copying                                     from the master’s first draft.

                                    Ejō

 

Notes

1     glance). See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.Zōjōman represents the Sanskrit abhimāna, one of the seven categories of māna (arro-

2     Shika (“fourth effect”), the state of an arhat.

3     A stream-enterer. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

4     A once-returner. (Ibid.) 5  A non-returner. (Ibid.)

6     and regeneration, usually rendered into Chinese characters as Chū-inSee Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. represents the Sanskrit antarā-bhava, the middle existence between deathchū-u, “middle existence.”

7     Avīci, lit., “waveless,” is the name of a particular hell. Niraya means hell.

8     Araṇyawilderness without visiting reliable teachers.means forest, wilderness, or deserted place. The bhikṣu lived alone in the

9     Daichidoron, fascicle 17.

10    paragraph 34.The first two mistakes are listed in this paragraph. The third mistake is described in 11 The fourth patriarch in India. See Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), Busso.

12    Chigi’s Fascicle 5, pt. 4 of the Makashikan. Master Tendai Chigi was founder of the Tendai.Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, a commentary on Master Tendai

13    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 5, pt. 4. 14 Ibid.

15    truth./Pāpīyas has no such thing.” See LS 1.142. See Volume III, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms (Lotus Sutra, Hiyupāpīyas).    (“A Parable”): “The World-honored One preaches the real

16    Fukuzō represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Śrīvaddhi, the name of a wealthy man said to be already one hundred years old when he resolved to become a monk. Śāriputra refused to let him, saying he was too old. Later, Śrīvaddhi asked the Buddha, and the Buddha allowed it. Śrīvaddhi is described in fascicle 4 of the mentioned in Chapter Eighty-six, Shukke-kudoku. Kengukyō, and also

281

17    Alludes to Lotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.72.

18    Confucius, is the founder of Confucianism. Laozi (also ca. sixth century Kōrō stands for Kōshi, Kongzi, and Rōshi, Laozi. Kongzi (555–479 B.C.E.B.C.E.), that is,) is regarded as the founder of Daoism.

19    Rokush iwho denied the existence of good and evil), Maskari-Gośalīputra (a fatalist), Sañ stands for rokushi-gedō, the six non-Buddhist teachers: Pūraṇa-Kāśyapa((jaya-Vairāṭīputra (a skeptic), Ajita-Keśakambala (a materialist), Kakuda-Kātyāyana(the founder of Jainismwho explained the universe by seven elemental factors), and Nirgrantha-Jñātiputra).

20    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 4, pt. 1.

21    1201–1205.

22    age of sixty-seven. Master Raian Shōju. A successor of Master Getsudō Dōshō. He died in 1208 at the 23 That is, presented to the emperor.

24    Kataifutōrokustories of both monks and laypeople.(Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch), completed 1201. Contains

25    Kozan Chien was a monk of the Tendai sect. He died in 1022 at the age of forty-seven. 26 Kenshō,by people who regard the experience of enlightenment as an aim outside of practice. “seeing the nature” or “enlightenment”: the concept kenshō is generally used

27    Quoted from the preface to the Kataifutōroku.

28    Alludes to a line in Master Yōka Genkaku’s Shōdōka: “Emptiness run wild negates cause and effect; and in a morass of looseness, invites misfortune and calamity.” See also Chapter Eighty-nine, Shinjin-inga.

29    Alludes to Master Nāgārjuna’s words, quoted in Chapter Eighty-nine, Shinjin-inga: no Three Treasures, Four [Noble] Truths, or four effects of a “When they deny the existence of cause and effect beyond the world, then there areśramaṇa.

30    Enō, the Sixth Patriarch. There are several editions, including the Tonkō edition The Kyoto), and the Korean edition. ure(Tonkō was a station on the Silk Road), the Kōshōji edition (Kōshōji is a temple in) was said to have been compiled by Hōkai and other disciples of Master DaikanRokusodaishihōbōdankyō (Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch’s Dharma Treas-

31    Laozi is said to be the founder of Daoism, and Zhuangzi is said to be his student. The Chinese texts of Daoism are named after the authors to whom those texts are ascribed. teacher.So the name “Zhuangzi” represents both Daoist teaching and the name of the supposed

32    The Small Vehicle means intellectual Buddhism in which subject and object are separated. 33 [Nyaku-jaku nyaku-ha,attachment].” Nyaku expresses possibility, but Master Dōgen used the character literally, “possibility of attachment, possibility of breakingto represent actuality, or the fact of something already having happened. In Chapterit has arrived,” and Twenty-two (Vol. II), ki-shi,Busshō,“it has already arrived.”paragraph 14, Master Dōgen identifies nyaku-shi, “if

34 Dōtoku.Merit of the Dao of LaoziThere is a text ascribed to Laozi called the ). Rōshidōtokukyō (Scripture of the 35 Zhuangzi: to walk amid nature in a state of perfect ease.Shōyō, lit., walk, amble, or stroll, expresses the fundamental ideal in the teaching of

36    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 3, pt. 4.

37    Shōjōhōgyōkyō, lit., “Sutra of Pure Dharma Conduct,” is not contained in the , the complete collection of Buddhist sutras. The sutra was likely Taishō a fake, written in China and titled as if it were written in India. Shinshū Daizōkyō

38    of this bodhisattva, along with that of Nikkō-bosatsu, Bodhisattva Sun Light (from Gekkō (Moon Light) represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Candraprabha. The image popular in China and Japan from ancient times.nyorai, lit., “Medicine King Tathāgata,” the buddha of healing (Sanskrit: Bhaiṣajyaguruor Bhaiṣa jya guru vaiḍūrya prabha-tathāgata). Statues of these three have been verythe Sanskrit Sūryaprabha), are usually arranged on either side of the image of Yakushi-

39    Gankai was said to be the most excellent of the ten great disciples of Kongzi.

40    Kōjō (“Light and Purity”); Sanskrit name not traced.

41    Chūji, another name of Confucius.

42    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 6, pt. 3.

43    Ibid.

44    Wakō-ōjaku. Wakō, “softening light,” describes the practice of buddhas and bodhisattvas of concealing the brightness of their own state, so as not to bedazzle the living beings people in China and Japan have argued that Confucianist and Daoist teachers, andwho must be saved (see, for example, LS 3.252). Applying the theory of buddhas and bodhisattvas of flexibly showing different forms as befits living beingswhom they wish to save. Ōjaku, “harmonizing traces,” describes the practice ofwakō-ōjaku,

Shintō gods, are manifestations of buddhas and bodhisattvas. 45 Kōkyu, another name of Confucius. Kyu was his first name.

46    Kitan means the ancient Chinese emperor Shūkō, who laid down guidelines for aneffective political system.

47    GoteiC.E.) is known as (“five rulers”). The legendary period of Chinese history (2852 gotei-ki, “age of the five rulers.”       B.C.E. to 2205 48 There is a similar passage in the Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 10, pt. 2. 49 commentaries. The scriptures of Brahmanism: the four Vedas, six commentaries, and a further eight

50    The Sanskrit Terms). The Vedas, which are thought to have been compiled between ca. 2000 and B.C.E., consist of 1) the veda literally means “divine knowledge” (see Glossary of SanskritṚg-veda,Ṛg-veda) set to music for use in rituals; 3) the the oldest collection of hymns; 2) the Atharva-veda, spells used in daily rites. Sāma-Yajurca. 500

veda,veda, hymns (mainly from the spells used in rituals; and 4) the

51    Daichidoron, chap. 5.

52    Makashikan, fascicle 10, pt. 1.

53    Saikoku (“Western Kingdom”), a variation of Saiten, “Western Heavens”; both terms refer to India.

54    in Chinese Buddhism to describe karma that produces the individual differences between a man or a woman, the wise and the unwise, the rich and the poor, etc.Mangō, sometimes called beppō-go, “karma of distinct results,” is a technical term 55 Ingō means karma that produces general results, such as birth as a human being.

56    Suggests the material realms of the Daoists. This section in quote marks represents an attempt to identify the materialist or naturalistic view with the Buddha-Dharma.

57    E-shō-nihō means shōhō and Ehō,ehō. Shōhō,lit., “dependence results,” means the circumstances lit., “true result,” means the human subject Eshō is commonly used as an expression

upon which the subject’s existence depends. of object and subject.as the result of past karma.

58    Shi-tōviparyāsa,of Sanskrit Terms). The four illusions are 1) the illusion of permanence (viparyāsaśuci-viparyāsais short for )which means overturning, inversion, perverseness, or delusion (see Glossary, 2) the illusion of pleasure ), and 4) the illusion of self shi-tendō, literally, “four inversions.” (sukha-viparyāsa(ātma-viparyāsaTendō), 3) the illusion of purity).represents the Sanskritnitya-

(

59    Sandoku (“three poisons”): greed, anger, and ignorance. 60 The inclusive state of truth.

61 going beyond conventional thinking: what is conventionally called “birth” or “appear-Shō-soku-mushō,ance” is, in reality, a momentary state in which there is no change. “birth is non-birth,” is a principle in the Sanron sect that suggests 62 Shintai-sanzō. Shintai, lit., “true philosophy,” represents the meaning of the Sanskrit

Paramārtha (449–569), a native of western India, was invited to China by Emperor Paramārtha, the monk’s name. Sanzō was a title for a scholar of the Tripiṭaka. texts into Chinese, including the Wu of the Liang dynasty in 546. He translated sixty-four sutras and other Buddhist Konkōmyōkyō (Golden Light Sutra). 63 Rākṣasas are evil or malignant demons.

64 Makashikan, fascicle 10, pt. 1; Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 10, pt. 2. 65 Chū-indo, lit., “middle India,” suggests India as the center of civilization.

60 secular life. Genzoku describes a person giving up the life of a Buddhist monk and going back to

67    Ō-ekiDaoism, and burdened Buddhist monks by forcing them to perform such service.was a kind of labor in lieu of tax. In this age, the Chinese government supported

68    Makashikan, fascicle 10, pt. 1.

69    zazen. Suggests people who have become descendants of Master Bodhidharma, by practicing

70    Twenty-six (Vol. II), Shōchisha, “those who know from birth.” This term is also discussed in Chapter Daigo.

71    Because knowing derives from effort.

72    SutraŚarīra(s are sacred relics or bones, especially of the Buddha. See, for example, LS 2.154) and Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III), Nyorai-zenshin.  Lotus

73    Rongo (Discourses), by Confucius; the fundamental text of Confucianism.

74    Rongo, fascicle 8.

75    Isshū,human beings live. “one continent,” means the southern continent of Jambudvīpa upon which

76    Pūrvavideha (east), Aparagodāna (west), and Uttarakuru (north). See Glossary ofShishū, “four continents,” from the Sanskrit catvārodvīpāḥ, are Jambudvīpa (south),

Sanskrit Terms.

77    Sangai-kūj worlds of desire, matter, and non-matter. It is said that the world of desire is one realm with hell at the bottom and the six heavens at the top. The worlds of matter and non-matter have four realms each. Here represents the whole real world. The triple world comprises the

78    An instant. See Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), Hotsu-bodaishin,kṣāṇa. . . .” paragraph 201: “Only the Tathāgata clearly knows the length of this

79    (220–265).Keishi was a scholar and orator who became a prime minister during the Wei dynasty 80 A stream-enterer, the first of the four effects leading to arhathood.

81 nents. The Four Quarter Kings (Sanskrit: catvāro mahā-rājikāḥ) who guard the four conti82 (RetsudenHistory).(Biographies) refers to the biographical section of the Chinese book Shiki 83 The Zhou dynasty prevailed in China from ca. 1122 B.C.E. to ca. 222 B.C.E.

84    Ki wished to quit his position in Zhou society.

85    Laozi is here called by the name Tan.

86    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 5, pt. 6.

87    3)Jūzen adultery, 4) lying, 5) duplicitous speech, 6) abusive speech, 7) idle chatter, 8) greed, anger, 10) wrong views.(“ten kinds of good”) are abstention from the ten evils: 1) killing, 2) stealing,

9)

88    Master Taiso Eka, successor of Master Bodhidharma. See, for example, Chapter Yoji. Thirty (Vol. II),

89    Eki, “divination,” stands for Ekikyō, lit., “Divination Scripture,” that is, the yinYijing. and yang. This work was written during the Zhou dynasty, based on Daoist concepts of

90    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 3.

91    Master Taiso Eka. Shinko was his monk’s name in his youth.

92    The district bordered by two rivers pronounced in Japanese as I and Raku.

93    Keitokudentōroku, chap. 3.

94    Ronriki (“Debating Power”). Sanskrit name not traced.

95    also called Vaiśālī, was located at present-day Besarb, twenty-seven miles north of The Licchavis were an ethnic group that inhabited the republic of Vaiśālī. Its capital,

Patna.

96    Rokutō (“Deer Head”), from the Pāli Migasīsa. He was a brahman from Kośala, who formerly practiced magic techniques but later took refuge in the Buddha and become an arhat.

97    Mugakuka, “the effect of one beyond study,” is a synonym for the state of arhat.

98    Dō, lit., “Way” or “truth,” represents the Sanskrit bodhi. In this context it suggests Deer Head’s former way, outlook, or philosophy of life.

99    Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu, fascicle 10, pt. 2; Daichidoron, fascicle 18.

100  Chōso represents the Sanskrit Dīrghanakha, the name of a brahman who did not cut Zōagongyō. his nails, described in the

101  Senika was a brahman described in the One (Vol. I), Bendōwa; Chapter Six (Vol. I), Garland Sutra.Soku-shin-ze-butsu. See, for example, Chapter

102  Master Dōgen began or rewrote after deciding to make a one hundred-chapter edition1255of the . Master Dōgen had died two years previously. This is one of the twelve chaptersShōbōgenzō. The twelve chapters are: Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Kesa-kudoku; seven, Chapter Eighty-five, Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), jin-inga; Hachi-dainingaku;Kuyō-shobutsu; Chapter Ninety, Shime; Chapter Eighty-eight, and Shizen-biku;Hotsu-bodaishin;Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmonChapter Eighty-six, Chapter Ninety-four, Kie-sanbō;Chapter Eighty-four, Shukke-kudoku;(Appendix IIIChapter Eighty-nine, Jukai;Chapter Eighty-Chapter Ninety-).Sanji-no-gō;Shinfive,

 

[Chapter Ninety-one]

Yui-butsu-yo-butsu

Together with Buddhas Alone

Translator’s Note: Yui means “only” or “solely,” butsu means “buddha” or “buddhas,” and yo means “and” or “together with.” So yui-butsu-yobutsu means “buddhas alone, together with buddhas.” Yui-butsu-yo-butsu is a phrase from a well-known quotation from the Lotus Sutra. The full quotation is: “Buddhas alone, together with buddhas are directly able to perfectly realize that all dharmas are real form.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen explains what buddhas are.

[71] The Buddha-Dharma cannot be known by people. For this reason, since ancient times, no common person has realized the Buddha-Dharma and no one in the two vehicles1 has mastered the Buddha-Dharma. Because it is realized only by buddhas, we say that “buddhas alone, together with buddhas, are directly able perfectly to realize it.”2 When we perfectly realize it, while still as we are, we would never have thought previously that realization would 302a be like this. Even though we had imagined it, it is not a realization that is compatible with that imagining. Realization itself is nothing like we imagined. That being so, to imagine it beforehand is not useful. When we have attained realization,3 we do not know what the reasons were for our being [now] in the state of realization.4 Let us reflect on this. To have thought, prior to realization, that it will be like this or like that, was not useful for realization. That it was different from how we had supposed it to be, in all our miscellaneous prior thoughts, does not mean that our thinking, being very bad, had no power in it. Even the thinking of that time was realization itself, but because we were then directing it the wrong way round, we thought and said that it was powerless. Whenever we feel that [we are] useless, there is something that we should know; namely, that we have been afraid of becoming

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small.5 If realization appears through the force of thoughts prior to realization, it might be an unreliable realization. Because it does not rely upon [realization], and it has come far transcending the time prior to realization, realization is assisted solely by the force of realization itself. Delusion, remember, is something that does not exist. Realization, remember, is something that does not exist.

[74] When the supreme state of bodhi is a person, we call it “buddha.”

When buddha is in the supreme state of bodhi, we call it “the supreme state

of bodhi.” If we failed to recognize the feature of the moment of being in this truth, that might be stupid. That feature, namely, is untaintedness. Untaintedness does not mean forcibly endeavoring to be aimless and free of attachment and detachment; nor does it mean maintaining something other than one’s aim. Actually, without being aimed at, or attached to, or detached from, untaintedness exists. [But,] for example, when we meet people, we fix in mind what their features are like, and [when we see] a flower or the moon, we think upon them an extra layer of light and color. Again, we should recognize that just as it is inescapable for spring to be simply the spirit of spring itself, and for autumn likewise to be the beauty and ugliness of autumn itself, even if we try to be other than ourselves, we are ourselves. We should reflect also that even if we want to make these sounds of spring and autumn into ourself, they are beyond us. Neither have they piled up upon us, nor are they thoughts just now existing in us. This means that we cannot see the four elements and the five aggregates of the present as ourself and we cannot trace them as someone else. Thus, the colors of the mind excited by a flower or the moon should not be seen as self at all, but we think of them as ourself. If we consider what is not ourself to be ourself, even that can be left as it is, but when we illuminate [the state in which] there is no possibility of either repellent colors or attractive ones being tainted, then action that naturally exists in the truth is the unconcealed original features.

[76] A man of old6 said that the whole earth is our own Dharma body— but it must not be hindered by a “Dharma body.” If it were hindered by a

“Dharma body,” to move the body even slightly would be impossible. There should be a way of getting the body out. What is this way by which people get the body out? For those who fail to express this way of getting the body out, the life of the Dharma body ceases at once, and they are long sunk in

the sea of suffering. If asked a question like this, what should we express, to let the Dharma body live and so as not to sink into the sea of suffering? At such a time we should express, “The whole earth is our own Dharma body.” If this truth is present, the moment expressed as “The whole earth is our own Dharma body” is beyond expression. Moreover, when it is beyond expression we should promptly notice the possibility of not expressing it. There is an expression of an eternal buddha who did not express it: [namely,] in death there are instances of living;7 in living there are instances of being dead;8 there are the dead who will always be dead;9 and there are the living who are constantly alive. People do not forcibly cause it to be so: the Dharma is like this. Therefore, when [buddhas] turn the wheel of Dharma they have light and they have sound like this, and we should recognize that in their “manifesting the body to save the living”10 also, they are like this. This state is called “the wisdom of non-birth.”11 Their “manifesting the body to save the living” is their “saving the living to manifest the body.” When we behold their “saving,” we do not see a trace of “manifestation,” and when we watch them “manifesting,” they may be free of concern about “salvation.” We should understand, should preach, and should experience that in this “saving” the Buddha-Dharma is perfectly realized. We hear and we preach that both “manifesting” and “the body” are as one with “saving.” Here also, [the unity of] “manifesting the body to save the living” makes it so. When [buddhas] have substantiated this principle, from the morning of their attaining the truth to the evening of their nirvana, even if they have never preached a word, 303a words of preaching have been let loose all around.

[79] An eternal buddha said:12

The whole earth is the real human body,

The whole earth is the gate of liberation,

The whole earth is the one Eye of Vairocana,13 The whole earth is our own Dharma body.14

The point here is that “the real” is the real body. We should recognize that “the whole earth” is not our imagination; it is the body that is real. If someone asks, “Why have I not noticed this so far?” we should say, “Give me back my words that ‘the whole earth is the real human body.’”15 Or we might say, “That ‘the whole earth is the real human body,’ we know like this!” Next, “the whole earth is the gate of liberation” describes there being nothing at all to tangle with or to embrace. The words “the whole earth” are familiar to time, to the years, to the mind, and to words: they are immediate, without any separation. We should call that which is limitless and boundless “the whole earth.” If we seek to enter this “gate of liberation,” or seek to pass through it, that will be utterly impossible. Why is it so? We should reflect on the asking of the question. Even if we hope to visit a place that does not exist, that is not feasible. Next, “the whole earth is the one Eye of Vairocana”: though buddha is one Eye, do not think that it must necessarily be like a person’s eye. In people there are two eyes,16 but when speaking of 303b [our] Eye,17 we just say “the human eye”;18 we do not speak of two or three. When those who learn the teaching, also speak of the Buddha’s Eye, the Dharma Eye, the Supernatural Eye,19 and so on, we are not studying eyes. To have understood them as if they were eyes is called unreliable. Now we should just be informed that the Buddha’s Eye is one, and in it the whole earth exists. There may be a thousand Eyes20 or ten thousand Eyes, but to begin with “the whole earth” is one among them. There is no error in saying that it is one among so many; at the same time, it is not mistaken to recognize that in the state of buddha there is only one Eye. Eyes may be of many kinds. There are instances of three being present, there are instances of a thousand Eyes being present, and there are instances of eighty-four thousand being present; so the ears should not be surprised to hear that the Eye is like this. Next, we must hear that “the whole earth is our own Dharma body.” To seek to know ourself is the inevitable will of the living. But those with Eyes that see themselves are few: buddhas alone know this state. Others, non-Buddhists and the like, vainly consider only what does not exist to be their self. What buddhas call themselves is just the whole earth. In sum, in all instances, whether we know or do not know ourselves, there is no whole earth that is other than ourself. The matters of such times we should defer to people of yonder times.21

[82] In ancient times a monk asked a venerable patriarch,22 “When a hundred thousand myriad circumstances converge all at once, what should

I do?” The venerable patriarch said, “Do not try to manage them.”23 The

meaning is, “Let what is coming come! In any event, do not stir!” This is immediate Buddha-Dharma: it is not about circumstances. These words

should not be understood as an admonition; they should be understood as enlightenment in regard to reality. [Even] if we consider how to manage [circumstances], they are beyond being managed.

[83] An ancient buddha said, “Mountains, rivers, the earth, and human beings, are born together. The buddhas of the three times and human beings have always practiced together.” Thus, if we look at the mountains, rivers, and earth while one human being is being born, we do not see this human being now appearing through isolated superimposition upon mountains, rivers, and earth that existed before [this human being] was born. Having said this, still the ancient words may not be devoid of further meaning. How should we understand them? Just because we have not understood them, we should not disregard them; we should resolve to understand them without fail. They are words that were actually preached, and so we should listen to them. Having listened to them, then we may be able to understand them. A way in which to understand them [is as follows]: Who is the person that has clarified, by investigating this birth24 from the side of this human being being born, just what is, from beginning to end, this thing called “birth”? We do not know the end or the beginning, but we have been born. Neither, indeed, do we know the limits of mountains, rivers, and the earth, but we see them here; and at this place, it is as if they are walking.25 Do not complain that mountains, rivers, and the earth are not comparable with birth. Illuminate mountains, rivers, and the earth as they have been described, as utterly the

      same as our being born.                                                                                           

[85] Again, “the buddhas of the three times” have already through their practice accomplished the truth and perfected realization. How, then, are we to understand that this state of buddha is the same as us? To begin with, we should understand the action of buddha. The action of buddha takes place in unison with the whole earth and takes place together with all living beings. If it does not include all, it is never the action of buddha. Therefore, from the establishment of the mind until the attainment of realization, both realization and practice are inevitably done together with the whole earth and together with all living beings. Some doubts may arise in regard to this: when we seek to clarify that which seems to be mixed into ideas that are unknowable, such [doubting] voices are heard; but we should not wonder whether [the state of oneness] is the situation of [other] people. This is a teaching to be understood, and so we should recognize that when we establish, and practice, the mind of the buddhas of the three times, the principle is inevitably present that we do not let our own body and mind leak away. To have doubts about this is actually to disparage the buddhas of the three times. If we quietly reflect on ourselves, the truth exists in the fact that our own body and mind has been practicing in the same manner as the buddhas of the three times, and the truth is evident also that we have established the mind. If we reflect upon and illuminate the moment before and the moment behind this body and mind, the human being under investigation is not I and is not [another] person; in which case, as what stagnant object can we see it, and thereby consider it to be separated from the three times? All such thoughts do not belong to us. When the truth is being practiced by the original mind of the

304b buddhas of the three times, how is it possible for anything at all to hinder that moment? The truth, in short, should be called “beyond knowing and not knowing.”

[87] An ancient person said:26

Even the crashing down [of illusions] is nothing different;

Fluency27 is beyond discussion.

Mountains, rivers, and the earth,

Are just the total revelation of the Dharma King’s body.

People today also should learn in accordance with the saying of [this] person of ancient times. [Mountains, rivers, and the earth] already are the body of a king of Dharma. Therefore there existed a king of Dharma who understood that even the crashing down was nothing different. This idea is like the mountains being on the earth, and like the earth bearing the mountains. When we understand, the time when we did not understand does not return to impede understanding. At the same time, there is no case of understanding being able to destroy past non-understanding. Still, both in understanding and in non-understanding, there is the mind of spring and the voice of autumn. The reason we have not understood even them is that, although [spring and autumn] have been preaching at the top of their voices, those voices have not entered our ears—our ears have been idly wandering inside the voices. Understanding will take place when, with the voice already having entered the ears, samādhi becomes evident. We should not think, though, that this understanding is small whereas the non-understanding was great. We should remember that because we are beyond matters we have conceived privately, “the Dharma King” is like this. As to the meaning of “the body of the Dharma King,” the Eye is like the body and the mind may be equal to the body. It may be that both the mind and the body, without the slightest separation, are “totally revealed.” We understand that in the brightness of light and in the preaching of Dharma, there exists, as described

      above, the body of the Dharma King.                                                               304c

[89] There is a saying from ancient times that none other than fish knows the mind of fish, and none other than birds can follow the traces of birds. Few people have been able to know this principle. Those who have interpreted only that human beings do not know the mind of fish and that human beings do not know the mind of birds, have misconstrued [the saying]. The way to understand it is [as follows]: Fish together with fish always know each other’s mind. They are never ignorant [of each other] as human beings are. When they are going to swim upstream through the Dragon’s Gate,28 this is known to all, and together they make their mind one. The mind to get through the nine [rapids] of Zhekiang,29 also, is communicated in common. [But] none other than fish know this [mind]. Again, when birds are flying through the sky, walking creatures never imagine even in a dream the knowing of these tracks or the seeing and the following of these traces; [walking creatures] do not know that such [traces] exist, and so there is no example of [walking creatures] imagining [such traces]. Birds, however, can see in many ways that hundreds or thousands of small birds have flocked together and flown away, or that these are the traces of big birds that have gone south or flown north in so many lines. [To birds, those traces] are more evident than wheel tracks in a lane, or a horse’s hoofprints visible in the grass. Birds see the traces of birds. This principle also applies to buddhas. They suppose how many ages buddhas have spent in practice, and they know small buddhas and great buddhas, even among those who have gone uncounted. These are things that, when we are not buddha we never know at all. There might be 305a someone who asks, “Why can I not know it?” Because it is with the Eye of Buddha that those traces can be seen; and those who are not buddha are not equipped with the Eye of Buddha. Buddhas are counted among those that count things; without knowing, [however,] they are totally able to trace the

tracks of the paths of buddhas. If, with [our own] eyes we can see these traces, we may be in the presence of buddhas and we may be able to compare their footprints. In the comparing, buddhas’ traces are known, the length and depth of buddhas’ traces are known, and, through consideration of buddhas’ traces, the illumination of our own traces is realized. To realize these traces may be called the Buddha-Dharma.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Yui-butsu-yo-butsu

                                    This was copied under the southern eaves of                                     the guest quarters of Eiheiji on Kichijōzan, in                                     Shibi Manor in the Yoshida district of Esshū,30                                     at the end of the last month in spring in the                                     eleventh year of Kōan.31

Notes

1            The vehicles of the śrāvaka and the pratyekabuddha. 2 Lotus Sutra, Hōben. See LS 1.68.

3     have been enlightened, to have understood.” Used as a transitive verb, it means “to Satori nuru is here used, in the present perfect, as an intransitive verb, literally, “to “enlightenment.” See Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II), connotations. The noun realize.” In general, the term “enlightenment” has been avoided because of its idealistic satori, similarly, has been translated as “realization”

4     Or “When we have been enlightened, we do not know what the reasons were for our being enlightened.”

5     realizing ourselves in the present. Because we are worried about becoming small we try to become better, instead of

6     Master Chōsha Keishin; see the following paragraph.

7     For example, a person on a battlefield establishes the will to the truth.

8     For example, a person wastes time regretting something that has already happened.

9     People laid to rest in cemeteries, etc. 10 Genshin-doshō. See LS 3.252.

11       Mushō no chiken. Mushō,no birth or beginning). both instantaneousness (in the moment there is no appearance) and eternal (reality hasedge” or “knowing,” is used many times in the Mushō“nonappearance” or “non-birth,” expresses reality, which is also used as a synonym for nirvana. Lotus Sutra to represent Chicken, prajñā,“knowl-or the

Buddha’s wisdom. See, for example, LS 1.68; LS 1.88–90.

12       Master Chōsha Keishin (d. 868), a successor of Master Nansen Fugan.

13       Vairocana is the Sun Buddha, a symbol of universal light.

14       A slightly different version of Master Chōsha’s words is quoted in the goroku, chap. 6.    Engozenji 15 the words. A person who can only understand the words intellectually does not deserve to have 16 Me means ordinary eyes.

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Shōbōgenzō Volume IV

17 Eye, view, experience, etc.—as in Manako is the Japanese pronunciation of Shōbōgenzō,gen, which means not only eyes but also right Dharma-eye treasury. 18 Ningen. Here gen means not only the concrete eye but also the function of seeing. 19 powers. See Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Tengen refers to tengenzū, the power of supernatural vision, one of the six mysticalJinzū. 20 Thirty-three (Vol. II), Sengen alludes to the thousand eyes of Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara. See Chapter Kannon. 21 We should rely on traditional expressions of the truth.

22    the successor of Master Rinzai Gigen. Another of Master Chinshū’s conversations isquoted in Master Chinshū Hōju (dates unknown), a successor of Master Hōju Enshō, who was Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 40.

23    Tachap. 12.[o] kan[suru koto] naka[re], or “Do not care about them.” Keitokudentōroku,

24    Shō means both “birth” and “life.”

25    Master Fuyō Dōkai said, “The blue mountains are constantly walking.” See Chapter Sansuigyō. Fourteen (Vol. I),

26    Master Kōkyō Shōju, quoted in the Sekimonrinkanroku (Sekimon’s Forest Record), vol. 1.

27    tidally or horizontally. “Dharma. The same words appear in the opening paragraph of Chapter One (Vol. I),Jū-ō, lit., “vertical and horizontal,” describes the fluency of a buddha’s preaching of “When we speak [of Dharma], it fills the mouth: it has no restriction

Bendōwa:

28    Dragon’s Gate is the name of a set of rapids on the Yellow River. It is said that a carpthat gets through the Dragon’s Gate becomes a dragon. 29 Kyū-setsu. Kyū,a province (Zhekiang) and of a fast-flowing river in which there are many rapids.“nine,” means many. Setsu means Sekkō, which is both the name of

30    Corresponds to modern-day Fukui prefecture.

31    1288completed the chapter is not recorded., thirty-five years after Master Dōgen’s death. The date on which Master Dōgen

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[Chapter Ninety-two] Shōji

Life and Death

Translator’s Note: Shō means “life” and ji means “death,” so shoji means “life and death.” Although the words “life” and “death” exist in all languages, Master Dōgen says that we are not able to understand intellectually what our life and death are. He says that their meaning is embedded in our real day-to-day life itself. In this chapter he explains life and death as the real momentary state at the present moment. In our daily life, life and death both exist in undivided wholeness.

[93] Because in life and death there is buddha, there is no life and death. Again, we can say: Because in life and death there is no “buddha,” we are not deluded in life and death.1 [This] meaning was expressed by Kassan2 and Jōzan.3 [These] are the words of the two Zen masters; they are the words of people who had got the truth, and so they were decidedly not laid down in vain. A person who wishes to get free from life and death should just illuminate this truth. If a person looks for buddha outside of life and death, that is like 305b pointing a cart north and making for [the south country of] Etsu, or like facing south and hoping to see the North Star. It is to be amassing more and more causes of life and death, and to have utterly lost the way of liberation. When we understand that only life and death itself is nirvana, there is nothing to hate as life and death and nothing to aspire to as nirvana. Then, for the first time, the means exist to get free from life and death. To understand that we move from birth4 to death is a mistake. Birth is a state at one moment; it already has a past and will have a future. For this reason, it is said in the Buddha-Dharma that appearance is just nonappearance.5 Extinction6 also is a state at one moment; it too has a past and a future. This is why it is said that disappearance is just non-disappearance.7 In the time called “life,” there is nothing besides life. In the time called “death,” there is nothing besides

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death. Thus, when life comes it is just life, and when death comes it is just death; do not say, confronting them, that you will serve them,8 and do not wish for them.

[95] This life and death is just the sacred life of buddha. If we hate it and want to get rid of it, that is just wanting to lose the sacred life of buddha. If we stick in it, if we attach to life and death, this also is to lose the sacred life of buddha. We confine ourselves to the condition of buddha. When we are without dislike and without longing, then for the first time we enter the mind of buddha. But do not consider it with mind and do not say it with words! When we just let go of our own body and our own mind and throw

305c them into the house of buddha, they are set into action from the side of buddha; then when we continue to obey this, without exerting any force and without expending any mind, we get free from life and death and become buddha. Who would wish to linger in mind?

[97] There is a very easy way to become buddha. Not committing wrongs; being without attachment to life and death; showing deep compassion for all living beings, venerating those above and pitying those below; being free of the mind that dislikes the ten thousand things and free of the mind that desires them; the mind being without thought and without grief: this is called buddha. Look for nothing else.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Shōji                                     Year not recorded.

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Notes

1     These are Master Dōgen’s variations of expressions that appear in the tōroku,then we are not deluded by life and death.” then it is not life and death.” Kassan says, “Because in life and death there is buddha, chap. 7: Jōzan says to Kassan, “Because in life and death there is no buddha, Keitokuden-

2     of Master Dōgo Enchi, he visited Master Sensu and attained the truth under him (see Master Kassan Zenne (805–881), a successor of Master Sensu Tokujō. At the suggestion Sansuigyō; Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 90). Later he lived

Chapter Fourteen [Vol. I], and taught on Mount Kassan. His posthumous title was Great Master Denmyō.

3     Master Jōzan Shinei (dates unknown), a successor of Master Isan Reiyū. 4           Shō means “birth,” “life,” “arising,” or “appearance.”

5     Shō sunawachi fushō. Fushō,for example, Chapter Three (Vol. I), “nonappearance,” expresses instantaneousness. See,Genjō-kōan.

6     Mets suggests “life and death,” whereas Mets means “extinction,” “death,” “cessation,” or “disappearance.” In general also means “death.” shōmetsu suggests “appearance and disappearance”;shōji but

7     nervousness—the moment of the present is independent, so it does not appear from the Metsu sunawachi fumetsu. Fumetsu, “non-disappearance,” also expresses instant past and it does not disappear into the future.

8     “Serving life” or “being a slave to life,” means, for example, the attitude of a hypophonia drug addict, or of someone who drives unreasonably fast. “Confronting” suggests driac, or the excessively health-conscious. “Serving death” describes the attitude of separation.

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[Chapter Ninety-three] Dōshin

The Will to the Truth

Translator’s Note: Dōshin represents the Sanskrit bodhicitta. Dō, which means “Way” or “truth,” is a translation of the Sanskrit word bodhi, and shin means “mind/consciousness” or “will.” In this chapter, Master Dōgen preaches the will to the truth, devotion to the Three Treasures, the making of buddha images, and practicing zazen. The teachings in this chapter are rather concrete and direct, and some Buddhist scholars suppose that this chapter may have been written and preached for laypeople.

[99] In pursuing the Buddha’s truth, we should see the will to the truth as foremost. People who know what the will to the truth is like are rare. We should inquire into it under people who know it clearly. Among people of the world there are people who are said to have the will to the truth but who really do not have the will to the truth. There are people who really have the will to the truth but are not known by [other] people. Thus, it is hard to know of its existence and nonexistence. For the most part, we do not believe and do not listen to the words of people who are stupid and bad. At the same time, we must not see our own mind as foremost. We should see as foremost the Law that the Buddha has preached. Constantly, night and day, we should obsess our minds with how the will to the truth should be; and we should 306a hope and pray that somehow true bodhi might exist in this world. In a degenerate age there is almost no one with a genuine will to the truth. Nevertheless, applying the mind for a while to inconstancy, we should not forget the unreliability of the world and the precariousness of human life. We need not be conscious that “I am thinking about the unreliability of the world.” Deliberately attaching weight to the Dharma, we should think light of “my body” and “my life.” For the sake of the Dharma we should begrudge neither body nor life.

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[101] Next, we should profoundly venerate the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. We should desire to serve offerings to and venerate the Three Treasures, even through exchanging a life or exchanging the body.1 Asleep and awake, we should consider the merit of the Three Treasures. Asleep and awake, we should chant the Three Treasures. Even between abandoning this life and being born in a next life—in which period there is said to be a “middle existence” whose life is seven days—even during that period, we should intend to chant the Three Treasures without ever lulling the voice. After seven days we [are said to] die in the middle existence, and then to receive another body in the middle existence, for seven days. At the longest [this body] lasts seven days. At this time we can see and hear anything without restriction, as if with the supernatural Eye.2 At such a time, spurring the mind, we should chant the Three Treasures; we should chant without pause, not forgetting to recite “namu-kie-butsu, namu-kie-hō, namu-kie-sō.”3

When, having passed out of the middle existence we are drawing close to a father and mother, we should steel ourselves and—even when, due to the presence of right wisdom, we are in the womb-store [world]4 that will commit us to the womb—we should chant the Three Treasures. We might not neglect to chant even while being born. We should profoundly desire that, through the six sense organs, we might serve offerings to, chant, and take refuge in the Three Treasures. Again, it may be that when this life ends [a person’s] two eyes become dark at once. At that time, knowing already that it is the end of our life, we should strive to chant “namu-kie-butsu.” Then the buddhas of the ten directions will bestow their compassion. Even sins for which— due to the presence of contributing causes—we might go to an evil world, will be transformed, and we will be born in the heavens above; being born before the Buddha, we will worship the Buddha and hear the Dharma that the Buddha preaches. After darkness comes before our eyes, we should strive unflaggingly to recite the Three Devotions, not letting up even until the middle existence, and even until the next birth. In this manner, exhausting life after life in age after age, we should recite [the Three Devotions]. Even until we arrive at the buddha-effect of bodhi, we should not let up. This is the truth practiced by the buddhas and bodhisattvas. It is called “profoundly to realize the Dharma,” and is called “the Buddha’s truth being present in the body.” We should desire never to mix it with different ideas.

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[104] Again, within our lifetime we should endeavor to make a buddha

[image]. Having made it, we should serve to it the three kinds of offerings. 306c The three kinds are seats of straw, sugared drinks, and lights. We should serve these as offerings.

[104]  Again, during this life we should produce [copies of] the Sutra of the Flower of Dharma. We should write them, should print them, and should retain them. Constantly we should receive them upon the head in reverence, make prostrations to them, and offer them flowers, incense, lights, food and drink, and clothing. Constantly keeping the head clean, we should humbly receive them upon the head.

[105]  Again, constantly we should wear the kaṣāya and sit in zazen. There are past examples of the kaṣāya [leading to] attaining the truth in a third life.5 Already it is the attire of the buddhas of the three times: its merit is unfathomable. Zazen is not a method of the triple world:6 it is the method of the Buddhist patriarchs.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Dōshin                                     Date not recorded.

 

Notes

1     to be able to serve offerings to buddhas. See Chapter Eighty-seven, In the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra, for example, a bodhisattva barters his body in order Kuyō-shobutsu.

2     Tengen, one of the six mystical powers. See Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), Jinzū.

3     refuge in the Dharma”; Namu-kie-butsu, Namasnamu-kie-sō,! I take refuge in the Buddha”; “Namas! I take refuge in the Sangha.” These namu-kie-hō,namas is a reverential salu-“Namas! I take are the Three Devotions or Three Refuges. The Sanskrit

4     a term used in esoteric Buddhism to describe a world produced by the Buddha’s Taizō stands for taizōkai, lit., “womb-store world” (from the Sanskrit garbhadhātu), benevolence. It is the subject of one of the two major mandalas of esoteric Buddhism.

5     Twelve (Vol. I), See, for example, the story of the prostitute who wore the Kesa-kudoku.    kaṣāya as a joke, in Chapter

6     Sangaiordinary people.(“triple word”), the worlds of desire, matter, and non-matter; the world of

 

[Chapter Ninety-four] Jukai

Receiving the Precepts

Translator’s Note: Ju means “to receive,” and kai means the Buddhist precepts. So jukai means “receiving the precepts.” The traditional way of entering the Buddhist order is by receiving the Buddhist precepts. It is a ceremony marking one’s entry into Buddhist life—becoming a Buddhist. Master Dōgen put great value on receiving the precepts; in this chapter he explains what that value is, and gives an outline of the precept-receiving ceremony.

[107] The Zen’enshingi1 says:

The buddhas of the three times all say that to leave family life is to realize the truth. The ancestral masters of successive generations who transmitted the buddha-mind–seal, were all śramaṇas.2 Perhaps it was by strictly observing the Vinaya that they were able to become universal models for the triple world. Therefore, in practicing [za]zen and inquiring into the truth, the precepts are foremost. If we do not depart from excess and guard against wrong, how is it possible to realize the state of buddha and to become a patriarch? The method of receiving the precepts: The three robes and pātra must be provided, together with new and clean clothes. If you have no new clothes, wash [old clothes] clean. Do not borrow the robes and pātra of another to go onto the platform and receive the precepts. Concentrate wholeheartedly and be careful not to go against circumstances. To assume the form of the Buddha, to come into possession of the Buddha’s precepts, to get what the Buddha received and used: these are not small matters. How could they be treated lightly? If we were to borrow the robes and pātra of another, even if we mounted the platform and received the precepts, we would not get the precepts at all. Having failed to receive them, we

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would become people without precepts throughout a lifetime, fraternizing without reason in the lineage of emptiness, and consuming devout offerings in vain. Beginners in the truth have not yet memorized the Dharma precepts; it is masters, by not saying anything, who cause people to fall into this [wrongness]. Now herewith a stern exhortation has been spoken. It is keenly hoped that you will engrave it on your hearts. If you have already received the śrāvaka precepts3 you should receive the bodhisattva precepts. This is the beginning of entering the Dharma.

[109] In the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands, wherever the transmission has passed between Buddhist patriarchs, at the beginning of entering the Dharma there is inevitably the receiving of the precepts. Without receiving the precepts we are never the disciples of the buddhas and never the descendants of the ancestral masters—because they have seen “departing from excess and guarding against wrong” as “practicing [za]zen and inquiring into the truth.” The words “the precepts are foremost” already are the right Dharmaeye treasury itself. To “realize buddha and become a patriarch” inevitably is to receive and maintain the right Dharma-eye treasury; therefore, ancestral masters who receive the authentic transmission of the right Dharma-eye treasury inevitably receive and maintain the Buddhist precepts. There cannot be a Buddhist patriarch who does not receive and maintain the Buddhist precepts. Some receive and maintain them under the Tathāgata, which in every instance is to have received the lifeblood. The Buddhist precepts now authentically transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch were exactly transmitted only by the ancestral patriarch of Sūgaku4 and, transmitted five times in China, they reached the founding patriarch of Sōkei.5 The authentic transmissions from Seigen, Nangaku, and so on6 have been conveyed to the present day, but there are unreliable old veterans and the like who do not know it at all. They are most pitiful. That “we should receive the bodhisattva precepts; this is the beginning of entering the Dharma” is just what practitioners should know. The observance in which “we should receive the bodhisattva precepts” is authentically transmitted, in every case, by those who have long learned in practice in the inner sanctum of the Buddhist patriarchs; it is not accomplished by negligent and lazy people. In

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that observance, in every case, we burn incense and perform prostrations before the patriarch master,7 and ask “to receive the bodhisattva precepts.” Once granted permission, we bathe and purify ourselves, and put on new and clean clothes. Or we may wash [existing] clothes, then scatter flowers, 307b burn incense, perform prostrations and show reverence, and then put them on. Widely we perform prostrations to the statues and images, perform prostrations to the Three Treasures, and perform prostrations to venerable patriarchs; we get rid of miscellaneous hindrances; and [thus] we are able to make body and mind pure. Those observances have long been authentically transmitted in the inner sanctum of the Buddhist patriarchs. After that, at the practice place, the presiding ācārya duly instructs the receiver to do prostrations, to kneel upright,8 and, with palms together,9 to speak these words:

[112] “I take refuge in the Buddha, I take refuge in the Dharma, I take

refuge in the Sangha.

I take refuge in the Buddha, honored among two-legged ones.10 I take refuge in the Dharma, honored as beyond desire.

I take refuge in the Sangha, honored among communities.

I have taken refuge in the Buddha, have taken refuge in the Dharma,

have taken refuge in the Sangha.” (repeated three times)

“The Tathāgata, the ultimate, supreme, right and balanced state of truth, is my great teacher, in whom I now take refuge. From this time forward, I shall not be devoted to wicked demons and non-Buddhists. It is due to [the

Tathāgata’s] compassion. It is due to his compassion.” (repeated three times)

[113] “Good sons!11 Now that you have discarded the false and devoted yourself to the true, the precepts already are surrounding you. You shall receive the Three Summarized Pure Precepts.”

“One: The precept of observance of rules. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Two: The precept of observance of the moral Law. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Three: The precept of abundantly benefiting living beings. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

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“The preceding Three Summarized Pure Precepts each must not be violated. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep these precepts, or not?” Answer: “I can keep them.” Asked three times, answered three times. “These things thus you should keep.” The receiver performs three prostrations, and kneels up with palms together.

[115] “Good sons! You already have received the Three Summarized Pure Precepts. You shall receive the Ten [Bodhisattva] Precepts. They are just the pure and great precepts of the buddhas and bodhisattvas.”

“One: Not to kill. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

307c “Two: Not to steal. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Three: Not to lust. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Four: Not to lie. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Five: Not to sell liquor. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Six: Not to discuss the transgressions of other bodhisattvas, be they laypeople or those who have left family life. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Seven: Not to praise yourself or to criticize others. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Eight: Not to begrudge Dharma or material possessions. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Nine: Not to become angry. From your present body until attainment

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of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“Ten: Not to insult the Three Treasures. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep this precept, or not?” Answer: “I can keep it.” Asked three times, answered three times.

“The preceding Ten Precepts each must not be violated. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, can you keep these precepts, or not?” Answer: “I can keep them.” Asked three times and answered three times. “These things thus you should keep.” The receiver performs three prostrations.

[118] “The preceding Three Devotions, Three Summarized Pure Precepts, and Ten Serious Prohibitions are what the buddhas have received and kept. From your present body until attainment of the Buddha’s body, these sixteen precepts thus you should keep.” The receiver performs three prostrations. Then we do the Sanskrit [chant, which begins] “Shi-shi-kai. . . ,”12 after which we say:

“I take refuge in Buddha, take refuge in Dharma, take refuge in Sangha.” Then the receiver leaves the practice place.

[118] This observance of receiving the precepts has been authentically transmitted by Buddhist patriarchs without fail. The likes of Tanka Tennen13 and the śrāmaṇera Kō of Yakusan14 have similarly received and kept [these 308a precepts]. There have been ancestral masters who did not receive the bhikṣu precepts15 but there has never been an ancestral master who failed to receive these bodhisattva precepts authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs. We receive and keep them without fail.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Jukai                                     Year not recorded.

 

Notes

1     Master Chōrō Sōsaku in 1103. This quotation from the first fascicle also appears in Zen’enshingi (Pure Criteria for Zen MonasteriesShukke; Chapter Eighty-six, ) is a ten-fascicle text compiled byShukke-kudoku.

Chapter Eighty-three,

2     The Sanskrit śramaṇa means one who makes effort, a striver, a Buddhist monk. 3 Suggests precepts taken by Hinayana Buddhists (of which there are two hundred and opposed to the sixteen bodhisattva precepts enumerated in this chapter. Fifty precepts for monks and three hundred and forty-eight precepts for nuns), as

4            Master Bodhidharma, the First Patriarch in China. 5 Master Daikan Enō, the Sixth Patriarch in China.

6     sects trace back to Master Nangaku Ejō.several successors. The lineages of masters of the Sōtō, Unmon, and Hōgen sectstrace back to Master Seigen Gyōshi. The lineages of masters of the Igyō and RinzaiMaster Seigen Gyōshi and Master Nangaku Ejō were two of Master Daikan Enō’s

7     Bodhidharma. In this case it means a living master who is a patriarch.Soshi is usually translated as “ancestral master,” and is often used to refer to Master

8     straight line. Chōki, lit., “extended kneeling”: knees on the floor, thighs and torso extending in a 9 trils. Gasshō: the palms held together, fingertips pointing upward at the level of the nos-

10 In the source text, taking refuge in the Buddha is recorded on a separate line, as a mark of reverence. 11 Zennanshi, short for zennanshi-zennyonin, “good sons and good daughters.” These words are commonly spoken by the Buddha in Buddhist sutras. See, for example, LS3.56.

12          The Chinese verse, originally a Sanskrit chant, can be found in the first volume of Bussetsuchojitsumyōanmaikyō. The four lines of the poem are as follows: Shi-“To is supremely venerable.” be in the world is [to be] as space;/As a lotus flower not touching water./The mind is pure and beyond the objective world./I strike my head in prostration to the one whoshi-kai-ji-ki-kun/Ji-ren-ka-fu-ja-shi/Shin-shinjin-cho-315

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13       records that he received the bodhisattva precepts but not the two hundred and fifty bike for having burned a wooden buddha image to keep warm, and other unorthodox Master Tanka Tennen (739–824). A disciple of Master Sekitō Kisen, he was famous precepts. Keitokudentōroku, chap. 14, behavior. He also studied under Master Baso Dōitsu.

14       someone who took the bodhisattva precepts but not the two hundred and fifty Kō was a disciple of Master Yakusan Igen. See Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), After leaving Master Yakusan’s order, he lived in a hut by a road and taught the travelers who passed by. He is also mentioned in the precepts. Keitokudentōroku, chap. 14, as Kankin.bhikṣu

15       age of Hinayana Buddhism. Biku-kai means the two hundred and fifty precepts that evolved in India during the

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[Chapter Ninety-five] Hachi-dainingaku

The Eight Truths of a Great Human Being

Translator’s Note: Hachi means “eight.” Dainin means “great human being,” that is, a buddha. And kaku, pronounced here as gaku, means “an intuitive reflection or truth.” Gautama Buddha preached the eight truths of a great human just before he died, and they are recorded in the Yuikyōgyō (Sutra of Bequeathed Teachings); they were his last teachings. Master Dōgen preached this chapter when he felt his death was not far away, and in his case, too, it was his last teaching. This chapter thus forms the last chapter in the ninety-five–chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō.

[121]  Buddhas are great human beings. [The Dharma] that great human beings realize1 is therefore called “the eight truths of a great human being.” To realize this Dharma is the cause of nirvana.2

It was the last preaching of our Original Master, Śākyamuni Buddha, on the night that he entered nirvana.3

[122]  1) Small desire.4 (Not widely to chase after those among objects

of the five desires5 that are as yet ungained, is called “small desire.”)6 The Buddha said:

You bhikṣus should know that people of abundant desire abundantly seek gain, and so their suffering also is abundant. People of small desire, being free of seeking and free of desire, are free of this affliction. You should practice and learn small desire just for itself. Still more, small desire can give rise to all virtues: people of small desire never curry favor and bend in order to gain the minds of others. Further, they are not led by the sense organs. Those who practice small desire are level in mind; they are without worries and fears; when they come into

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contact with things they have latitude; and they are constantly free from dissatisfaction. Those who have small desire just have nirvana. This is called “small desire.”7

[123]  2) To know satisfaction.8 (To take within limits from among

things already gained is called “to know satisfaction.”) The Buddha said:

If you bhikṣus desire to get rid of all kinds of suffering, you should reflect on knowing satisfaction. The practice of knowing satisfaction is the very place of abundance, joy, and peace. People who know satisfaction, even when lying on the ground, are still comfortable and joyful. Those who do not know satisfaction, even when living in a heavenly palace, are still not suited. Those who do not know satisfaction, even if rich, are poor. People who know satisfaction, even if poor, are rich.

308b Those who do not know satisfaction are constantly led by the five desires; they are pitied by those who know satisfaction. This is called “to know satisfaction.”

[124]  3) To enjoy tranquility.9 (Departing from all kinds of noise and

living alone in an empty space is called “to enjoy tranquility.”) The Buddha said:

If you bhikṣus wish to pursue tranquil and unintentional peace and joy, you should depart from noise and live alone in seclusion. People of quiet places are revered alike by the god Śakra and all the gods. For this reason you should abandon your own groups and other groups, live alone in an empty space, and think of dissolving the root of suffering. Those who take pleasure in groups suffer many troubles— like a flock of birds gathering on a great tree and then worrying that it will wither or break. [Those] fettered by and attached to the world are immersed in many kinds of suffering—like an old elephant drowning in mud, unable to get out by itself. This is called “distancing.”

[126]         4) To practice diligence.10 (It is ceaselessly to endeavor to perform good works, and so it is called “devoted effort”—“devotion” without adulteration and “effort” without regression.11)

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The Buddha said:

If you bhikṣus practice diligence, nothing will be difficult. For this reason you should practice diligence—as a trickle of water that constantly flows is able to drill through rock. If the mind of a practitioner often tires and quits, that is like [a person] twirling a stick to start a fire and resting before it gets hot: although [the person] wishes to obtain fire, fire is unobtainable. This is called “diligence.”

[127]         5) Not to lose mindfulness.12 (It is also called “to keep right mindfulness.” To keep the Dharma and not to lose it is called “right mindful-

ness” and is also called “not to lose mindfulness.”) The Buddha said:

For you bhikṣus who seek good counselors and seek their good auspices, there is nothing like not losing mindfulness. If people possess [the ability] not to lose mindfulness, the bandits of the afflictions are unable to invade them. For this reason, you constantly should regulate thoughts and keep them in their place in the mind. Those who lose mindfulness lose all virtues. If your power of mindfulness is solid and strong, even if you go among the bandits of the five desires you will not be harmed by them—it is like entering a battlefield clad in armor and having nothing to fear. This is called “not to lose mindfulness.”

[128]         6) To practice the balanced state of dhyāna.13 (To abide in the Dharma undisturbed is called “the balanced state of dhyāna.”) The Buddha said:

If you bhikṣus regulate the mind, the mind will then exist in the balanced state. Because the mind exists in the balanced state you will be able to know the Dharma form of the arising and vanishing of the world. For this reason you constantly should be diligent in practicing all forms of balance. When a person gets the balanced state, the mind does not dissipate. It is like a household that values water attentively repairing a 308c dike. Practitioners also are like that. For the sake of the water of wisdom, we attentively practice the balanced state of dhyāna and prevent [the water of wisdom] from leaking away. This is called “the balanced state.”

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[129]         7) To practice wisdom.14 (To engender hearing, thinking, practice,

and experience is called “wisdom.”) The Buddha said:

If you bhikṣus have wisdom, then you will be without greed and attachment. By constantly reflecting on and observing yourself, you will prevent [wisdom] from being lost. This is just to be able, within my Dharma, to attain liberation. If you are not so, already you are different from people of the truth15 and also different from those clothed in white;16 there is nothing to call you. Truly, wisdom is a sturdy ship in which to cross the ocean of aging, sickness, and death. Again, it is a great bright torch for the darkness of ignorance, it is good medicine for all sick people, and it is a sharp ax to fell the trees of anguish. For this reason, you should hear, consider, and practice wisdom and thereby develop yourself. If a human being possesses the light of wisdom, he or she is—although with eyes of flesh—a human being of clear vision. This is called “wisdom.”

[130]         8) Not to engage in idle discussion.17 (To experience, to go beyond discrimination, is called “not to engage in idle discussion.” To perfectly

realize real form is just not to engage in idle discussion.) The Buddha said:

If you bhikṣus engage in all kinds of idle discussion your mind will be disturbed. Although you have left family life, still you will be unable to get free. For this reason, bhikṣus, you should immediately throw away disturbing idle discussion. If you wish to attain the joy of serenity18 you should just inhibit well the fault of idle discussion. This is called “not to engage in idle discussion.”

[131]         These are the eight truths of a great human being. Each is equipped with the eight, and so there may be sixty-four. When we extend them, they may be countless. If we abridge them, they are sixty-four. “They are the last preaching of Great Master Śākyamuni; they are the instruction of the Great Vehicle; and they are the [Buddha’s] supreme swan song, in the middle of the night of the fifteenth day of the second month.” After this, he does not preach the Dharma again, and finally he passes into parinirvāṇa.

Chapter Ninety-five

[132]         The Buddha said:

You bhikṣus constantly should endeavor, with undivided mind, to pursue the truth of liberation. All the dharmas of the world, moving and unmoving, without exception are perishing and unstable forms. Let yourselves stop for a while, and talk no more. Time must pass, and

               I am going to die. This is my last instruction.                                          309a

Therefore, disciples of the Tathāgata unfailingly learn this [instruction]. Those who do not practice and learn it, and who do not know it, are not the Buddha’s disciples. It is the Tathāgata’s right Dharma-eye treasury and fine mind of nirvana. Nevertheless, today many do not know it and few have seen or heard it; it is due to the trickery of demons that they do not know. Again, those lacking in long-accumulated good roots neither hear nor see [this instruction]. During the bygone days of the right Dharma and the imitative Dharma, all disciples of the Buddha knew it. They practiced it and learned it in experience. Now there is not one or two among a thousand bhikṣus who knows the eight truths of a great human being. It is pitiful. There is nothing even to compare to the insidious degeneration of [these] decadent times. While the Tathāgata’s right Dharma is now [still] permeating the great-thousandfold [world], while the immaculate Dharma has not yet disappeared, we should learn it without delay. Do not be slack or lazy. To meet the Buddha-Dharma, even in countless kalpas, is hard. To receive a human body also is hard. Even in receiving the human body, human bodies on the three continents19 are better. Human bodies on the southern continent are best of all—because they meet Buddha, hear the Dharma, leave family life, and attain the truth. People who died prior to the Tathāgata’s parinirvāṇa neither heard nor learned these eight truths of a great human being. That now we are seeing and hearing them, and learning them, is due to long-accumulated good roots. In learning them now, in developing them life by life and arriving without fail at the supreme [truth of] bodhi, and in preaching them for living beings, may we become the same as Śākyamuni Buddha; may there be no differences.

                                    Shōbōgenzō Hachi-dainingaku

                                    Written at Eiheiji, on the sixth day of the first                                     lunar month in the fifth year of Kenchō.20

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[133] Now, on the day before the end of the retreat in the seventh year of Kenchō,21 I have had the clerk-monk22 Gien finish the copying; at the same time, I have checked it thoroughly against the original text. This was the last draft [written by] the late master, in his sickness. I remember him saying that he would rewrite all of the kana Shōbōgenzō23 and so on that he had completed before, and also include new drafts so as to be able to compile [the Shōbōgenzō] in altogether one hundred chapters. This chapter, which was a fresh draft,24 was to be the twelfth. After this, the master’s sickness grew more and more serious so that his work on original drafts and suchlike stopped. Therefore this draft is the last instruction of the late master. That we unfortunately never saw the one hundred chapters is most regrettable. People who love and miss the late master should unfailingly copy this chapter and preserve it. It is the final instruction of Śākyamuni, and it is the final bequeathed teaching of the late master.

                                  

Notes

1     reflect, to realize, etc. In the chapter title, the same character, Kakuchi. the object of buddhas’ feeling, awareness, reflection, or realization. The first half of the compound, kaku, here means to feel, to be aware, tokaku, “truth,” means

2     The serene and peaceful state.

3     Nirvana here means parinirvāṇa, that is, complete extinction, death.

4     Shōyoku, from the Sanskrit alpecchuḥ. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

5     desires for wealth, sensual contact, food, fame, and comfort. The five desires of the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin. They are also explained as 6 added to the original sutra by way of commentary. The words in parentheses are in small Chinese characters in the source text, as if

7         setsu kyōkai gyō.Yuikyōgyō, lit., “Sutra of Bequeathed Teaching,” short for The original Sanskrit version of this sutra has been lost.Bussui hatsu nehan ryaku -

8         Chisoku, from the Sanskrit saṃtuṣṭaḥ. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

9         Jakujō, “tranquility,” represents the Sanskrit śānta. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

10       See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.Gon-shōjin. Shōjin, from the Sanskrit vīrya, is also the fourth of the six pāramitās. 11 purified, refined, or devoted, and The Chinese compound shōjin, “diligence,” is explained by the characters: shin means to progress, push forward, or makeshō means effort.

12    Fumōnen. NenTerms.      represents the Sanskrit smṛti. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit

13    Shu-zenjō. Zenjō,is the fifth of the six representing both the sound and the meaning of the Sanskrit pāramitās. dhyāna,

14    Shū-chie. Chie represents the Sanskrit Maka-hannya-haramitsu;prajñā,Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. The sixth of the six pāramitās. See

Chapter Two (Vol. I),

15    Dōnin, monks and nuns.

16    Byaku-e, laymen and laywomen.

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Shōbōgenzō Volume IV

17    Keron, or wordiness. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. “idle discussion,” represents the Sanskrit prapañca, which means prolixity 18 Sanskrit Terms. Jakumetsu, “serenity,” represents the Sanskrit nirvana. See Volume I, Glossary of

19       Sanshū,ern continent, the transient human world in which it is easiest to feel the winds of “three continents,” means three of the four continents: Jambudvīpa (the south continent). The fourth continent, Uttarakuru (the northern continent), is an immortal impermanence), Pūrvavideha (the eastern continent), and Aparagodāna (the western realm inhabited by heavenly beings.

20       1253, the year of Master Dōgen’s death. He is said to have died on August 28. 21 1255.

22    Shoki, the clerk assisting the head monk, one of the six assistant officers.

23    Kaji-shōbōgenzō means Master Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō,Shinji-shōbōgenzō,which he wrote using which is in Chinese kana, characters only. The Japanese syllabary, as opposed to the

24    of his life. The twelve-chapter edition of the “A fresh draft” suggests that Master Dōgen began the chapter afresh in the final yearsShōbōgenzō not only includes such fresh Kesa-kudokuchapters, which are generally dated 1255, but also includes earlier chapters such as(Chapter Twelve in the ninety-five–chapter edition, dated 1240).

Appendix I Editions of the Shōbōgenzō

The original source text for this translation was the ninety-five–chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō published by the Iwanami publishing house as an Iwanami Bunko edition. When Iwanami first published its ninety-five–chapter edition between 1935 and 1943, it also included, in a separate appendix, the following chapters: 1) Butsu-kōjō-no-ji from the twenty-eight–chapter “Secret Shōbōgenzō,” which had only recently been made public; 2) Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon, which is included in the twelve-chapter edition but not in the ninety-five–chapter edition; 3) Hensan and 4) Senmen, both from the sixty-chapter edition; and 5) Sanji-no-gō from the twelve-chapter edition. As the Butsu-kōjō-no-ji chapter in the twenty-eight–chapter Secret Shōbōgenzō and the chapter of the same name (Chapter Twenty-Eight, Vol. II) in the ninety-five–chapter edition are very different, it has been translated here and included for reference as Appendix II. The Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon was not included in the ninety-five–chapter edition, and so has also been translated here and included as Appendix III. However, the sixty-chapter edition versions of Hensan (Chapter Sixty-two, Vol. III) and Senmen (Chapter Fifty-six, Vol. III) and the twelve-chapter edition version of Sanji-nogō (Chapter Eighty-four) are sufficiently similar to the chapters of the same names in the ninety-five–chapter edition, and have therefore not been translated.

The Ninety-five–chapter Edition

Also known as the Kōzen Edition, because it was edited by Master Hangyō Kōzen in about 1690.

The Seventy-five–chapter Edition

The Sixty-chapter Edition

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Appendix I

The Secret Shōbōgenzō (twenty-eight–chapters in three parts)

The Himitsu-shōbōgenzō (Secret Shōbōgenzō) is so called because it was kept stored in secret at Eiheiji. A book of the same name, with unrelated content, was also written by Master Keizan Jōkin, the third-generation descendant of Master Dōgen; he established Sōjiji.

Part One

  1. Butsu-kōjō-no-ji
  2. Shōji
  3. Shin-fukatoku (I)
  4. Shin-fukatoku (II)
  5. Shinjin-inga
  6. Shohō-jissō
  7. Butsudō
  8. Raihai-tokuzui
  9. Butsudō
  10. Zanmai-ō-zanmai
  11. Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō

Chapters Seven and Nine are both titled Butsudō (“The Buddha’s Truth”). One of them, however, corresponds to Chapter Ninety-three, Dōshin (“The Will to the Truth”) in the ninety-five–chapter edition. Part Two

  1. Den-e
  2. Bukkyō (“The Buddha’s Teaching”)
  3. Sansuigyō
  4. Mitsugo
  5. Tenbōrin
  6. Jishō-zanmai
  7. Dai-shugyō
  8. Shisho
  9. Hachi-dainingaku
  10. Jukai Part Three
    1. Busso
    2. Shizen-biku

Appendix I

  1. Shukke
  2. Bukkyō (“Buddhist Sutras”)
  3. Menju
  4. Sesshin-sesshō
  5. Yui-butsu-yo-butsu

The Twelve-chapter Edition

  1. Shukke-kudoku
  2. Jukai
  3. Kesa-kudoku
  4. Hotsu-bodaishin
  5. Kuyō-shobutsu
  6. Kie-bupposo-ho
  7. Shinjin-inga
  8. Sanji-no-gō
  9. Shime
  10. Shizen-biku
  11. Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon
  12. Hachi-dainingaku

The Bonshin Edition

Edited by Master Bonshin (eighty-four chapters).

The Manzan Edition

Edited by Master Manzan (eighty-nine chapters).

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Appendix II

Butsu-kōjō-no-ji

The Matter of the

Ascendant State of Buddha

Translator’s Note: The words butsu-kōjō-no-ji describe the fact that, even after realizing the truth, Buddhist masters continue their daily lives as they have always done; they do not attain some special state of “enlightenment” and become different. Comparing this chapter, which appears in the twenty-eight– chapter Secret Shōbōgenzō, and the chapter with the same name that appears as Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II) in the ninety-five–chapter edition, we find many differences. The chapter in the ninety-five–chapter edition is a collection of many stories relating to Buddhist masters in China, whereas this chapter contains a rather long philosophical explanation of butsu-kōjō-no-ji and one or two related stories. It is thus helpful to read this chapter from the twentyeight–chapter edition, which gives a more detailed explanation of butsu-kōjōno-ji, “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha,” than the earlier chapter.

[139] Great Master Gohon of Tōzan1 said, “You should know that there is the matter of the ascendant state of buddha. When you know of the matter of the ascendant state of buddha, you will truly possess the means to speak.”2 “The means to speak” is the means to turn the wheel of Dharma. In truth, if we do not know the matter of the ascendant state of buddha, we idly stagnate without penetrating to and getting free of the state beyond buddha. If we do not penetrate it and get free, we do not transcend the worlds of demons. Once we find the Way that arrives at buddha, we leave the area of the common person immediately. The people who have mastered this Way are few. Still, just because we are unable to know it, we should not, so saying, leave it at that. If, with a true will, we learn

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in practice under good counselors who have truly illuminated [the Way], we will be able to attain it without fail. For this reason, Tōzan teaches [us], “You should know. . . .” The gist of his idea is [as follows: Consider,] for example, having arrived at buddha. It is hard for buddha to be realized as the buddha we were expecting yesterday having become the buddha of today. To continue making buddha aware that the buddha of today has existed not only today3 is called “the matter of the ascendant state of buddha.” From [the attainment] of this state onward, even explanation, being speaking of the truth, is said to be being preached: although until the present it has inevitably not ceased to be preached as speaking, and although yesterday’s was yesterday’s, it exists as the speaking [of the truth]. Further, when we know [this matter] as the matter of the ascendant state of buddha and hear it as the matter of the ascendant state of buddha, the wheel of Dharma that we have attained uses us as speech, to preach the great and the small, and causes us, as the wheel of Dharma, to possess the means to speak—such is the matter of the ascendant state of buddha.

[142] A buddha preached, “The Buddha turning the Dharma wheel is beyond material particles of sound4 and form.” The approximate meaning is that the Buddha-Dharma, in its teaching, practice, and experience, is originally not concerned with beginning or end.5 Neither is it tainted by “now.” That being so, we should know the voice of buddha and should learn the words of buddha. That is, [we should know and learn that] there is nowhere the voice of buddha does not reach and there is no matter that it does not reach. Again, [buddha] is beyond the level of the common person, the two vehicles, non-Buddhists, and the like who are concerned with beginning and end. It realizes the truth within its voice and radiates light within its voice. To raise the voice in the moment before the body, and to hear the voice in the moment after the body, also are [virtues] belonging only to buddha. So there are [instances of] living-and-dying and going-and-coming getting through to the voice of buddha; and there are [instances of] wind, rain, water, and fire raising the voice of buddha. The kitchen hall and the temple gates widely proclaim the voice, and the monks’ hall and the Buddha hall loudly redouble the voice. Not only that; all dharmas each let us hear a half of this voice of buddha, and none of the three worlds forgets a little bit of this voice of buddha: who need worry about it “either disappearing or appearing?”6 It is naturally without disorder and without mistakes. In general, when we hear the voice of buddha, we hear it through the ears and we hear it through the eyes; none of the six sense organs, even in sleep or during wakefulness, fails to be able to hear the voice of buddha. Conversely, whether inside or outside the world of Dharma, whether in going-and-coming as every place or in every place as going-and-coming, there can never be any place where the voice of buddha does not exist. It exists at a place and it exists at a time. Further, there is a principle that the voice of buddha preaches the voice with the voice, and hears the voice with the voice. Again, when we consider the concrete situation of the words of buddha, there is no case of them being preached separately from the voice. Being preached by the whole of the voice, one word or two phrases can exist; and in no case is it impossible to hear, in one word or two phrases, the whole of the voice. At the place of this voice, nothing fails to be penetrated or fails to be mastered. No person, nor even any thing, should ever have a voice that seeks to avoid [the voice of buddha], saying, “I will not understand it, I will not be able to penetrate it.” The words of buddha are not preached under such conditions, excited by thoughts. There is a voice that, while preached as a voice, is also thoughts. When it preaches a half or preaches the whole it is never unfamiliar and never obscure—not only are each of the hundred weeds clear; the will of the ancestral masters also is clear.7 They never intend, from the standpoint of [abstract] matters, to define the edges of [concrete] things. Neither have they sought to patch matters up through the medium of doing, and [this state] is just the voice of buddha and the words of buddha. In learning the state of truth, we should, as the practice thereof, without fail diligently practice zazen. This has been transmitted between buddhas without interruption from ancient times to the present. When we become buddha, we do not do so apart from this [practice]. Being transmitted by buddha, it is beyond human supposition. To endeavor to suppose it is not the traditional style in learning the truth. When practiced by us it is sometimes illuminated, but the peripheries of it that are supposed by us remain dark. Thus, there being no fathomable periphery, even if we think that through exerting ourselves to the limit we have fathomed it, we have not fathomed it; [our exertion] was only the restlessness of a frisky horse or a mischievous monkey. If, on the other hand, a true master bestows the teaching on us and leaves the traces of the Buddhist patriarchs, and if it is possible for training to be definitely realized, then it becomes apparent that day-to-day learning of the truth has not been in vain, and it becomes evident that action in the present has not been for nothing. At this time there is nothing to conceal the body-and-mind. With the intention of connecting this state with thinking, [however,] it is still hard for us to penetrate. Still less can people who count grains of sand8 realize it, even in a dream. Only people who have experienced, in the mountain-still state,9 the zazen that is different from thinking, are able to grasp it.

[146] Briefly, there are two aspects to learning the Buddha’s truth; namely, learning through the mind and learning through the body. “Learning through the body” describes, in sitting in zazen pursuing the truth, the presence of acting buddha who does not seek to become buddha. When the universe is realized, the body-buddha is, from the beginning, beyond “becoming buddha”; and because nets and cages have long been broken open, the sitting buddha does not obstruct at all the becoming buddha. When we learn through the body like this, we have the power eternally, for a thousand ages and ten thousand ages, to enter [the state of] buddha or to enter [the state of] demons. In forward steps and backward steps, we cause there to be light that fills ditches and fills valleys: who would not call this the features [we had] before [our] father and mother were born?

[148] “Learning through the mind” describes clarification of how the mind is. Clarifying the mind does not mean clarifying the mind of the common person, non-Buddhists, the two vehicles, and the like; it means illumination of the buddha-mind. In ancient times, a monk asked National Master Echū,10 “What is the mind of eternal buddhas?” The National Master said, “Fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.” Let us now listen to these words for a while, and let us quietly learn this mind. To resolve to learn the Buddha’s truth, and to illuminate from the beginning the mind of eternal buddhas: this may be called “learning the truth through the mind.” The selfish mind, though idly proud of knowledge and understanding, possesses only thinking and discrimination. Old One Śākyamuni said, “This Dharma cannot be understood by thinking and discrimination.”11 Clearly we see that in ourselves there is no mind worth getting: in eternal buddhas there is the mind that we should learn. If we want to inquire into this mind, it is present in visible fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles; and if we want to experience this mind, it is present in the realization of fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles. Now, though these fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles are produced by human beings, at the same time they are words and deeds of Dharma. Who could hold sway over them? When we see them like this, it is evident that “fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles” are beyond substance before our eyes, and that substance before our eyes is not “fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.” In sum, fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles on this side12 are illuminating us as yonder objects; and we on this side are being illuminated by fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles as yonder objects. The fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles that exist like this as the mind of eternal buddhas are conspicuous in their brightness and in their merits, and so we can enumerate those [merits] that are numerable and we can remember those that are knowable. In knowing things and also in discerning matters, we should not learn from common people, the two vehicles, non-Buddhists, and the like; we should learn from the mind of eternal buddhas. All through the twelve hours, night and day, of daily functioning, we should be single-mindedly learning from eternal buddhas. Where the mind of eternal buddhas is teaching, we are able to hear the mind of eternal buddhas. Having been able to meet the mind of eternal buddhas, we should learn it thoroughly. We should not think, even in a dream, that it may be like the mind with which the common person is equipped. Stupid people, however, who trifle with the knowledge of the common person, and who mistakenly believe that the buddha-mind also may be like that, discuss the knowing of a knower and the known, and talk about illumination as “serene illumination” or “spiritual illumination.” We should totally throw away such false views. We should just learn the fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles that are the mind of eternal buddhas. It is not that we describe them thus because fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles are created from the mind of eternal buddhas and thus patterned after their creator: directly, without disturbing them, we call them “of eternal buddhas.” We should learn that eternal buddhas, in every case, at the time of preaching the Dharma and doing training, at the time of nirvana, and at the time of realizing the truth, have made this mind into [their own] mind. Thus our Great Master Śākyamuni Buddha dwelled in and retained this as [his own] mind, and the ancestral master also maintained and relied upon this as [his own] mind. Is it equivalent to or not equivalent to fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles? We must look into this thoroughly. Wherever nature naturally possesses something familiar and direct, the mind of eternal buddhas is naturally preaching the mind of eternal buddhas—so we should get used to hearing that it is like this. When this mind is realized, it is unstoppable. Because it is unstoppable, both mastery of fundamentals and mastery of explanation are left utterly at the mercy of this mind, and there is no practice of the truth nor any way of moral discipline that is not left entirely at the mercy of this mind. Eternal buddhas, in all their preaching and teaching, may be like this. With this as [our own] mind, we learn the truth.

[152] Again, Great Master Shinsai of Jōshū13 once asked Nansen,14 “What is the truth?”15 Nansen taught, “The normal mind is the truth.” In other words, the everyday16 mind is the truth. To learn [the truth] as the normal mind may be extremely rare. It is to learn, both in regard to the body and in regard to the mind, that in time, they are normal. For instance there is not the slightest taintedness17 nor any design. In the state of body-mind, we neither describe yesterday as today, nor describe nor practice today as tomorrow, nor make the body into the mind, nor proceed from the mind to the body.18 The state like this is called “the normal mind,” but [people] are prone to misunderstand it to be a class of common miscellany.19 While remaining in this [state of normal mind], we can intuit and affirm that the [miscellaneous] hundred weeds are normal. It is because this normal state of mind is the truth that the hundred weeds do not wither or rot. The Buddhist patriarchs, without being normal, could never have got free from the world, forgotten themselves, and practiced the truth—for practice of the truth naturally is normal. We too, having thrown away former worldly emotions, are readily practicing, and moving forward in, the tracks of the Buddhist patriarchs, but if we are inclined to think that because the normal mind is the truth we might not need to practice, we may be purporting to misunderstand normality. Practice and experience is not nonexistent, [but] there is none that is not normal. There being none that is not normal, there can be none that is tainted. In ancient times Old One Śākyamuni under the bodhi tree, on seeing the bright star, at once realized the truth. The principle here is the principle that not a single thing is fetched. Previously the Buddha had experienced the bright star, but from this time on the bright star was experiencing the Buddha. What is the basis [for saying that] he was experienced by the bright star and that he experienced the bright star? Namely, “Practice and experience is not nonexistent [but] it cannot be tainted.”20

[154] A [monk] named Chōkei21 asks Master Hofuku,22 “They say that to

see form is to see the mind. But do you see the boat?”

Hofuku says, “I see it.”

Chōkei says, “Let us set aside the boat for the moment. Just what is the

mind?”

Hofuku points a finger at the boat.23

So, even in our learning of the truth in the present age, we should know that discussion of the mind of the Buddhist patriarchs is like this. Having recognized that it is so, we are not drawn by non-Buddhists, the two vehicles, and the like. When buddha-tathāgatas are always playing in samādhi, we call this the Buddha’s truth. In this state, there is abandonment of the body for the Dharma. In order to illuminate and study that boat, we need to know what the Buddha Dharma is. “The Buddha-Dharma,” namely, is the myriad dharmas, the hundred weeds, all real dharmas, the triple world. No buddha has failed to perfectly realize this, and so there is nothing that is not perfectly realized as this by buddhas. That being so, when we inquire into life, there is none beyond real dharmas, and when we look for death, it is never separate from the myriad dharmas. Even to act in the interests of [life and death]24 also is this Dharma. For this reason, the principle of “abandoning the body for the Dharma” is clear. We have been abiding in and retaining this life and this death for a long time, [but] we have not received them from others; they do not depend on anyone else. As exhalation and inhalation at this concrete place, life is the body, and the body is the Dharma here and now. So the inevitable abandonment of life is, from the outset, for the Dharma. When we do not forget that death [also] is abandonment, we are experienced in the present by the Dharma; and even if we sought to abandon the body at a place beyond the Dharma, that could never be at all. As to the meaning of this “abandonment,” it is always incurred by “the body,” and just at the time of “abandonment of the body for the Dharma,” when we turn light around and reflect, it is also “abandonment of the Dharma for the body.” In other words, when the Dharma raises its own voice to proclaim itself, the expression “abandoning the Dharma for the body” is present; and when the body naturally raises its voice to announce itself, the expression “abandoning the body for the Dharma” is communicated: we should know that those to whom these buddha actions, totally, have come, and those who have been learning them for long ages, are ourselves. Now and eternally, unable to regress or stray, we are put into practice by action in the present, and there is no instance in which action does not overflow from us. Since ancient times it has been said that a person who attains the truth entrusts life and death to the mind. Truly, it may be so; we should not doubt it. When this principle is apparent, we also know our own mind; and when we know our own mind, “this principle” also is apparent. At the same time, we also know what our own body is, and we also clarify and learn the dignified behavior that belongs to our body. In learning this we illuminate the way life is and the way death is. To illuminate this is not to have deviously thrown light upon what [otherwise] might not have been illuminated. We should understand that this kind of illumination takes place when we illuminate what is evident. To illuminate “this principle,” we should first know how the mind is and should learn how the mind is. To learn of its condition means, in other words, to know that “the myriad dharmas” are “the concrete mind,” and to understand that “the triple world” is “the mind alone.”25 Even what is called “knowing” and what is called “understanding” are the myriad dharmas and are the triple world, and are their having been like this. Thereafter we must exactly investigate what life is entrusted to, and what death is entrusted to. As we continue investigating, an evident truth is present; it is, namely, the vigorous activity of the mind alone. It has not been produced by anything else; it is the real state of the mind alone itself—it has not been marshaled by objects. Thus, the real state of life and death is just the mind alone having been entrusted to itself. The reason, if asked, is that there is no mind alone that is not the myriad dharmas, and no myriad dharmas that are not the mind alone. Even if we purport to banish this life and death to a place beyond the mind alone, it will still be impossible for us to be hated by the mind alone. Truly, the two vehicles do not know, and non Buddhists have no means [to comprehend], that to rely on the myriad dharmas is to rely on the mind alone; how much less could the common person realize it, even in a dream? Therefore, the matter of knowing our own body and the matter of knowing our own mind we should learn under the mind alone and we should learn under the myriad dharmas; and we should not do so in haste; we should do so in detail. This is called “the condition of entrusting life and death to the mind.” To think of it as idle reliance on the mind of the common person is wrong. Even in the Buddha’s vocal teaching we do not hear of entrusting life and death to the mind of the common person. At the same time, we should clearly know that our own mind also is not entrusted [to us] by life and death, and that we are beyond the common person.

[160] In the house of the Buddha there is Bodhisattva regarded of the Sounds of the World.26 Few people have not seen her27 but very few people know her. We need not use coins to buy her elegant manner of being, and when we look into her faces, which is right and which is wrong? In order to speak she turns [our] body around and mounts the zazen platform; in order to listen she takes [our] hand and stands on the ground. At places not hindered by even a single dharma, her compassionate eyes illuminate us. Her response and our being responded to28 are a donkey looking at a well, and are the well looking at the donkey.29 There may be no human being who clearly understands this state; “it keenly avoids verbal expression.”30 If we express it with words, horns will appear on the head. It is simply illumination of the mind in seeing forms, and realization of the truth in hearing sounds. The mind described as “the mind to be illuminated” may be the mind of Buddha. The truth to be illuminated may be the truth of Buddha. In the truth of Buddha and in the house of Buddha, we just illuminate the mind by seeing forms and realize the truth by hearing sounds; there is nothing else at all. A state that is like this, being already in the Buddha’s truth, should preach, “To those who must be saved through this body, I will manifest at once this body and preach the Dharma.”31 Truly, there is no preaching of Dharma without manifestation of the body, and there can be no salvation that is not the preaching of Dharma. A man of old said, “It is a long time since I sold you this paddy field. The four border ridges, however, sometimes you leave unrecognized. Though I have always given the field unreservedly, I have not yet given the tree that has been in its center. From now on I will not begrudge the tree either.”32 Studying this in experience, we should not forget that it has been a long time since this paddy field was given to us. Its ridges are kept level, and its four borders are evident. When we play in it, everywhere it produces good omens and produces happiness. Truly, we must conclude that a field like this has been with us all along.

 

Notes

1     Master Tōzan Ryōkai (807–869), successor of Master Ungan Donjō. Great MasterGohon is his posthumous title.

2     Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 12.

3     “The buddha of today has existed not only today” suggests that a person’s normallife even before he or she realized the truth was the life of a buddha. 4 voice of buddha.Shō, koe means voice or sound. There follows a consideration of hotoke no koe, the 5 That is, they take place in the here and now.

6     Nyaku-tai-nyaku-shutsu.Tathāgata knows and sees the form of the triple world as it really is, without life andAlludes to the Lotus Sutra, Nyorai-juryō (LS 3.18): “The death, or disappearance or appearance. . . .”

7     “Clear-clear are the hundred weeds; clear-clear is the will of the ancestral masters, “Alludes to the traditional saying mei-mei taru hyaku-sō-tō; mei-mei taru soshi-no-i,Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 88. quoted for example by Layman Hōun in the 8 People who only read sutras.

9             Gotsu-gotsu toshite,gotsu, repeated for emphasis, literally means “high and level,” “lofty,” or “motionless. “a phrase that also appears in the Fukanzazengi. The character balanced. The word originally suggests a table mountain, and hence something imposing and 10 four (Vol. III), Master Nan’yō Echū (d. 775), successor of Master Daikan Enō. See Chapter Forty-Kobusshin.

11 Lotus Sutra, Hōben. LS 1.88–90. Also quoted in the Fukanzazengi. 12 Shahen, “this side,” suggests the subject.

13    Master Jōshū Jūshin (778–897), successor of Master Nansen Fugan. Great MasterShinsai is his posthumous title.

14    Master Nansen Fugan (748–834), successor of Master Baso Dōitsu. 15 Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 19.

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16    Master Dōgen explained the Chinese characters Japanese phonetic word yonotsune, which means usual, ordinary, common, or every-byōjō or heijō, “normal,” with the day.

17    Zenna, fully in the present moment.“tainted Ness,” means separation of means and end, which stops us from being

18    Because in reality there is no past or future and no separation of body and mind.

19    Hyakusō,7.    lit., “hundreds of weeds,” symbolize miscellaneous trivial things. See note

20    Master Nangaku Ejo’s words to Master Daikan Enō. See, for example, Chapter Seven(Hensan; Shinji-shōbōgenzō,Vol. I), Senjō; Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), pt. 2, no. 1. Inmo; Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III),

21    title was Great Master Chōkaku. Master Chōkei Eryō (854–932). A successor of Master Seppō Gison. His posthumous 22 many stories of conversations between him and Master Chōkei, his elder brother in Master Hofuku Jūten (d. 928). Also a successor of Master Seppō Gison. There are

Master Seppō’s order.

23    Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 92.

24    To act in the interests of life means, for example, to take care of one’s own health. some end. To act in the interests of death means, for example, to exert oneself in the pursuit of

25    Yuishin, triple world is only the mind.” See Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), “mind only” or “mind alone,” appears in the phrase sangai-yuishin,Sangai-yuishin.“the 26 kiteśvara. See Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), Kanzeon (“Regarder of the Sounds of the World”) represents the Sanskrit Avalo- Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumon. Kannon; chap. 25 of the Lotus Sutra,

27    male form, are commonly seen in China and Japan; e.g., in temple statues and art-Images of Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, sometimes in female form and sometimes in work.

28    Ō to ōze raru koto,of those in distress. See LS 3.242.described in chap. 25 of the “the response and being responded to,” alludes to the belief, Lotus Sutra, that the bodhisattva will respond to the cries

29    Alludes to the said that the Buddha’s true Dharma body is just like space, and it manifests its form Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 2, no. 25: Master Sōzan asks Ācārya Toku, “It is says, “Your words are extremely nice words, but they only express eighty or ninety percent.” Toku says, “What would the master say?” Master Sōzan says, “It is like the of mutual accordance?” Toku says, “It is like a donkey looking into a well.” The master according to things, like the moon [reflected] in water. How do you preach this principle

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and object.“accord with” or “in response to,” which suggests the mutual relation between subjectwell looking at the donkey.” The story discusses the meaning of the character ō, ō[jiru],

30    The words of Master Dōgo Enchi. See Shinji-shōbōgenzō, pt. 1, no. 57.

31    LS 3.252.

32    been traced. The source of this quotation, which Master Dōgen rendered into Japanese, has not

 

Appendix III

Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon

One Hundred and Eight Gatesof Dharma Illumination

Translator’s Note: Ippyakuhachi means “one hundred and eight.” means Dharma; that is, the Buddha’s teachings or the universe. Myō means “clarity,” “brightness,” or “illumination.” Mon means “gate”; that is, a means to something, or a partial aspect of something. So ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon means “one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination.” In compiling this chapter, Master Dōgen quoted two long paragraphs from the Butsuhongyōjikkyō, a biographical sutra about Gautama Buddha. This chapter forms the eleventh chapter in the twelve-chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō, but it is not included in either the ninety-five–chapter edition or the seventy-five–chapter edition. [165] At that time Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination finished contemplating upon the family into which he would be born. In Tuṣita Heaven1 in that age there was a celestial palace, called Lofty Banner. Its height and width were exactly the same: sixty yojanas. The bodhisattva from time to time would go up into that palace to preach to the gods of Tuṣita Heaven the pivot of the Dharma. On this occasion, the bodhisattva ascended to the palace and, after sitting in peacefulness,2 he addressed all the celestial beings of Tuṣita, saying, “Ye gods! Come and gather round! My body before long will descend to the human world. I now would like to preach, in their entirety, the gates of Dharma illumination, known as the gates of expedient means for penetrating all dharmas and forms. I will leave them as my last instruction to you, so that you will remember me. If you listen to these gates of Dharma,3 you will experience joy.” Then, after hearing

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these words of the bodhisattva, the great assembly of the gods of Tuṣita, along with jeweled goddesses and all their entourages, all gathered together and ascended to that palace. Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination, after seeing that those celestial multitudes had convened, desired to preach to them the Dharma. Instantly, he produced by magic above that original celestial palace, Lofty Banner, another celestial palace that was so high, grand, and wide that it covered the four continents. In its delightful exquisiteness and regularity, [the new palace] was without compare. Majestic and towering, it was embellished by masses of jewels. Among all the heavenly palaces in the world of desire there was nothing to which to liken it. When gods in the world of matter saw that magic palace, they had the stark realization that their own palaces were like burial mounds. Then Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination—having already in past ages performed valuable work, planted many good roots, accomplished much happiness, and become replete with virtue—mounted the decorated lion throne4 that he had created, and there he sat. Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination, upon that lofty lion seat, arrayed it intricately with countless treasures; he spread over that seat countless and infinite varieties of heavenly robes; he perfumed that seat with all kinds of wondrous incense; he burned incense in countless infinite jeweled censers; and he produced all kinds of finely scented flowers and scattered them over the earth. Around the lofty seat there were many rare treasures, and a hundred thousand myriad koṭis of glittering ornaments lit up the palace. That palace, above and below, was covered by jeweled nets. From those nets hung many golden bells, and those golden bells tinkled delicately. That great jeweled palace itself sent forth countless varieties of light. Over that jeweled palace, a thousand myriad banners and canopies in all kinds of wonderful colors formed a resplendent mantle. From that great palace hung all sorts of tassels.5 Countless infinite hundred thousand myriad koṭis of jewel goddesses, each bearing miscellaneous varieties of the seven treasures, praised [the bodhisattva], their voices making music, and told of the bodhisattva’s countless infinite past merits. World-protecting quarter kings, in their hundred thousand myriads of koṭis, standing to the left and to the right, kept guard over that palace. Thousands of myriads of Śakra-devānām-indras prostrated themselves to that palace. Thousands of myriads of Brahmadevas worshiped that palace. Again, hundreds of thousands of myriads of koṭis of nayutas of hosts of bodhisattvas protected that palace; and buddhas in the ten directions, numbering in myriad koṭis of nayutas, kept watch over that palace. Works practiced for a hundred thousand myriad koṭis of nayutas of kalpas, and all the pāramitās, accomplished their happy result; causes and conditions were fulfilled and were further promoted day and night so that countless virtues made everything splendid, and so on, and so on, indescribably, indescribably. Upon that great exquisite lion throne, the bodhisattva sat; he addressed all the heavenly throngs, saying: “Ye gods! Now, the one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination: When bodhisattva mahāsattvas at the place of appointment in one life are in a Tuṣita palace and they are going to descend to be conceived and born in the human world, they must inevitably proclaim, and preach before the celestial multitudes, these one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination, leaving them for the gods to memorize. After that, they descend to be reborn. Ye gods! Now you must, with utmost sincerity, clearly listen and clearly accept [the one hundred and eight gates]. I now shall preach them. What are the one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination?” [170] [1] Right belief is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the steadfast mind is not broken.

[2]     Pure mind is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] there is no defilement.

[3]     Delight is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it is the mind of peace and tranquility.

[4]     Love and cheerfulness are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they make the mind pure.

[5]     Right conduct of the actions of the body is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the three forms of behavior6 are pure.

[6]     Pure conduct of the actions of the mouth is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it eliminates the four evils.7

[7]     Pure conduct of the actions of the mind is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it eliminates the three poisons.8

[8]     Mindfulness of Buddha is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] reflection of [the state of] Buddha is pure.

[9]     Mindfulness of Dharma is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] reflection of the Dharma is pure.

[10]   Mindfulness of Sangha is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] attainment of the truth is steadfast.

[11]   Mindfulness of generosity is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not expect reward.

[12]   Mindfulness of precepts is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we fulfill all vows.

[13]   Mindfulness of the heavens is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it gives rise to a wide and big mind.

[14]   Benevolence is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] good roots prevail in all the situations of life.

[15]   Compassion is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not kill or harm living beings.

[16]   Joy is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we abandon all unpleasant things.

[17]   Abandonment is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we turn away from the five desires.

[18]   Reflection on inconstancy is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we reflect upon the desires of the triple world.

[19]   Reflection on suffering is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we cease all aspirations.

[20]   Reflection on there being no self is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not tainted attach to self.

[21]   Reflection on stillness is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not disturb the mind.

[22]   Repentance is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the mind within is stilled.

[23]   Humility is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] eternal malevolence vanishes.

[24]   Veracity is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not deceive gods and human beings.

[25]   Truth is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not deceive ourselves.

[26]   Dharma conduct is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we follow the conduct that is the Dharma.

[27]   The Three Devotions9 are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they purify the three evil worlds.10

[28]   Recognition of kindness is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not throw away good roots.

[29]   Repayment of kindness is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not cheat and disregard others.

[30]   No self-deception is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not praise ourselves.

[31]   To work for living beings is a gate of Dharma illumination; for we do not blame others.

[32]   To work for the Dharma is a gate of Dharma illumination; for we actin conformity with the Dharma.

[33]   Awareness of time is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not treat spoken teaching lightly.

[34]   Inhibition of self-conceit is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] wisdom is fulfilled.

[35]   The nonerasing of ill-will is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we protect ourselves and protect others.

[36]   Being without hindrances is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the mind is free of doubt.

[37]   Belief and understanding are a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with them] we decisively comprehend the paramount [truth].11

[38]   Reflection on impurity is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we abandon the mind that is tainted by desire.

[39]   Not to quarrel is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it stops angry accusations.

[40]   Not being foolish is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it stops thekilling of living things.

[41]   Enjoyment of the meaning of the Dharma is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we seek the meaning of the Dharma.

[42]   Love of Dharma illumination is a gate of Dharma illumination; for[with it] we attain Dharma illumination.

[43]   Pursuit of abundant knowledge is a gate of Dharma illumination; for[with it] we truly reflect on the form of the Dharma.

[44]   Right means are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they are accompanied by right conduct.

[45]   Knowledge of names and forms is a gate of Dharma illumination;for it clears away many obstacles.

[46]   The view to expiate causes is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain salvation.

[47]   The mind without enmity and intimacy is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it], when among enemies and intimates, we are impartial.

[48]   Hidden expedient means are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they are sensitive to many kinds of suffering.

[49]   Equality of all elements is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it obviates all rules for harmonious association.

[50]   The sense organs are a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with them] we practice the right way.

[51]   Realization of nonappearance12 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we experience the truth of cessation.13

[52]   The body as an abode of mindfulness14 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] all dharmas are serene.

[53]   Feeling as an abode of mindfulness15 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we detach from all miscellaneous feelings.

[54]   Mind as an abode of mindfulness16 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we reflect that mind is like a phantom.

[55]   The Dharma as an abode of mindfulness17 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] wisdom is free of blurs.

[56]   The four right exertions18 are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they eliminate all evils and realize many kinds of good.

[57]   The four bases of mystical power19 are a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with them] the body-and-mind is light.

[58]   The faculty of belief20 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not [blindly] follow the words of others.

[59]   The faculty of effort21 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we thoroughly attain many kinds of wisdom.

[60]   The faculty of mindfulness22 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we thoroughly perform many kinds of work.

[61]   The faculty of balance23 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the mind is pure.

[62]   The faculty of wisdom24 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we really see all dharmas.

[63]   The power of belief25 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it surpasses the power of demons.

[64]   The power of effort26 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not regress or stray.

[65]   The power of mindfulness27 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not [blindly] go along with others.

[66]   The power of balance28 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we discontinue all thoughts.

[67]   The power of wisdom29 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we depart from the two extremes.

[68]   Mindfulness, as a part of the state of truth,30 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it is wisdom that accords with real dharmas.

[69]   Examination of Dharma, as a part of the state of truth,31 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it illuminates all dharmas.

[70]   Effort, as a part of the state of truth,32 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we become proficient in realization.

[71]   Enjoyment, as a part of the state of truth,33 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain many kinds of balanced state.

[72]   Entrustment as a part of the state of truth,34 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] conduct is already managed.

[73]   The balanced state, as a part of the state of truth,35 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we recognize that all dharmas are in equilibrium.

[74]   Abandonment, as a part of the state of truth,36 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we [can] turn away from all kinds of lives.

[75]   Right view37 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain the noble path on which the superfluous is exhausted.

[76]   Right discrimination38 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we eliminate all discrimination and lack of discrimination.

[77]   Right speech39 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] concepts, voice, and words all are known as sound.

[78]   Right action40 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] there is no karma and no retribution.

[79]   Right livelihood41 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we get rid of all evil ways.

[80]   Right practice42 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we arrive at the far shore.

[81]   Right mindfulness43 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not consider all dharmas intellectually.

[82]   Right balanced state44 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain undistracted samādhi.

[83]   The bodhi-mind is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we are not separated from the Three Treasures.

[84]   Reliance is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we do not incline toward Small Vehicles.

[85]   Right belief 45 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain the supreme Dharma.

[86]   Development is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we realize all dharmas concerning the root of good.

[87]   The dāna pāramitā46 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it], in every instance, we cause features to be pleasant, we adorn the Buddhist land, and we teach and guide stingy and greedy living beings.

[88]   The precepts pāramitā47 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we distantly depart from the hardships of evil worlds, and we teach and guide precept-breaking living beings.

[89]   The forbearance pāramitā48 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we abandon all anger, arrogance, flattery, and foolery, and we teach and guide living beings who have such vices.

[90]   The diligence pāramitā49 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we completely attain all good dharmas, and we teach and guide lazy living beings.

[91]   The dhyāna pāramitā50 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we accomplish all balanced states of dhyāna and mystical powers, and we teach and guide distracted living beings.

[92]   The wisdom pāramitā51 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we eradicate the darkness of ignorance, together with attachment to views, and we teach and guide foolish living beings.

[93]   Expedient means are a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with them] we manifest ourselves according to the dignified forms that living beings admire, and we teach and guide [living beings], accomplishing the Dharma of all the buddhas.

[94]   The four elements of sociability52 are a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with them] we accept all living beings and, after we have attained [the truth of] bodhi, we bestow upon all living beings the Dharma. [95] To teach and guide living beings is a gate of Dharma illumination; for we ourselves neither indulge pleasures nor become tired.

[96]   Acceptance of the right Dharma is a gate of Dharma illumination;for it eradicates the afflictions of all living beings.

[97]   Accretion of happiness is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it benefitsall living beings.

[98]   The practice of the balanced state of dhyāna is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it fulfills the ten powers.

[99]   Stillness is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it realizes, and is replete with, the samādhi of the Tathāgata.

[100]           The wisdom view is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] wisdom is realized and fulfilled.

[101]           Entry into the state of unrestricted speech is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain realization of the Dharma-eye. [102] Entry into all conduct is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain realization of the Buddha-eye.

[103]         Accomplishment of the state of dhāraṇī is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we hear the Dharma of all the buddhas and are able to receive and retain it.

[104]         Attainment of the state of unrestricted speech is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we cause all living beings totally to rejoice. [105] Endurance of obedient following53 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we obey the Dharma of all the buddhas.

[106] Attainment of realization of the Dharma of nonappearance54 is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] we attain affirmation. [107] The state beyond regressing and straying is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it is replete with the Dharma of past buddhas.

[108]         The wisdom that leads us from one state to another state is a gateof Dharma illumination; for [with it], having water sprinkled on the head,55 we accomplish total wisdom.

[109]         The state in which water is sprinkled on the head is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it], following birth in a family, we are at last able to realize anuttara Samyak Sambodhi.

[182]     Then Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination, having preached these words, addressed all those celestial multitudes, saying, “Gods, remember! These are the one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination. I bequeath them to the gods. You should receive them and retain them, always keep them in mind, and never forget them.”

[183]     These are just the one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination. That all bodhisattvas bound by a single life, when they are going to descend from Tuṣita Heaven to be born in Jambudvīpa, unfailingly proclaim to the multitudes of Tuṣita Heaven these one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination, and thereby teach the gods, is the constant rule of the buddhas. “Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination” was the name of Śākyamuni Buddha when he was in the fourth heaven56 as [a bodhisattva] at the place of appointment in one life. When Ri Fuma57 compiled the Tenshōkōtōroku, he recorded the name of these one hundred and eight gates of Dharma illumination. [But] the students who have known them clearly are few, and those who do not know them are as [common as] rice, flax, bamboo, and reeds. Now, for the benefit of beginners and senior students, I have compiled them. Those who would ascend the lion seat and become the teachers of human beings and gods should painstakingly learn them in practice. Without having lived in this Tuṣita Heaven as [a bodhisattva] bound by one life, we are not buddhas at all. Practitioners, do not be proud of yourselves at random. For a bodhisattva bound by one life, there is no intermediate stage.58

                                    Shōbōgenzō Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon,                                     number eleven.59

Notes

1     Heaven, the fourth of the six heavens in the world of desire. Gautama Buddha was image-other bodhisattvas; and Bodhisattva Maitreya is imagined to be living there nonwinged to have practiced there in the past, as Bodhisattva Protector of Illumination and Bodhisattvas who are about to become a buddha in their next life are said to live in Tuṣita

2     Anza, “peaceful sitting,” is a synonym for zazen.

3     Hōmon represents the Sanskrit mon, “gate,” suggests regular progression through a series. See Glossary dharma-paryāya. The word paryāya, “going round,” of Sanskrit Terms. represented by

4     Shishito the roar of a lion. seat of Buddhist preaching.[no] kōza, literally, “lion’s high seat.” The Buddha’s preaching was compared Shishi-za, “lion seat,” is a common expression in sutras for a

5     banners, flags, etc. Each tassel was made of interwoven threads of the five primary Ryūso. An ancient Indian ornament used to decorate carriages, horses, beds, curtains, colors.

6     Sangō (“three forms of behavior”): actions of body, speech, and mind.

7     Shi-aku (“four evils”): 1) lying, 2) suppression of speech, 3) abusive speech, 4) duplicitous speech.

8     Sandoku (“three poisons”): greed, anger, and ignorance.

9     Sanki (“Three Devotions”): devotion to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.

10    animals. San-aku-dō (“three evil states”): hell, the world of hungry ghosts, and the world of

11    Dai-ichi-gi is short for dai-ichi-gi-tai, “paramount truth.”

12    Mushōnin is short for mushō-hō-nin. Nin can be interpreted as representing theMushō, “nonappearance” or “non arising,” is a synonym for nirvana, the state in which interferences do not arise.character meaning “recognition” or “realization.”

13    Mettai, the third of the Four Noble Truths.

14    Shin-nen-jo, from the Sanskrit kāya-smṛtyupasthāna, is the reflection that the body bodhi. See Chapter Seventy-three, is not pure, which is the first of the thirty-seven elements of Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō, paragraph 4.

355

15    suffering. Ju-nen-jo, from the Sanskrit vedanā-smṛtyupasthāna, is the reflection that feeling is 16 Shin-nen-jo,without constancy.from the Sanskrit citta-smṛtyupasthāna, is the reflection that mind is

17    is without self. Numbers fifty-two to fifty-five in this list are known as Hō-nen-jo, “four abodes of mindfulness,” from the Sanskrit the first four of the thirty-seven elements of from the Sanskrit dharma-smṛtyupasthāna,bodhicatvāri smṛtyupasthānāni.listed in Chapter Seventy-three, is the reflection that the Dharmashi-nen-jo,They are

Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō.

18    Sanskrit Terms). The four exertions are the fifth to the eighth of the thirty-seven ele-Shi-shō-gon,Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,bodhi.from the Sanskrit prahāṇaThey are, namely: 1) to prevent bad that has not yet occurred, 2) to cover both meanings, exertion and restraint (see Glossary ofthey are called catvāri samyakprahāṇāni.shi-shō-dan, In Chapter Seventy-three, “kinds of right restraint.”

The Sanskrit

has not yet occurred, and 4) to promote the good that has already occurred. Cause bad that has already occurred to be extinguished, 3) to cause to occur good treatment of

19    Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. In Chapter Seventy-three, Shi-nyoi-soku, lit., “four bases of acting at will,” from the Sanskrit Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,catur-ṛddhipāda. See

2)twelfth of the thirty-seven elements of they are called shi-jin-soku, “four bases of mystical ability.” They are the ninth to the bodhi. In Sanskrit they are: 1) mīmāṃsā (profound consideration Chanda (volition),).  vīrya (effort), 3) citta (intelligence), and 4) 20 Shinkon, from the Sanskrit śraddhendriya.

21    Shōjinkon, from the Sanskrit vīryendriya.

22    Nenkon, from the Sanskrit smṛtindriya.

23    Jōkon, from the Sanskrit samādhindriya.

24    Ekon, from the Sanskrit gokon, “five faculties” or “five roots,” from the Sanskrit prajñendriya. Numbers fifty-eight to sixty-two in this listpañcendriyāṇi.

are known as See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. They are the thirteenth to the seventeenth of the thirty-seven elements of bodhi.

25    Shinriki, from the Sanskrit śraddhā-bala.

26    Shōjinriki, from the Sanskrit vīrya-bala.

27    Nenriki, from the Sanskrit smṛti-bala.

28    Jōriki, from the Sanskrit samādhi-bala.

29    are known as Eriki,Vol. II. They are the five powers deriving from the five faculties and are the eighteenthto the twenty-second of the thirty-seven elements of from the Sanskrit goriki, from the Sanskrit prajñā-bala. Numbers sixty-three to sixty-seven in this listpañca-balāni. See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms,bodhi.

Appendix III

30    Nen-kakubun, from the Sanskrit smṛti bodhyaṅga.

31    “selection,” but the Sanskrit Chakuhō-kakubun, from the Sanskrit pravicayadharmapravicaya bodhyaṅga. Chakumeans examination or investigation.is literally

32    Shōjin-kakubun, from the Sanskrit vīrya bodhyaṅga.

33    Ki-kakubun, from the Sanskrit prīti bodhyaṅga.

34    Jo-kakubun, from the Sanskrit praśrabdhi bodhyaṅga. 35 Jō-kakubun, from the Sanskrit samādhi bodhyaṅga.

36       Sha-kakubun,shichi-kakubun, from the Sanskrit from the Sanskrit upekṣa bodhyaṅga.sapta bodhyaṅgāni.Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,Numbers sixty-eight to seventy-See Volume II, Glossary they are third to the twenty-ninth of the thirty-seven elements of of Sanskrit Terms. In Chapter Seventy-three, called sapta sambodhyaṅgāni,four are shichi-tokakushi,and they are listed in a different order. They are the twenty-“seven branches of the balanced truth,” from the Sanskritbodhi.

37       Shōken, from the Sanskrit samyag-dṛṣṭi.

38       Shōfunbetsu, from the Sanskrit it is rendered as samyag-saṃkalpa.shō-shi-i,In Chapter Seventy-three, “right thinking.” Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō, 39 Shōgo, from the Sanskrit samyag-vāc.

40 Shōgō, from the Sanskrit samyak-karmānta. 41 Shōmyō, from the Sanskrit samyag-ājīva.

42    bon-bodai-bunpō,Shōgyō, from the Sanskrit it is rendered as samyag-vyāyāma.shoshojin,In Chapter Seventy-three, “right exertion.”    Sanjūshichi-

43    Shōnen, from the Sanskrit samyak-smṛti.

44    from the Sanskrit Shōjō,elements of from the Sanskrit hasshōdō,bodhi. āryāṣṭāṅga-mārga.See Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.“eightfold path of rightness” or samyak-samādhi.They are the last eight of the thirty-sevenNumbers seventy-five to eighty-two arehasshōdō, “eightfold noble path,” known as

45    Shōshin. Exactly the same term, shōshin, is listed as the first gate of Dharma illumihundred and eight gates. (Otherwise, there are one hundred and nine.)nation. If the two gates of “right belief” are counted as one, then the sutra lists one

46    (Dando. Dan represents the sound of the Sanskrit pāramitā, which means “accomplishment.” See Chapter TwoVolume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.dāna, “giving.” Do represents the meaning of the Sanskrit Vol. I), Maka-hannya-haramitsu;

47    Kaido, from the Sanskrit śīla-pāramitā.

48    Nindo, from the Sanskrit kṣānti-pāramitā.

357

49    Shōjindo, from the Sanskrit vīrya-pāramitā.

50    Zendo. practice of zazen, is sometimes represented as The Sanskrit dhyāna, which means meditation or concentration, that is, thejō-ryo, literally, “quiet thought.” See

Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.

51    the six Chido, pāramitāfrom the Sanskrit s.        prajñāpāramitā. Numbers eighty-seven to ninety-two are

52    ShishōbōThe four in Sanskrit are 1)  artha-carya(“four elements of sociability”), from the Sanskrit (useful conduct), and 4) dāna (Bodaisatta-shishōbō;giving), 2) samāna-arthatāpriya-ākhyāna Glossary of Sanskrit Terms.(catvāri saṃgraha-vastūni. sharing a common aim(kind communication),).

3)See Chapter Forty-five (Vol. III),

53    Junnin, one of the gonin, five kinds of endurance.

54    Toku-mushō-hō-nin. See number fifty-one in the list, and the accompanying note 12. 55 Kanchō,done when a bodhisattva is about to enter the ultimate state and become a buddha.the ceremonial sprinkling of water on a bodhisattva’s head, is said to be

56    Daishiten, another name for Tuṣita, which was regarded as the fourth of the six heavens in the world of desire.

57    he became the successor of Master Kokuon. Later he maintained a close association Ri Fuma, “Imperial Aide Li,” also known as Ri Junkyoku. Ri, “Li,” was his surname. Fuma was an official title. He first practiced in the order of Master Kokuon Unso and in Chapter Seventy-three, with Master Jimyō Soen and the Buddhist layman Yō Dainen. He is also mentioned Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō. He died in 1038.

58    Chūhatsu. The meaning of the character hatsu has not been traced, but chūhatsu. Chūhatsuchūhatsu may is explained as an intermediate stage between an and rebirth in the world of matter. The related concept be a synonym for another set of characters also pronounced anāgāmin

sattva’s must just directly become a buddha. See Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms. Or “middle existence,” represents the Sanskrit antarā-bhava.chū-u,’s death in the world of desire “intermediate existence” The point is that bodhi-

59    is not recorded. This is the eleventh chapter in the twelve-chapter edition of the Shōbōgenzō. A date

Appendix IV Chinese Masters

JapaneseBanzan Hōshaku                                   Panshan Baoji                                           Pinyin

Baso Dōitsu                                          Mazu Daoyi

Busshō Hōtai                                        Foxing Fatai

Chōkei Eryō                                          Changqing Huileng Chōsha Keishin                                    Changsha Jingcen Daibai Hōjō                                          Damei Fachang Daie Sōkō                                             Dahui Zonggao

Daikan Enō                                           Dajian Huineng Engo Kokugon                                      Yuanwu Keqin

Fun’yō Zenshō                                      Fenyang Shanzhao Fuyō Dōkai                                           Furong Daokai

Gensha Shibi                                        Xuansha Shibei Godai Impō                                           Wutai Yinfeng

Goso Hōen                                            Wuzu Fayan Gutei                                                     Juzhi

Hofuku Jūten                                        Baofu Congzhan

Hokken                                                 Faxian

Hōun (layman)                                      Pangyun

Hyakujō Ekai                                        Baizhang Huaihai Jōshū Jūshin                                          Zhaozhou Congshen Jōzan Shinei                                          Dingshan Shenying Kaie (Hakuun) Shutan                          Haihui Shoudan Kassan Zenne                                       Jiashan Shanhui Koboku Hōjō                                        Kumu Facheng Kozan Chien                                         Gushan Zhiyuan

Kyōgen Chikan                                     Xiangyan Zhixian

359

Appendix IV

Kyōzan Ejaku                                       Yangshan Huiji

Myōkyō Shōri                                       Mingjiao Shaoli

Nan’yō Echū                                         Nanyang Huizhong

Nangaku Ejō                                         Nanyue Huairang Nangaku Eshi                                       Nanyue Huisi Nansen Fugan                                       Nanquan Puyuan

Ōbaku Kiun                                          Huangbo Xiyun

Ōryū Shishin (Goshin)                         Huanglong Sixin (Wuxin)

Raian Shōju                                          Leian Zhengshou Ri Fuma                                                Li Fuma

Rinzai Gigen                                         Linji Yixuan

Sakei Genrō                                          Zuoxi Xuanlang Seidō Chizō                                          Xitang Zhizang

Seigen Gyōshi                                      Qingyuan Xingsi Seizan Ryō                                            Xishan Liang

Setchō Jūken                                         Xuedou Chongxian Shakkyō Ezō                                         Shigong Huicang

Sōkei Reitō                                           Caoxi Lingtao

Taiso Eka                                              Dazu Huike

Tandō Bunjun                                       Zhangtang Wenzhun

Tanka Shijun                                         Danxia Zichun

Tanka Tennen                                        Danxia Tianran Tendō Nyojō                                         Tiantong Rujing Tōzan Dōbi                                           Dongshan Daowei Tōzan Ryōkai                                        Dongshan Liangjie Unmon Bun’en                                     Yunmen Wenyan Wanshi Shōgaku                                   Hongzhi Zhengjue

Yakusan Igen                                        Yueshan Weiyan Yakusan Kō (Śrāmaṇera)                      Yueshan Gao Yobunko                                               Yang Wengong

Yōka Genkaku                                      Yongjia Xuanjue

Glossary of Sanskrit Terms

This glossary contains Sanskrit terms appearing in Volume IV that are not already listed in the Glossaries of Sanskrit Terms in Volumes I–III. Definitions are drawn in general A Sanskrit-English Dictionary were English Buddhist DictionaryArrangement is according to the English alphabet. from Chapter references, unless otherwise stated, refer to chapters of the A Practical Sanskrit Dictionary(JEBD).by Sir Monier Monier-Williams (MW). Also used by A. A. Macdonell (MAC) and the Shōbōgenzō.Japanese-

abhimāna injure, insidiousness; high opinion of one’s self, self-conceit, pride, haughtiness.(self-conceit). Represented by zōjōman, “self-conceit.” (MW) Intention tomāna. Ref: Chapter Ninety,

Shizen-biku, See also Volume I, Glossary of Sanskrit Terms, under paragraph 23. alpecchuḥ having little or moderate wishes. Ref: Chapter Ninety-five, graph 122.(small desire). Represented by shōyoku, “small desire.” (MW) Hachi-dainingaku,Alpeccha:paraantagrāha-dṛṣṭi(MW) Anta:(holding extreme views). Represented by end, limit, boundary; end of life, death, destruction. henken,Dṛṣṭi:“extreme views.”Grāha:seeing, viewing,seizing, holding, catching, receiving; seizure, grasping, laying hold of. beholding; view, notion; (with Buddhists) a wrong view; theory, doctrine. Ref:Chapter Eighty-nine, Shinjin-inga, paragraph 11.

āryāṣṭāṅga-mārgaAppendix III, path.” (MW) “The holy eightfold path” pointed out by Buddha for escape from the5)misery of existence: 1) right views, 2) right thoughts, 3) right words, 4) right actions, right living, 6) right exertion, 7) right recollection, 8) right meditation. RefIppyakuhachi-hōmyōmon.(holy eightfold path). Represented by hasshōdō, “eightfold noble:

catur-ṛddhipādaand 4) tical feet.” (MW) (four bases of mystical ability). Represented by Catur: four. Ṛddhipāda:chanda (will); 2) one of the constituent parts of supernaturalcitta (thoughts); 3) shi-jin-soku,Sanjūshichi-bon-vīrya“four mys-(exertion); power. In Sanskrit they are: 1)

bodai-bunpō,mīmāṃsāparagraph 21.(investigation). Ref: Chapter Seventy-three,

catvāri saṃgraha-vastūni elements of sociability.” (JEBD) “The four ways of leading human beings to eman-Catur:(four elements of popularity). Represented by four. Saṃgraha-vastū: an element of popularity. In Sanskritshishōbō, “four cipation.” (MW) 

361

Glossary of Sanskrit Terms

dix III, caryathe four are: 1) (useful conduct); and 4) Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon.dāna (giving); 2) samāna-arthatāpriya-ākhyāna(sharing a common aim). Ref: Appen(kind communication); 3) artha--

catvāri samyakprahāṇāniarising, to abandon it when arisen, to produce merit, and to increase it when produced. quishing, abandoning, avoiding; exertion, Dharmas. Ref: Chapter Seventy-three,(shō-gon.MW) Catur:(JEBD) Right exertion. Right effort of four kinds which are mentioned in four. Samyañc:(four kinds of restraint). Represented by bodhipakṣa-dharmacorrect, accurate, proper, true, right. paragraph 15.s. They are: To prevent demerit from shi-shō-danPrahāṇa: and relin-shia list of the thirty-seven

Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō, catvārodvīpāḥfour. Dvīpa:(four continents). Represented by an island, peninsula, sandbank; a division of the terrestrial world. The shishū, “four continents.” (MW) Catur: and Uttarakuru (north). Ref: Chapter Ninety, four continents are Jambudvīpa (south), Pūrvavideha (east), A paragodāna (west),Shizen-biku, paragraph 56.

daśa-tathāgata-balānibala:powers with which a tathāgata is equipped,” or “possessing ten powers,” name of a buddha. (ten tathāgata powers). Represented by jūriki,Bala:“ten powers.” (MW) nyorai-gusoku-jūriki,power, strength, might,Daśa-“ten

etc.); 4) knowing the superior or inferior qualities of others; 5) knowing the de sires and wrong; 2) knowing which karmic effects follow from which causes; 3) knowing the various balanced states (four vigor, force; force or power of articulation; force considered as a sixth organ ofaction. A traditional interpretation of the ten powers is as follows: 1) knowing rightdhyānas, eight states of libera tion, three samā dhis, vana, hell, etc.); 8) knowing the past; 9) knowing life and death; 10) knowing how of others; 6) knowing the states of others; 7) knowing the destinations of others (nir-Sanji-no-gō, paragraph 114.

to end excesses. Ref: Chapter Eighty-four,

dharma-paryāya Dharma: that which is established or firm, steadfast decree, statute, ordinance, law;(like a gate, because through it sentient beings attain the enlightenment. (MW)JEBD) The teaching of the Buddha. The meaning is that the Dharma is something (succcession of Dharmas). Represented by Paryāya: going or turning or winding round, hōmon, “gate of Dharma.” the law or doctrine of Buddhism. revolving, revolution; regular recurrence, repetition, succession, turn. Ref: AppendixIII, Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon.

jana-kāyaJana: collection, multitude. Ref: Chapter Eighty-five, (creature, living being, man, person, race; people, subjects. community). Represented by shūraku, “colony” or “community.” (MW)Shime, paragraph 59.Kāya: assemblage, pañca-śīlāniduct,” is one of the six or ten perfections or the five chief rules of conduct for Buddhists. (five precepts). Represented by gokai, Śīla:“five precepts.” (MW) good disposition or character, śīla, “moral con-Pañca-śīla: moral conduct, integrity, morality, piety, virtue; (with Buddhists,

śīla Buddhists there are five fundamental precepts or rules of moral conduct, cf. ). The five precepts are: 1) not to kill, 2) not to steal, 3) not to commit adultery, pāramitās); a moral precept (with pañcaGlossary of Sanskrit Terms

4)graph 75. not to lie, 5) not to drink alcohol. Ref: Chapter Eighty-six, Shukke-kudoku, para-

pañcāvīci-karmāṇigō.one’s father, killing one’s mother, killing a saint (arhat), injuring the body of aformance, business. (JEBD) The five deadly sins, the five cardinal sins: killing(MW) Pañca:(five actions leading to incessant hell). Represented by five. Avīci: waveless; a particular hell. Karman: act, action, per-go-mugen four, Buddha, and causing disunity in the community of monks. Ref: Chapter Eighty-Sanji-no-gō, paragraph 38.

pañcendriyāṇi five organs of sense (viz., the ear, eye, nose, tongue, and skin) or the five organs of action (viz., hands, feet, larynx, and organs of generation and excretion). (five roots). Represented by gokon, “five roots.” (MW) Pañcendriya: Indriya: the

especially to the mighty Indra; faculty of sense, sense, organ of sense. (JEBD) The fit for or belonging to or agreeable to Indra; power force, the quality which belongs śraddhendriya, sense of meditation Shukke-), sense five organs that lead man to good conduct—sense of belief (of endeavor ((kudoku,samādhīndriya paragraph 118; Appendix III, vīryendriya), sense of wisdom ), sense of memory (prajñendriyaIppyakuhachi-hōmyōmon.(smṛtīndriya). Ref: Chapter Eighty-six, )

piṇḍavanaof medicants or monks. Monks gathered at one place. See also Volume I. Ref:(forest ranks). Represented by Ō-saku-sendaba,sōrin,paragraph 248.“thicket-forest.” (JEBD) An assemblage

Chapter Eighty-one,

prahāṇacatvāri samyakprahāṇāni.(restraint, exertion). Represented by dan, “restraint,” or gon, “exertion.” See prapañca prolixity, diffuseness, copiousness (in style). Note: In philosophical contexts, (wordiness). Represented by is used to mean the visible world, reality in front of us. Ref: Chapter Ninety-paragraph 130.keron, “idle discussion.” (MW) Amplification, five, pañcaHachi-dainingaku,

praśrabdhi-sambodhyaṅgathe Sanskrit fidence. kakubun,wisdom). Represented by Sam: “entrustment as a part of the state of truth.” (MW) with, together with, along with; conjunction, union, integration. (confidence as an integrated requisite for attaining perfectjo-tōkakushi,Bodhyaṅga:“elimination as a limb of the truth,” represented by a requisite for obtaining perfect Praśrabdhi:shichi-tōkakushi,trust, con-Sam-fromjo knowledge. One of the seven limbs of bodhya: to be enlightened or instructed.

bodai-bunpō, Terms, under sapta-sambodhyaṅga.paragraphs 37, 40; Appendix III, sapta-bodhyaṅgāni. Ref: Chapter Seventy-three, See also Volume Two, Glossary of Sanskritbodhi;                                 Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon.Sanjūshichi-bon-

pūjana honoring, worship, respect, attention, hospitable reception. Ref: Chapter Eighty-(serving offerings). Represented by Kuyō-shōbutsu, paragraph 127.kuyō, “serve offerings.” (MW) Reverencing, seven, saṃkalpain the mind or heart, (esp.) will, volition, desire, purpose, definite intention or(thinking). Represented by shi-i. (MW) Conception or idea or notion formed

363

Glossary of Sanskrit Terms

bon-bodai-bunpō,determination or decision or wish for. Ref: Chapter Seventy-three, paragraph 44. Sanjūshichisaṃnāha184.trements, armor, mail, a coat of mail. Ref: Chapter Eighty-eight, (suit of armor). Represented phonetically. (MW) Equipment, harness; accouKie-sanbō, paragraph saṃtuṣṭaḥSaṃtuṣṭi:(complete satisfaction). Represented by complete satisfaction, contentment with. Ref: Chapter Ninety-five, paragraph 123. chisoku, “to know satisfaction.” (MW)Hachidainingaku,

śāntaquiet, peace or calmness of mind, absence of passion, averting of pain. Ref: Chapter(tranquility). Represented by Hachi-dainingaku,jakujō,paragraph 124.“tranquility.” (MW) Śānti: tranquility, peace,

Ninety-five,

śaraṇatecting, guarding; protection, refuge. Ref: Chapter Eighty-eight, (refuge). Represented by kie, “returning to and depending upon.” (MAC) Pro-Kie-sanbō, paragraph

181.

śūraṃgama-samādhi gon-zanmai.all illusions, just as a brave general destroys his enemies. (MW) ticular samādhi;(JEBD) Powerful name of a bodhisattva. Ref: Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III), (powerful Sanjūshichi-bon-bodai-bunpō,samādhisamādhi.). Represented by The samādhi by which one can exterminateparagraph 5; Chapter Sev-shuryōgon-jōŚūraṃgama: and shuryō-Kūge;a par-

Chapter Seventy-three, enty-four, Tenbōrin.

upasthānaplacing one’s self near to, going near, approach, access; staying upon or at, abiding,(abode). Represented by jū, “abode,” and by jo, “abode.” (MW) The act ofSanjūshichi-bon-bodaia place of abiding, abode. Ref: Chapter Seventy-three, bunpō, paragraph 4. vedamanism, not recognized by Buddhists. (MW) Knowledge, true or sacred knowledge(divine knowledge). Represented phonetically. (JEBD) The basic scriptures of Brahor lore; name of certain celebrated works which constitute the basis of the firstperiod of the Hindu religion. Ref: Chapter Ninety, Shizen-biku, paragraph 46.

viparyāsa(upsetting; transposition, transportation; exchange, inversion, change, interchange.JEBD) Error, delusion. Ref: Chapter Ninety, (inversion). Represented by tendō, “inversion.” (MW) Overturning, overthrow,Shizen-biku, paragraph 49.

Bibliography

I . Main Chinese Sources Quoted by Master Dōgen in the Shōbōgenzō

A. Sutras Attempts at English translations of sutra titles are provisional, and provided only for reference.

AgonkyōZōagongyōJōagongyō(Āgama sutras). In Chinese translation, there are four(Long Āgama Sutra;(Middle Āgama Sutra;Pāli Skt. Dīgha-nikāyaMadhyamāgama;Skt. Saṃyuktāgama;)                                                     :Pāli Majjhima-nikāyaPāli Samyutta- )

Chūagongyō(Miscellaneous Āgama Sutra;

ZōitsuagongyōAṅguttara-nikāyanikāya)             (Āgama Sutras Increased by One;)      Skt. Ekottarāgama; Pāli

These are supplemented by the

comprises fifteen short books.Āgamas. In the Pāli canon, the kāgama; Pāli Khuddaka-nikāyaKhuddaka-nikāyaShōagongyō), a collection of all the Āgamas beside the four(Small Āgama Sutras;is the fifth of the five Nikāyas andSkt. Kṣudra -

Aikuōkyō (Aśoka Sutra)

Butsuhongyōjikkyō (Sutra of Collected Past Deeds of the Buddha)

Daibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōman and the Buddha) (Sutra of Questions and Answers between Mahābrah-

Daihannyagyō Great Prajñāpāramitā;(Great Prajñā SutraSkt. Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra), short for Daihannyaharamittakyō )                                                    (Sutra of the

Daihatsunehangyō (Sutra of the Great Demise; Skt. Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra) Daihōkōengakushutararyōgikyō (Mahāvaipulya Round Realization Sutra) Daihōkōhōkyōgyō (Mahāvaipulya Treasure Chest Sutra)

Daihōshakkyō (Great Treasure Accumulation Sutra; Skt. Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtra)

DaijōhonshōshinchikankyōLives) (Mahayana Sutra of Reflection on the Mental State in Past

Daishūkyō (Great Collection Sutra; Skt. Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra) Engakukyō (Sutra of Round Realization)

Fuyōkyō (Sutra of Diffusion of Shining Artlessness; Skt. Lalitavistara-sūtra) Higekyō (Flower of Compassion Sutra; Skt. Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtra)

365

Hokkekyōof the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma;(Lotus Sutra, Sutra of the Flower of DharmaSkt. ), short for Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraMyōhōrengekyō (Sutra)

Hokkukyō (Sutra of Dharma Phrases; Pāli Dhammapada)

Honjōgyō (Past Lives Sutra; Skt. Jātaka)

Juōkyō (Ten Kings Sutra)

Kanfugenbosatsugyōbōkyō Universal Virtue) (Sutra of Reflection on the Practice of Dharma by Bodhisattva

Kegongyō (Garland Sutra; Skt. Avataṃsaka-sūtra)

Kengukyō (Sutra of the Wise and the Foolish)

Keukōryōkudokukyō (Sutra of Comparison of the Merits of Rare Occurrences)

Kongōkyō Prajñāpāramitā;(Diamond SutraSkt. ), short for Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtraKongōhannyaharamitsukyō ) (Sutra of the Diamond

Konkōmyōkyōof the Supreme King;(Golden Light SutraSkt. Suvarṇaprabhāsottamarāja-sūtra), short for Konkōmyōsaishōkyō) (Golden Light Sutra

Mirokujōshōkyō (Sutra of Maitreya’s Ascent and Birth in Tuṣita Heaven)

Mizouinnenkyō (Sutra of Unprecedented Episodes)

Ninnōgyō Sutra of the Benevolent King(Benevolent King Sutra), short for )                                                         Ninnōhannyaharamitsugyō  (Prajñā pāramitā

Senjūhyakuenkyō (Sutra of a Hundred Collected Stories) Shakubukurakangyō (Sutra of the Defeat of the Arhat)

Shobutsuyōshūkyō (Sutra of the Collected Essentials of the Buddhas) Shugyōhongikyō (Sutra of Past Occurrences of Practice)

Shuryōgonkyō (Śūraṃgama Sutra; Skt. Śūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśa-sūtra)

Yōrakuhongikyō (Sutra of Past Deeds as a String of Pearls)

Yuimagyō (Vimalakīrti Sutra; Skt. Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtra) Zuiōhongikyō (Sutra of Auspicious Past Occurrences)

  1. B.  Precepts

Bonmōkyō (Pure Net Sutra)

Daibikusanzenyuigikyō (Sutra of Three Thousand Dignified Forms for Ordained Monks)

Jūjuritsu Sarvāstivādin school(Precepts in Ten Parts), a sixty-one–fascicle translation of the Vinaya of the Konponsetsuissaiubuhyakuichikatsuma sarvāsti vādin School) (One Hundred and One Customs of the Mūla -

Makasōgiritsuof the Mahāsaṃghika school of Hinayana Buddhism (Precepts for the Great Sangha), a forty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya Shibunritsu the Dharmaguptaka school(Precepts in Four Divisions), a sixty-fascicle translation of the Vinaya of Zen’enshingi (Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries)

C. Commentaries

Bosatsuchijikyō (Sutra of Maintaining the Bodhisattva State)

Daibibasharon (Skt. Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstra)

Daichidoron prajñā pāramitopadeśa(Commentary on the Accomplishment which is Great Wisdom;)                                                                                              Skt. Mahā -

Daijōgishō (Writings on the Mahayana Teachings)

HokkezanmaisengiDharma) (A Humble Expression of the Form of the Samādhi of the Flower of

Kusharon (Abhidharmakośa-śāstra)

Makashikan Chigi, founder of the Tendai sect(Great Quietness and Reflection), a record of the lectures of Master Tendai

Makashikanhogyōdenguketsu Quietness and ReflectionKeikei Tannen       ), a Chinese commentary on the (Extensive Decisions Transmitted in Support of GreatMakashikan by Master

D. General Chinese Buddhist Records

Daitōsaiikiki (Great Tang Records of Western Lands)

Gotōroku Rentōeyō in the Kataifutōroku compiled during the Song era (960–1279). They are represented in summary form(Five Records of the TorchGotōegen (Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch(Collection of the Fundamentals of the Five Torches(Keitoku Era Record of the Transmission of the Torch), five independent but complementary collections) ) ) ). They are)                                                                                                        :

Keitokudentōroku

Zokutōroku Tenshōkotōroku (Collection of Essentials for Continuation of the Torch(Supplementary Record of the Torch(Tensho Era Record of the Widely Extending Torch)

Hekiganroku (Blue Cliff Record)

Hōonjurin in one hundred volumes(A Forest of Pearls in the Garden of Dharma), a kind of Buddhist encyclopedia

Kaigenshakkyōroku (Kaigen Era Records of Śākyamuni’s Teaching)

Kosonshukugoroku (Record of the Words of the Venerable Patriarchs of the Past) Rinkanroku (Forest Record), short for Sekimonrinkanroku (Sekimon’s Forest Record) Sōkōsōden (Biographies of Noble Monks of the Song Era)

Zenmonshososhigeju (Verses and Eulogies of Ancestral Masters of the Zen Lineages) Zenrinhōkun (Treasure Instruction from the Zen Forest)

Zenshūjukorenjutsūshū of the Zen Sect) (Complete String-of-Pearls Collection of Eulogies to Past Masters

Zokudentōroku in China in 1635 as a sequel to the (Continuation of the Record of the Transmission of the TorchKeitokuden tōroku   ), published Zokukankosonshukugyō of the Past) (Summarized Collection of the Words of the Venerable Patrirachs

E. Records of and Independent Works by Chinese Masters

Basodōitsuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Baso Dōitsu)

Bukkagekisetsuroku of Master Setchō Jūken(Record of Bukka’s Attacks on Knotty Problems); Bukka is an alias

Chōreishutakuzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Chōrei Shutaku)

Daiefugakuzenjishūmonbuko Sōkō]) (War Chest of the School of Zen Master Daie Fugaku [Daie

Daiegoroku (Record of the Words of Daie Sōkō)

Daiezenjitōmei (Inscriptions on the Stupa of Zen Master Daie Sōkō)

Engozenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Engo Kokugon) Jōshūroku (Records of Jōshū Jūshin)

Jūgendan (Discussion of the Ten Kinds of Profundity), by Master Dōan Josatsu Hōezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Yōgi Hōe)

Hōkyōzanmai (Samādhi, the State of a Jewel Mirror), by Master Tōzan Ryōkai

Hōneininyūzenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Hōnei Ninyu)

Hyakujōroku (Record of Hyakujō Ekai)

Kidōshū by Rinsen Jurin(Kidō Collection), a collection of the words of Master Tanka Shijun, compiled

Kōkezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Kōke Sonshō)

Nyojōoshōgoroku (Record of the Words of Master Tendō Nyojō)

Ōandongezenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Oan Donge)

Rinzaizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Zen Master Rinzai Gigen)

Rokusodaishihōbōdankyō attributed to Master Daikan Enō(Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patrirach’s Dharma Treasure),

Sandōkai (Experiencing the State), by Master Sekitō Kisen

Sekitōsōan-no-uta (Songs from Sekitō’s Thatched Hut), by Master Sekitō Kisen

Setchōmyōkakuzenjigoroku Jūken]) (Record of the Words of Zen Master Setchō Myōkaku [Setchō

Shinjinmei (Inscription on Believing Mind), by Master Kanchi Sōsan

Shōdōka (Song of Experiencing the Truth), by Master Yōka Genkaku

Sōtairoku (Record of Answers to an Emperor), by Master Busshō Tokkō Tōzangoroku (Record of the Words of Tōzan Ryōkai) Unmongoroku (Broad Record of Unmon Bun’en)

Wanshijuko Record()Wanshi’s Eulogies to Past Masters), also known as the Sho yo roku (Relaxation Wanshikoroku (Broad Record of Wanshi Shōgaku)

Wanshizenjigoroku (Record of the Words of Wanshi Shōgaku)

Yafudōsenkongōkyō (Yafu Dōsen’s Diamond Sutra)

F. Chinese Non-Buddhist and Secular Works

Confucianist: Kōkyō ((Book of Filial PietyDiscourses of Confucius)   )

Rongo

Daoist:Sōji,Rikutō Bunshi,Inzui Kanshi,(Rhymes of Good Fortune(from the Chinese Six Strategies  from the Chinese (History of the Three Elements and Five Elements) Wenzi,Shizi,Guanzi,the name of the supposed author)the name of the author to whom the text is ascribedthe name of the supposed author the name of a disciple of Laozi (the ancient)

Shishi,Sangoryakuki from the Chinese from the Chinese Zhangzi,

Chinese philosopher regarded as the founder of Daoism)

Miscellaneous: Taiheikōki Jibutsugenki (Jōkan Era Treatise on the Essence of Government Collection of Matters and Examples(Record of the Origin of Things)       )       )       )       ) Meihōki Jōkanseiyō Jiruisenshū (Chronicles of the Underworld((Widely Extending Record of the Taihei Era

II. Other Works by Master Dōgen

Eiheikōroku (Broad Record of Eihei)

Eiheishingi Fushukuhanhō Cook), etc.(Pure Criteria of Eihei(The Method of Taking Meals), including: Bendōhō ), Tenzokyōkun (Methods of Pursuing the Truth(Instructions for the),

Fukanzazengi (Universal Guide to the Standard Method of Zazen) Gakudōyōjinshū (Collection of Concerns in Learning the Truth) Hōgyōki (Hōgyō Era Record)

Shinji-shōbōgenzō (Right Dharma-eye Treasury, in Original Chinese Characters)

III. Japanese References Akiyama, Hanji. Dōgen-no-kenkyū. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1935.

Eto, Soku-o. Shōbōgenzō-ji-i. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1965.

Hakuju, Ui, ed. Bukkyo-jiten. Tokyo: Daito Shuppansha, 1935.

Hashida, Kunihiko. Shōbōgenzō-shaku-i. 4 vols. Tokyo: Sankibo Busshorin, 1939–1950.

Hokkekyō. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1964–1967.

—.Jinbo, Nyoten, and Bunei Ando, eds. Zengaku-jiten.Genzo Chūkai Zensho Kankōkai, 1965–1968.Kyoto: Heirakuji Shoten, 1976.Shōbōgenzō-chūkai-zensho. 10 vols. Tokyo: Shōbō

Jingde chuan deng lu (Keitokudentōroku). Taipei: Zhenshan mei chu ban she, 1967. Kindaichi, Kyosuke, ed. Jikai. Tokyo: Sanseidō, 1970.

Morohashi, Tetsuji. Dai-kanwa-jiten. 13 vols. Tokyo: Daishūkan Shoten, 1955–1960.

Mujaku, Kosen. Shōbō Genzō Shoten-zoku-cho. Tokyo: Komeisha, 1896.

Nakajima, Kenzo, ed. Sōgō-rekishi-nenpyō. Tokyo: Nitchi Shuppan, 1951.

—.Nakamura, Hajime, ed. Shin-bukkyo-jiten. Tokyo: Seishin Shobo, 1962.Bukkyogo-daijiten. 3 vols. Tokyo: Tokyo Shoseki, 1975.

Nishiari, Bokuzan. Shōbōgenzō-keiteki. Tokyo: Daihorinkaku, 1979–1980.

Nishijima, Gudo.

—. Tokyo: Kanazawa Bunko, 1982–1986.volumes plus a one-volume appendix. Tokyo: Kana zawa Bunko, 1970–1981.ShōbōgenzōteishorokuGendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō (Shōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese(Record of Lectures on Shōbōgenzō). Thirty-four volumes.). Twelve

Ōkubo, Dōshū. Dōgen-zenji-den-no-kenkyū. Tokyo: Chikuma Shobo, 1966.

Oyanagi, Shigeta. Shinshū-kanwa-daijiten. Tokyo: Hakubunkan, 1937.

Satomi, Ton. Dōgen-zenji-no-hanashi. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1953.

Sawaki, Kodo. Sawaki-kodo-zenshu. 19 vols. Tokyo: Daihōrinkaku, 1962–1967.

Shōbōgenzō.and Yaoko Mizuno. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, n.d.Commentaries by Minoru Nishio, Genryu Kaga mi shi ma, Tokugen Sakai,

Taishō-shinshū-daizōkyō. Tokyo: Taishō Issaikyō Kankōkai, 1924–1932.

Tetsugaku-jiten. Tokyo: Hibonsha, 1971.

Tetsugaku-shōjiten. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1938.

Watsuji, Tetsuro. Watsuji-tetsuro-zenshū. Vols. 4, 5. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1961–1963. Zengaku-daijiten.1985. Edited by scholars of Komazawa University. Tokyo: Daishūkan Shoten,

Zokuzōkyō.Taipei: Xin Wen Feng chu ban gong si, 1976–1977.Collection of Buddhist sutras not included in the Taishō-shinshū-daizōkyō.

III. English References

Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary. Tokyo: Daitō Shuppansha, 1979.

Masuda, Koh, ed. 1974. Kenkyusha’s New Japanese-English Dictionary. Tokyo: Kenkyusha, Monier-Williams, Sir Monier. Press, 1899. A Sanskrit-English Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Nelson, Andrew. 1974. Japanese-English Character Dictionary. Rutland, VT: Charles Tuttle,

Schiffer, Wilhelm, and Yoshiro Tamura. 1975. A revised version of  by Bunno Kato and William Soothill.The Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful LawThe Threefold Lotus Sutra. New York: Weatherhill,

(1930)

Schumann, H. W. The Historical Buddha. New York: Arkana, 1989.

Spahn, Mark, and Wolfgang Hadamitzky. Asssociates, 1989. Japanese Character Dictionary. Tokyo: Nichigai

 

Index

A

Abundant Treasures  220Abhidharmakośa-śāstraAbhidharma (Ābhāsvara (Kusharonnous Sound)  23028, 90, 91, 109, see also)  231, see also248Heaven of Lumi-Tripītaka)  234311(see also(see201

Abhidharmamahāvibhāṣā-śāstraalso Daibibasharon)  3, 166, 186,

Ādityateja (ācāryaacupuncture  145see also Majestic Virtue) Āgama sutras  175, ama Sutrasūtra229 )  171(see also Samyuktāgama-

age(s)  3, 15, 25, 32, 44, 50, 59, 61, 101,125236, 165, 180, 194, 212, 215, 235,, 240, 270, 271, 285, 295, 304, 316 coming, future, later  19, 48, 49, 53,119223, 181, 187, 196, 208, 209, 211,, 253, 270

degenerate, degenerative  257, 271,distant, former, past  16, 57, 58, 184,279185224, , 207, 209, 210, 212, 216, 223,, 240, 241, 251, 303        255 of the five rulers  283present  44, 58, 59, 215, 255forty  15, 32recent  186, 193, 255second  182three  156, 165, 207

Agni  248Ajita-Keśakambala (see also

Ājñāta-Kauṇḍinya (Buddhist teachers)  282see also six non-

anāgāminalmsbowl (Ānanda  32, 87, 88, 169, 180, 184, 194,Anāthapiṇḍana  113Kauṇḍinya)  201, 237, 247returner)  203, 260, 263, 265, 266, 358197, 201, (see also pātrasee also206 four effects; non-)  36, 79, five bhikṣu153 s;

Aniruddha  32, 197, 206androgyne  159 9, 24, 89, 149, araṇyaanuttara samyaksaṃbodhiAparagodāna (285150208, 151, 173, 184, 188, 189, 194,, 209, 210, 211, 215, 235, 247, , 264324, 265, see also281 four continents)353

arhat(s) (archpriest  47, 53, 73, 76five hundred  166, 186, 201179264, 180, 230, 239, 248, 260, 263,, 265, 266, 267, 275, 279, 281, see also four effects) 32, 160,286 great  160, 182, 183, 186, 265, 271  see also

373

ascetic(s), asceticism  201, 248arhathood (practice(s) (250, 263, 285see also dhūtafour effects)  248, asuraAśvaghoṣa  166Aśvajit (109s (see alsosee also, 115, 201, 247, demon)  261five bhikṣu248s) 201, 247)  34, 53, Avalokiteśvara (Atharva-vedasion; Regarder of the Sounds of the(see alsosee alsoVedas)  284Great Compas-

Avīci Hell, Avīciincessant)  160, 161, 204, 264, 267,World)  30, 111, 298, 340-niraya (see also hell,

281

B

Baso Dōitsu  25, 26, 28, 32, 55, 57, 69,Baofu Congshan. Beijing  127Banzan Hōshaku  26, 193, 359banyan grove, tree  243, 249Baizhang Huaihai. 71339, 73, 75, 76, 83, 138, 204, 259, 316,, 359 SeeSeeHofuku JūtenHyakujō Ekai

Besarb (Bengal  167see alsosee alsoVaiśālī)  286

bhikṣuBhaiṣajyaguru (Bhadrika (201(, 206, s) (see also247see alsomonk)  xvii, 15, 16, 17,five bhikṣuYakushi)  283s) 197,

Biographiesfive  184, 206, 24718150218, 89, 94, 99, 101, 102, 103, 148, 149,, 160, 161, 170, 180, 194, 195, 211,, 219, 221, 222, 223, 255, (s) (see also nun)  17, 102, 103,249263

Blue Cliff Record. See Hekiganrokubhikṣuṇī1603, 149, 156, 180, 182, 189, 198,, 219, 220, 225, 236, 239, 244,, 290, 303, 304, 321, , 179, 182, 241, 242, , 5, 10, 22, 23, 29, 68, 102, 103,180192276, 285                         352

bodhi148203286

bodhicittathirty-seven elements of  3, 22, 355,seven limbs of  29power  effect  356, 357(see also bodhi-mind)  303 --

bodhisattva(s)  6, 14, 19, 20, 25, 33, 102,bodhi-bodhiBodhidharma (16010326286, 33, 34, 51, 68, 79, 259, 277, 285,garden  63, 69mind  121, 182, 255, 257, 351, 161, 166, 167, 172, 175, 182,, 199, 215, 216, 245, 249, 250,, 104, 111, 114, 120, 128, 129, 157,, 272, 279, 283, 304, 307, 312,, 343, 345, 353, 354, 355, , 315  see also First Patriarch)358

189270

stage(s). precepts  20, 148, 153, 202, 310, 311,mahāsattvagreat  105, 158, 271, 279340345313, 315, See(s)  93, 148, 149, 188, 189,316stage(s)

way  177vehicle  103

body, speech, and mind (bodhiBodhisattva (forms of conduct, behavior)  96, 100,tree  334, 114, 168, 195, see also Śākyamuni)  197355see also three

Bōshutei Pavilion  21, 34Bonshin  327112

Brahmajāla-sūtra. See Pure Net SutraBrahmā heaven(s), world  181, 210, 211,Brahmadeva(s)  19, 33, 64, 275, 279, 344230

Buddha (Brightness (Brahmayoni (brahman(s)  149, 178–79, 180, 181, 182,Brahmanism, Brahmanistic  165, 167,Brahmā, King  16, 18, 33, 102, 160, 210,xv, xvi, xvii, 6, 8, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18,248211199, 25, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 36, 37, 40,, 69, 80, 81, 84, 87, 88, 101, 102,, 266, , 201, 221, 223, 248, 273, 279, , 284  see alsosee also271see alsoGautama; Śākyamuni)Prabhā)  209, 229Gayāśīrṣa)  167286

1953

103121149166176243187263199233274206304215320, 104, 107, 109, 110, 111, 113, 114,, 123, 124, 125, 141, 147, 148,, 150, 151, 153, 160, 161, 165,, 167, 170, 171, 172, 173, 175,, 179, 180, 182, 183, 184, 185,, 188, 189, 190, 194, 195, 197,, 200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205,, 234, 235, 236, 238, 240–41, 242,, 207, 208, 209, 211, 212, 214,, 216, 219, 221–23, 224, 226, 229,

birth, birthday  91, 110, 204, 244, 246, 247, 248, 250, 257,, 264, 265, 266, 267, 268, 270,, 277, 278, 279, 281, 286, 303,, 307, 309, 315, 317, 318, 319,, 321, 330, 334, 336, 337, 346

descendents, successor(s)  88, 153body  160, 236, 311, 312, 313, 340death, demise  201, 204, 234  eye(s), Eye  182, 292, 295, 352disciple(s)  101, 108, 109, 143, 166,167255, 201, 202, 206, 229, 233, 243,, 263, 321 precepts  147, 309preaching  30, 35, 164, 195, 206, 244,posture  xviorder  33, 107, 113, 201, 247, 250name  245268, 270, 355

truth  15, 46, 64, 80, 119, 121, 171, 195,teaching(s)  35, 150, 204, 237, 254,relics  285216332271, 217, 218, 268, 279, 303, 304,, 335, , 274, 279, 336, 337      343

buddha(s)  3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15,words  171, 173, 315wisdom  114, 122, 268, 297164599121, 17, 20, 25, 28, 32, 33, 36, 37, 41,, 50, 63, 64, 68, 69, 73, 74, 79, 93,, 100, 102, 103, 104, 107, 110, 114,, 125, 128, 129, 135, 147, 148, 150184194209217, 156, 166, 167, 172, 180, 182,, 185, 187, 188, 190, 191, 193,, 195, 196, 197, 198, 203, 207,, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214, 216,, 244, 246, 247, 249, 254, 257,, 270, 271, 272, 273, 275, 276,, 283, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293,, 295, 296, 298, 299, 300, 301,, 305, 307, 309, 310, 312, 313,, 218, 219, 220, 221, 225, 240,

241266279294304317

ascendent state of  329–30body(ies)  74, 188, 200, 202, 220, 225,past  79, 184, 185, 207, 222, 353--eternal  3, 5, 13, 15, 16, 35, 36, 41, 49,image(s)  92, 110, 167, 217, 303, 305,four  160, 167seven ancient (effect  121, 217, 219–20, 225, 226,mind, -mind–seal  77, 147, 198, 30,339Buddhas)  67, 199, 231, 249, 25933223131633323673225, 323, 329, 330, 331, 332, 335,, 345, 352, 353, 354, 355, , 80, 85, 86, 125, 129, 132, 133,, , 268, 270, , 244, 255, 261, 275, 291, 332,, 334333         see also304        Seven 358

buddha-bhagavat  230Buddhabhadra  232, 234Buddha-Dharma  7, 9, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18,1791266419, 67, 89, 101, 119, 120, 121, 123,, 20, 30, 31, 44, 45, 48, 49, 59, 60,, 182, 183, 186, 187, 191, 193, 194,, 142, 150, 156, 170, 171, 172, 178,

196

296274230, 299, 321, 330, , 276, 277, 279, 284, 289, 291, 292,, 267, 268, 269, 270, 271, 272, 273,, 239, 240, 242, 253, 254, 255, 257,, 202, 207, 208, 225, 226, 227, 229,335

266

Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha (Three Treasures)  xv, 104, 163, 172,, 219, 232, 235, 236, 237, 238,see also

191239

Buddhahood  9, 18, 25, 172Buddha hall  20, 21, 55, 109, 111, 112,330307, 245, 248, 249, 250, 269, 304,, 311, 313, 346, 355

Buddhism  xv, xvi, 3, 35, 53, 63, 67, 69,buddha-tathāgata(s) (Buddha’s Treasury Sutra. See Butsuzō kyōBuddhapiṭakaduḥśīlanirgraha-sūtra. Seebuddha-nature  5, 6, 24, 25, 28, 68, 102,buddha lands  103  Chinese  25, 28415071207Butsuzō kyō114, 83, 121, 155, 166, 169, 177, 202,, 121, , 185, 215, 238, 272, 279, , 235, 248, 251, 259, 263, 123       see also Tathāgata)335282

Buddhist(s)  xvi, 3, 24, 28, 45, 54, 85,Theravāda  23Mahayana  165, 247Hinayana  3, 202, 251, 316esoteric  30788191250, 104, 117, 145, 153, 165, 169, 175,, 199, 207, 234, 235, 237, 249,, 251, 260, 309, 315, 351, 358

lecture, preaching, teaching  35, 111,

monk(s)  3, 33, 79, 131, 146, 153, 206,order(s)  107, 114, 147, 233, 309  patriarchs  xvi, 5, 8, 9, 13, 14, 15, 16,monastery(ies), temple(s)  55, 112,master(s), teacher(s)  3, 25, 35, 54, 71,life  79, 141, 309174881114263117176, 18, 19, 21, 36, 37, 41, 43, 45, 46,, 49, 50, 63, 64, 65, 71, 74, 79–80,, 85, 86, 88, 89, 99, 101, 102, 104,, 285, , 141, 145, , 165, , 355 315329 206 121148246, 122, 123, 125, 132, 139, 143,, 156, 164, 190, 196, 227, 235,

practitioner(s)  34, 108, 114, 117, 139,precepts  150, 309, 310  practice, training  29, 32, 33, 57, 139,philosophy  24, 155141250311, 313, 331, 334, , 253, 258, 272, 273, 305, 310,, , 167263                 335

state  129, 139, 203scholars  303

truth  19, 24, 150, 153, 203, 215theory(ies), thought  xv, 129, 151tradition  107, 112scripture(s), sutra(s), text(s)  31, 32, 35,39, 142, 169, 199, 229, 283, 284, see also Bodhidhar ma;315

Buddhist Patriarch (Buddha; Patriarch)  22, 36, 37, 50, 86,, 101, 104–105, 135, 193, 269,

Bunka era  xviiBukkyo-jiten99 30see also       274

ButsuhongyōjikkyōBusshō Hōtai   36, 39, 108, 359  Bussuihatsunehanryakusetsukyōkaigyō.Bussetsukeukōryōkudokukyō. See KeukyōBussetsuchojitsumyōanmaikyōBushū district  71Burning Torch (343See Yuikyōgyō208, 213, 229, 209, 213, 229, 231203, 208, 213, 231,Dīpaṃkara)231315

Butsuzō kyō

C

caitya227(s) , 232, 233, 238, 239, (see also stupa)  220, 225, 226,

Cāturmahārājakāyikā (Caoxi Lingtao. Candraprabha. caṇḍālasof the Four Quarter Kings)  230155, See165SeeMoon LightSōkei Reitōsee also 248Heaven 193

cause(s)  52, 59, 65, 103, 165, 179, 180,causal, causality, causation (185217254cause and effect)  27, 67, 68, 101,, 218, , 194, 195, 203, 205, 207, 215,, 218, 219, 237, 239, 240, 251,, 299, 304, 230 317                       see also

Central Asia  40  cause and effect (and conditions  45, 164, 192, 242259163causation) 10, 27, 57–58, 59, 60, 61,, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 155, 156, 162,, 260, 261, 269, 270, 275, , 165, 168, 193, 195, 232, 251–58,see also causal, causality,282 62

Changqing Huileng. Chandaka  189, 203

Chien (see also     SeeSee

Chimon Kōso  53, 128, 137  China  xvi, 16, 26, 29, 32, 35, 40, 50, 52,Changsha Jingcen. 270–7155112139172230259283, 67, 71, 75, 79, 83, 85, 101, 109,, 113, 114, 122, 127, 131, 135, 137,, 141, 143, 144, 145, 147, 153,, 197, 200, 202, 204, 205, 225,, 233, 234, 236, 237, 247, 253,, 260, 261, 271, 273, 275, 277,, 284, 286, 310, 315, 329, , 273Kozan Chien)  269,Chōsha KeishinChōkei Eryō340

Chinese  xviii, 12, 26, 40, 55, 57, 67, 71,language  xvii, xviii, 32, 40, 52, 53, 68,book(s), source, text(s), translation28411576146233323138282xviii, 23, 24, 27, 39, 42, 75, 137,, 137, 176, 251, 271, 273, 283,, , 107, 108, 111, 128, 130, 145,285, 167, 175, 202, 203, 229, 231,, 247, 249, 260, 281, 284, 315,, 324, , 154, 201, 202, 232, 248, 249,, 285 340

Chinshū district  193

Chishō 32Chōkaku. Chinshū Hōju  298Chinshū Fuke (See see also Fuke; Hōtai)  26

cintāmaṇi. SeeChūji (Chōrō Sōsaku  108, 153, 315Chronicles of the Underworld. See Mei-Chōsha Keishin  23, 163–64, 167, 168,Chōso (Chōkei Eryō  30, 334, 340, 359  hoki297see also, see also359 Chōkei Eryōwish-fulfilling gemConfucius)  270, 283Long Nails)  286

Collection of Matters and Examples,cloud hall  20, 93, 94, 95, 96, 99Part One. See Jiruizenshū

conduct (Communal Heaven  211bad  158, 165, 237, 254, 272155347     see also karma)  18, 63, 64, 119,

, 160, 165, 181, 185, 206, 207,, 350, 352, 358

Confucius (Confucian, Confucianism,consciousness(es)  9, 21, 23, 25, 26, 27,good  32, 159, 165, 205, 272right  345, 348karmic  9, 26261Confucianist(s)  31, 261, 263, 269,27634, 44, 52, 201, , 268, 282, 283, 285 , 282, 283, see also285303Chūji; Kongzi)  257,

  six  73          see also

Cross, Chodo  xviiConstant Light (209, 212, 213, 231     Dīpaṃkara)

D

DaibibasharonDaibai Hōjō 359Dahui Zonggao. mahāvibhāṣā-śāstra229     (see also Abhidharma -See Daie Sōkō) 166, 167, 201, Daibucchō nyorai mitsu inshū shōryō gisho -Daibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōbosatsu mangyōshuryōgonkyō40

Daibutsuji, Daibutsu Temple (Daibutsu (27Eiheiji)  39, 74, 77, 81, 105, 126, 135also Shuryōgonkyōsee also259see also(see also Great Com men -prajñā pāra mitopadeśaHyakujō Ekai)  57, 67,Dōgen)  36, 73)  39, 40see also(see)

Daichi (

281

Daie-shōbōgenzōDaie Sōkō (Daichidoron 133tary; Mahā251, 52, 153, 199, 219, 231, 232, 248,, 138, 257, 261, 359 , 284, , see also 286 52Sōkō) 41, 46, 52,

DaihannyakyōDaigyō (DaifugakuzenjishūmonbukoDaiezenjitōmeiDaiezenjigorokuDaie’s Right Dharma-eye Treasury. SeeDaie-shōbōgenzōsee also55Sekitō Reitō)  234261     20254

DaihatsunehangyōDaihannyaharamitsukyō(see also Mahā prajñā -)  (see also Mahā pari -75 pāramitā-sūtra

Bongyō-bonDemisenirvāṇa-sūtra; Sutra of the Great205, 231, )  137, 175, 176, 202, 204,250(“Pure Conduct”) chapter

DaihōshakkyōDaihōkōhōkyōgyōNyorai-sho-bonTathāgata”) chapter  137175See Mahākaruṇā168(  114“The Nature of the Daihi.

Daikan Enō (DaijōgishōDaiji Kanchū  28205see also, 232, Ro; Sixth Patriarch)247

32234, 51, 55, 83, 127, 129, 138, 204,, 260, 282, 315, 339, 340, 359

Daini Sanzō (119, 124, 125, see alsosee also

Daiyūhō (DaitōsaiikikiDaisō, Emperor  117, 127, 192, 204DaishūkyōDaishō (Peak; Hyakujōzan)  83see also20240, 249 Nan’yō Echū)  119, 128127Great and MightySanzō)  117, 118,

Daizui Hōshin  27, 34

dānapatidānaDamei Fachang. Dajian Huineng. 357(see also , 358143 six SeeSeeSeepāramitāDaibai HōjōDaikan Enōs)  233, 351,

Daśabala-Kāśyapa (Dao, Daoism, Daoist(s)  205, 261, 263,Danxia Zichun. Danxia Tianran. 269, 270, 282Seesee alsoTanka ShijunTanka Tennenfive bhikṣus)

201, 247  See

Deer Head  278–79, 286Debating Power  277–79, 286Dazu Huike.        Taiso Eka

demon(s) (deer park  31194rākṣasa266, 235, 238, 239, 248, 250, 261,, 271, 285, 311, 321, 329, 332, see also asura; māra-pāpīyas;)  4, 14, 16, 41, 89, 132, 193,349 king(s)  18, 179heavenly  101, 143, 246See277Kassan Zenne 

DentōrokuDevadatta  7, 14, 16, 25, 160, 167, 194,Denmyō. 197       see also

DhammapadadhāraṇīdharmaDhamma (87220337, 88, 178, 189, 202, 211, 218, 219,, 237, 275, 289, 321, 335, 336,, 343, 349, 350, ((s)  xvii, 3, 6, 7, 23, 45, 81, 83,s)  239, 353  243, Dharma)  247250351

Dharma (Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; rightsee also Buddha-Dharma;

1449110187197222233246265277304171321Dharma-eye treasury)  xv, xvii, xviii,, 15, 16, 26, 35, 42, 44, 46, 47, 48,, 57, 67, 83, 87, 88, 93, 100, 102,, 134, 135, 148, 156, 165, 170,, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196,, 201, 203, 204, 216, 218, 221,, 223, 225, 226, 227, 228, 231,, 235, 236–37, 238, 241, 242, 245,, 247, 249, 251, 253, 257, 264,, 266, 269, 270, 273, 274, 275,, 278, 279, 291, 294, 298, 303,, 310, 311, 312, 317, 319, 320,, 350, 351, 353, , 177, 178, 179, 182, 185, 186,, 332, 335, 343, 346, 347, 348,356

imitative  321four kinds of  171, 173gates (drum  95-eyes, Eye  xviii, xix, 148, 189, 219,349gates of Dharma illumination)  178,292, , see also357352    one hundred and eight

343

precepts  148, 310power  95, 100, 343preaching  16, 31, 44, 49, 74, 87, 88,phrases, words  95, 170, 332pivot of  245, 266117275, 151, 219, 222, 254, 266, 268,, 295, 298, 320, 333, 337, 344

standards  63, 227teacher(s)  120, 128, 245robe(s)  132, 180, 195seals  202seat  95, 97, 112right  14, 15, 16, 93, 156, 184, 188,relatives  94, 95, 96, 98, 112257193, 321, , 194, 195, 196, 197, 216, 254,352 wheel  35, 36, 37, 88, 107, 148, 149,transmission  11, 44, 129, 138, 141,160329172, 166, 188, 189, 201, 237, 291,, , 330219

Dharma body(ies)  6, 93, 129, 187, 202,world(s)  xvi, 125, 272, 273, 331236, 290, 291, 292, 340

Dharma hall  21, 35, 48, 54, 58, 64, 80,dharmakāya. Seeof five divisions  237, 24795, 96, 97, 99, 100, 107, 110, 112, Dharma bodyBuddha)  92, 132

Dharma King (see also

dhūtaDhītika  190–91, 203Dharmanandi  249115134(s) , 135, 294, (see also 295practice, ascetic)  104, dhyānatwelve  109263, 264, 268, 319, 323, 352, 358  (s) (see also six pāramitās)  32,

four  205fourth  161, 194, 203, 263–64, 265,second  263, 265first  194, 263, 265266, 267, 268, 269, 271, 274

229, 230,

Dōgen (Discourses. See RongoDoan Jōsatsu  259Dōbi (Dīrghanakha. Dīpaṃkara (Diamond SutraDingshan Shenying. third  263, 265see alsosee alsosee also231SeeTōzan Dōbi)  46, 48, 49, 50Daibutsu; Kigen)16Chōso, 47, SeeBurning Torch)53Jōzan Shinei

30xv–xvii, xviii, 1, 3, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29,

11369138, 71, 76, 77, 79, 83, 85, 108, 110,, 31, 35, 39, 41, 52, 53, 55, 57, 68,, 114, 117, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131,, 139, 141, 143, 145, 146, 147, 153, Dōgen (155231263, 165, 168, 169, 176, 177, 202, 206,, 234, 235, 248, 250, 251, 260, 261,continued)

dragon(s)  15, 83, 93, 102, 108, 172, 182,Dongshan Liangjie. Dōken  54Dongshan Daowei. Dōgo Enchi  69, 76, 301king(s)  16, 18, 80, 83240304, 283, 286, 289, 298, 299, 301, 303,, 317, 324, 326, 340, 341, , 241, 242, 298SeeSeeTōzan DōbiTōzan Ryōkai343

Droṇodana  206Dragon Spring Sword  88, 108Dṛḍhamati  39Dragon’s Gate  295, 298

E

eight branches of the right path (Eastern Qin dynasty  232Eastern Land(s) (123277see also, 182, 196, 200, 218, 235, 264,, 279, 310Nan’yō Echū)  117, 332see also China)  16,see also

Echū (

eightfold noble path  30, 52, 238, 357eightfold noble path)  13–22 “Eight Truths of a Great Human Being”eight kinds of pain  183, 200

EiheikōrokuEiheiji (Eihei era  597724, 143, 144, 151, 164, 296, 321, , 317–20, see also31321Daibutsuji)  xvii, 28, 39,326

Ejō (Eisai  28see also, 279, 322Koun Ejō)  164, 173, 258,

Ekottarāgama Sutra261(see also YijingHyakujō Ekai)  57, 251, 259 see also

element(s)  3, 22, 34EkikyōEkai (four  183, 290    239)  286

thirty-seven, of bodhi,

emptiness (Emperor of Flames (Summer)  1107523, 168, 255, 260, , 34, 355, 356, see also śūnyatāsee also282357the truth 3–22,)  32, 43, 71,God of

twenty kinds of  75kalpalineage of  148, 310of  9, 129

Excellent Reflection (evil state(s)  256, 274evil(s)  15, 16, 101, 156, 158, 178, 211,Etsu district, Etsu-u (Esshū district (Eshō  98, 113esoteric Buddhism  307Entei. Enchi Daian  30EngokorokuEngozenjiogorokuEngakukyōEngo Kokugon  36, 39, 48–49, 52, 53,Emptiness King  125, 129three  165, 187, 188, 202, 240, 242,four  256, 261four  345, 355ten  181, 200, 286213253Etsu-ū)  117, 135, 139, 296district)  22, 37, 50, 66, 74, 81, 126,54244, 104, 114, 115, 138, 256, 261, See, 257, 263, 282, 285, 304, 349, , 299, 249, 347, Emperor of Flames11439see also, 114, see also261355see alsosee also115, Etsu district,297SarvāstivādaEsshūVipaśyin)359351

139

Eye, the  33, 37, 43, 54, 60, 65, 87, 123,expedient means, expedients (Existence school (143skillful means)  87, 150, 238, 257,school)  225, 291, 292, 295, 298, , 343, 348, 352                                           304see also

265

F

family life, leaving of  13–18, 31, 63, 64,147–51207

First Patriarch (Fergana  176filial piety  270, 271Fenyang Shanzhao. Faxian. 312, 240, 241, 265, 268, 271, 309,, 320, See, 153, 177–98, 199, 203, 206,Hokken321see alsoSee Fun’yō ZenshōBodhidharma)

five five aggregates, 200133bhikṣu, , 277, 315  290s (see alsoskandhaĀjñāta-Kauṇḍinya;s  46, 52, 183,

five desires  192, 204, 245, 317, 318,five fetters  195, 205247319Mahānāma) 109, 184, 201, 206, 237,Aśvajit; Bhadrika; Daśabala-Kāśyapa;, 323, 346

five grave sins  25, 32, 160five hundred-year period(s)  244, 268

five root-forces  9–10, 27, 195, 205, 356Five Records of the Torch. See Gotōrokufive powers. See power(s), five 

Flower Adornment Sutraflower(s) (five signs of decay  239, 249five sects. five rulers  271, 276, 28334flower; , 36, 89, 92, 206, 208, 213, 214,, 217, 222, 223, 224, 226, 239,see alsoSeeuḍumbarasect(s), fivelotus flower; plumflower; 344utpala)  21,

216246, 249, 290, 305, 311, land Sutra)  49 see also Lotus Sutra;(see also Gar-

Flower of Dharma (238Sutra of the Flower of Dharma, 255       see alsosee alsoPadmottara)  210)  184,

Founding Patriarch (Flowers Above (dharma)  79 Bodhi -

four castes  145, 201four bases of mystical ability, powerfour abodes of mindfulness  3–6, 23, 356Founding Patriarch (8–9, 26, 349, 356see also Gautama)   four elements of sociability  352, 358four continents  181, 184, 200, 208, 239,four classes of Buddhist practitioners  87,275108, 276, 285, 324, , 114     344

four effects  254, 260, 269, 282, 285first (250see also srotāpanna, see also265   arhat; arhathood)  238,)  243, 244, second (fourth (248269, 250, 263, 264, 265, 267, 268,, 271, 275, see also sakṛdāgāmin281    )  265,

267

four great kings, four heavenly kings (four elements. third (also275Four Quarter Kings)  83, 276see also anāgāmin, 275 See element(s), four )  265, 266,see

four kinds of horses  169, 170–71, 172four kinds of right restraint (four illusions  272, 284right exertions)  6–8, 356see also four Four Quarter Kings (Four Noble Truths  xvi, xvii, 201, 231,238, 248, 254, 269, 282, see also355four great

four reliances  196, 20584kings, four heavenly kings)  80, 81,, 210, 285   see also four kinds

four right exertions (

four things, of a monk  208, 209, 210, 212fourth effect. Fourth Council  201of right restraint)  349, 356SeeSeefour effectsBusshō Hōtai

Fugaku. Fragrance Accumulation  145Foxing Fatai. See Daie Sōkō

Fuke (Fukanzazengisee also Chinshū Fuke)  26, 7523, 69, 83, 339

FutōrokuFun’yō Zenshō 20, 33, 359Furong Daokai. Fukui prefecture  xvii, 34, 105, 139, 151,298 (see also KataifutōrokuSee Fuyō Dōkai )  269

Fuyō Dōkai (Futsu era  59298, 359 see also Dōkai)  46, 53, 69,

G

Ganges River  107Gako  34Gandhāra  77, 159, 166

Gautama Sanghadeva  249gasshō, gasshō-monjinGautama (Gankai (Garland SutragāthāGangetic plain  206xv, xvi, xvii, 3, 51, 52, 147, 175, 206,146ment Sutra(, 250, 263, 317, see alsosee alsosee also)  129, (verse, four-line)  24, 145,see also Flower Adorn-Moon Light)  270, 283Buddha; Śākyamuni)28634394, 110, 315

235

Genjō. General Record of Engo Kokugon. SeeGayata  155–56, 161, 164, 165Gayāśīrṣa (Gayā  167EngokorokuSeeSeesee alsoXuanzangMoon LightMount Gayā)  167xvii

Gekkō. Gendaigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō

Girirāja (Gensha Shibi  23, 29, 54, 118, 119, 123,Getsudō Dōshō  282Gien  322Gigen (Genryaku era  91124, 128, 129, see alsosee alsoRinzai Gigen)  193Mountain King)  229 359 god(s)  16, 17, 33, 41, 43, 49, 53, 83, 87,34324018293, 110, 141, 160, 164, 171, 172, 178,, 264, 271, 275, 276, 279, 283, 318,, 242, 244, 245, 248, 249, 253, 254,, 185, 188, 190, 200, 215, 230, 239,354

256

Godai Impō 138, 359thirty-three (-king  243, 244, Heaven)  183, 200, 230, 249, 344, 345, 347, 353, see also245 Trāyastriṃśa

God of Autumn  100goddess(es)  344Goei Reimoku  28

Golden Light Sutra. See KonkōmyōkyōGohon (God of Summer  92see alsosee alsoTōzan Ryōkai)  329, 339Engo Kokugon)  47,

Gon Hasu (good  7, 16, 96, 100, 156, 157, 159, 161,16221925754 , 163, 168, 183, 192, 195, 205,, 222, 237, 240, 245, 253, 256,, 282, 318, 337, 349, 351, 356 causes  194, 195act(s), actions, deeds, ways  161, 162,175, 179, 194, 202, 231, 232 counselor(s), friend(s)  41, 42, 43, 49,conduct  32, 159, 165, 205, 27251

karma  159, 161, 162, 164, 168, 183,fortune  17, 64, 95, 156, 237, 245, 257effects, results  142, 159, 232, 239196214, 63, 167, 170, 171, 194, 195,, 253, 255, 319, 330 root(s)  15, 32, 156, 171, 180, 183,medicine  236, 320187235346, 194, 195, 202, 205, 208, 219,, 242, 247, 257, 261, 321, 344,, 347, 351 

Good Fortune  223, 224Good Serenity (ten kinds of  276, 286see also Śānta)  212 Goshin. Goso Hōen (Good Star. 54, 76, 114, 261, SeeSeeŌryū Shishinsee alsoSunakṣatra359Hōen)  36, 39, 48,

GotōrokuGreat and Mighty Peak (Gosozan  36Gotōegenjō Mountain, Hyakujōzan; Mount25934                 see also Hyaku -

Great Compassion (Great CommentaryGreat Brightness  215vara; Mahākaruṇā)  12, 30doronHyaku jō)  80, 83)  149 (see also(see also Daichi-see also Daihatsu ne -Avalokiteś-)  214

Great Nirvana Sutra

Great Vehicle (Great Square and Wide Treasure ChestGreat Prajñā Sutra (see also Mahā -13271Sutra. See Daihōkōhōkyōgyōprajñā pāramitā-sūtrahangyō; Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra, 20, 46, 89, 109, 121, 269, 270,, 320        see also Mahayana)  3,)  148

Gutei  132, 138, 359Gushan Zhiyuan. Guṇabhadra  175 See Kozan Chien

H

Hakugaizan  117Haihui Shoudan. Ha country  47, 54See White Emperorsee alsoSee Kaie ShutanKaie Shutan)

Hangzhou, Hangzhou Bay  261Hakuun Shutan (Hakutei. 39, 54, 359

Happy Buddha (Hanshi Mittai  40Hangyō Kōzen  xvii, 141, 325257, 261 see also Hōtai)  26, 110, Heart Sutrahṛdaya-sūtra; Shingyō(see also Prajñāpāramitā -)  73, 76, 202,

heaven(s)  12, 17, 20, 29, 45, 102, 111,229142192256, 161, 162, 163, 171, 177, 182,, 193, 203, 211, 230, 235, 244,, 304, 346, 353, 358

four, in the world of non-matter  193eighteen, in the world of matter  193,Brahmā  181, 230230              see also

six, in the world of desire  83, 193, 200,fourth, in the world of desire (of thirty-three gods (Tuṣita Heaven)  353, 358230, 239, 249, 275, 285, 355, see also Trāyas-358

heavenly  45, 192, 215, 246, 276, 318,being(s)  15, 102, 160, 166, 249, 324344triṃśa Heaven)  249, 345 offerings  141, 190king(s)  83, 245demons  101, 143, 246

Heaven of Luminous Sound (robe(s)  190, 245, 344Ābhāsvara)  211        see alsosee

Heaven of the Four Quarter Kings (also

Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich  xv, 261Heavens of Pure Abiding  190, 203Cāturmahārājakāyikā)  21039, 53, 54, 114, 138, )  7, 17, 25, 160,261 hell(s) (Hekiganroku161188264, 162, 163, 165, 179, 180, 182,, 202, 205, 235, 249, 261, 263,, 278, 281, 285, see also nirayasee alsoAvīci Hell)  160, 166355

Himalayas  129  Higekyōkings, ten  47, 54incessant (202

Himitsu-shōbōgenzō. See Secret Shōbō-genzō Hinayana (see also

Hō (Hōbō (History of Buddhism, TheHindu  33hiraganaHistory. See Shiki153see alsosee also, 199, 202, 232, 251, 315, 53 Small Vehicle)  3, 46,248      316

Hōgyō era  80Hofuku Jūten  34, 334, 340, 359Hōgen sect  76, 315HōenzenjigorokuHōbōzan  47Hōen (see alsoHōun)  192Goso Hōen)  36Tandō Bunjun)  47, 5339

Hojū Enshō  298Hōkai  282Hokken  225, 232, 234, 359

Honshōkyō HokkukyōHokkuhiyukyōHokkezanmaisengi. See HokkesenbōHokkesenbō25022025, 233See Wanshi Shōgaku)  199

Hongzhi Zhengjue.

Hōtai (Hopeh province  127, 204see also(see also Jātaka Sutra

householder(s)  142, 204Hōun  14, 32, 204, 339, 359  Buddha)  26, 110, 261Chinshū Fuke; Happy

Huang basin  127Huangbo Xiyun. See Hunan province  127Huizi (Huanglong Sixin. see also Keishi)  275SeeŌbaku KiunŌryū Shishin

hungry ghosts  165, 202, 249, 261, 355Hyakujō Ekai (and the wild fox13855, 57, 59–66, 67, 68, 69, 80, 83, 108,, 251, 253, 254, 256, 259, see also Daichi)  27, 29,359see

Hyakujō Mountain, Hyakujōzan (also Great and Mighty Peak; Mount

Hyakujō)  57, 58–59, 68, 83 

I

Igyō sect  76, 315idealistic, idealism (icchantika232nity; two extreme)  35, 39, 115, 230,, 250, 260, 261, 204, 205, 235, 247, see also297 view, eter-261

Imperial Form (India, Indian  xvi, 16, 24, 27, 33, 35, 40,illuminated hall  97, 11342225167107137, 46, 50, 68, 71, 77, 79, 85, 89, 101,, 269, 271, 273, 279, 281, 283, 284,, 197, 199, 200, 201, 203, 205, 206,, 108, 114, 115, 117, 121, 122, 123,, 141, 145, 147, 153, 155, 165, 166,355Śakra-devānām-indra)see also Indradhvaja)  212

260, 316, , 229, 231, 234, 236, 237, 248, 249,

Indra-saila-guhā  87, 108Indradhvaja (Indra (83285, see also108      see also Imperial Form)  230See Indra-saila-

Isan Reiyū  23, 24, 26, 27, 128, 138, 301I River (Instructions for the Cook. See Tenzo kyō -Indus River  131Inscriptions on the Stupa of Zen MasterIndra’s Stone Hideaway. kunDaie. See Daiezenjitōmeiguhā137see also Yiraku)  286

Inzui

Īśvara  19, 33

J

Jambukhādaka  178Jambudvīpa (166250, 185, 197, 200, 210, 211, 222,, 285, 324see also four continents)

Japan  3, 63, 85, 101, 111, 114, 146, 201,Jambūnada  212, 230202, 230, 233, 250, 260, 283, 340 Jeta, Prince  113Jātaka SutraJapanese-English Buddhist DictionaryJapanese  xviii, 87, 139, 145language  xvii, xviii, 22, 28, 53, 128,39260, 166, , 286, 298, 324, 233(see also Honshōkyō341    )  179

Jewel Topknot (Jetavana Park  99, 103, 113, 149, 180see also Ratnaśikhin)

Jiangxi province  75213 See Kassan Zenne Jimyō Soen  32, 358JiruizenshūJiashan Shanhui.

Jōgen era  117Jñānagupta  203, 248Jizaiten. Jīvaka  166SeeSeePure Land108Īśvara

Jōdo.

Jōshū Jūshin (Jōji Temple  80, 8329206        see also Shinsai)  20, 24,

Jōzan Shinei  299, 301, 359, 76, 118, 123, 128, 132, 133, 137,, 334, 339, see also Setchō Jūken)  119, 124,359

Jyotiṣka  160, 166JūōkyōJūken (Juzhi. 134See54Gutei

K

Kakuda-Kātyāyana (KaigenshakkyōrokuKaie Shutan (118, 124, 128, see also359see also32Hakuun Shutan)six non-

kalpakalaviṅka209241Buddhist teachers)  282(s)  21, 34, 42, 86, 161, 164, 172,, 210, 211, 213, 214, 217, 220,, 242, 249, 254, 272, 275, 121, 129      345 asaṃkhya

bhadra-countless, infinite, myriad, numberless45212, 213, 215, 216, 219, 231, 249149, 161, 167, 170, 189, 211,237 sixty minor  149great  216, 271, 272of emptiness  9, 129253, 86, 149, 156, 170, 180, 244,, 271, 272, 321

kalyāṇamitraof the wise  240friend)  51  (see also good, counselor,

Kanchi Sōsan (Kanchipuram (kanaKamakura period  165128, 322, see alsosee also324                  Kōshi)  206Third Patriarch)

Kangen era  22, 37, 50, 66, 74, 81, 87,Kaniṣka, King  159, 1662994, 105, 126, 135, 141, 151

Kanzeon. Kaniṣka, kingdom of  201the WorldSee Regarder of the Sounds of

karma  68, 155–64, 165, 168, 193, 213,Kapilavastu  243, 250eight kinds of  164, 168bad, black  158, 159, 161, 163, 164,218168, 242, 253, 272, 276, 284, , 183, 192, 196, 242  351 karmic  60, 129, 205, 272retribution  67, 156, 164, 224, 225, 241consciousness  9, 26hindrances  163, 164good  159, 161, 162, 164, 168, 183, 196indefinite  164, 168

Kashmir  167kaṣāya Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka-sūtra. See Higekyō80187, 93, 148, 149, 150, 153, 181, 182,, 190, 233, 234, 260, 305, (see alsoSee Kashmirrobe)  5, 24, 32, 43, 79,307

Kaśmīra.

Kassan Zenne  299, 301, 359Kassan Mountain (san)  36, 256 see also Mount Kas-

Katai era  269Kāśyapa  57, 58, 59, 62, 67, 179, 182,199, 270  , 210, 213, 221, 223, 224, 251,

259

Katai Era Record of the Universal Torch.See Kataifutōroku

Kauṇḍinya  210, 229Kātyāyana  32Kataifutōrokusee also(see also FutōrokuĀjñāta-Kauṇḍinya))  282

Kazakhstan  67Kauṇḍinya (90

KeitokudentōrokuKeishi (Keizan Jōkin  326Keigenfu  13275203 see also Huizi)  28523, 25, 26, 29, 32, 53,

, 77, 128, 138, 153, 165, 167, 175,, 204, 259, 260, 286, 298, 301, 316

Kenchō era  164, 173, 198, 228, 246,258, 279, 321,

Kenryaku era  91Kenpō  68Kenpō era  91Ken gu kyō 200, 281322

Kenzei’s Record. See KenzeikiKenzeikiKenzei  2824828  250

Khuddaka-nikāyaKeukyō

King Majestic Sound (Kichijōzan  296Ki  276, 286Kiangsi province  67, 259see also Dōgen)  144, 146see also Majestic

Kigen (

King of Realization  100Sound)  101

King Treasure Adornment  191, 203King Resplendent  184 Kitan (KiseinhongyōKippō Temple  22, 37, 39, 50, 66Kinzan Mountain  46, 133, 257see also 205Shūkō, Emperor)  271, 283 kōankitchen hall  93, 94, 95, 97, 99, 111, 112,Kō  313, 316Kō (141see also(s)  23, 52, 58, 67, 68, 138, , 143, Sōkō)  47 145  261

Kokālika  160, 167Kōgetsu  163Koboku Hōjō 65, 69, 359 Kōe  32Kōan era  296See Light and Purity Kōjō.

Kokuon Unso  32, 358Kōkyō Shōju  298Kōkyu (Koliya clan  206see alsosee alsoConfucius)  283Confucius)  268, 270,

Konkōmyōkyō  Korean  282Kongzi (271282, 272, 274, 275, 276, 277, 279,, 283        284

Kośala  113, 167, 203, 221, 233, 286See

KoshingiKōshōji  282Kōshi (Kōshaku. Kōsetsu. see alsoSee108Universal PreachingFragrance AccumulationKanchipuram)  197, 206

Koun Ejō (Kōtakuji  117Kōshū district  57, 58, 73, 257250, 261see alsosee alsoEjō)  176, 206, 234,Chien)  269, 282,

Kozan Chien (

kṣāṇaKōzei (kṣānti359(s)  181, 183, 199, 200, 236, 241,, see alsosee also 285    Baso Dōitsu)  14, 108six pāramitās) 201, 357

275(

Kumārajīva  39, 40, 108, 154, 202, 229 kṣatriya201 (see also four castes)  185, 197,

Kyōsei Dōfu  24Kyoto  282Kyōzan Ejaku  118, 123, 124, 128, 360Kyōgen Chikan (KusharonKuṇḍina  229Kū-ō. Kumu Facheng. Kumāralabdha  155, 156, 161, 164, 165,138253See , 139, (Emptiness King see also Abhidharmakośa-359248Seesee alsoKoboku HōjōShūtō) 14, śāstra)  231,

L

Laozi  257, 261, 268, 269, 270, 271, 272,273

lay  15, 16, 143, 190Law, the (Later Han dynasty  59precepts  177, 185 Buddhist, disciple, follower (283laypeople, layperson)  113, 166,, 274, 275, 276, 277, 279, 282,, 286, 199, 233, see alsosee also upāsakaDharma)  237, 303, 311250 see also)  14,

185

250

laypeople, layperson  14, 15, 17, 89, 98,layman, laymen (13319931, 69, 108, 114, 145, 161, 182, 235,, 143, 150, 153, 158, 177, 185,, 202, 250, 282, 303, , 323, 358, 359 see also upāsikā312                                          )

laywoman, laywomen (31, 69, 108, 114, 235, 323  See

Light and Purity  270, 283Licchavi(s)  197, 206, 278, 286Liang dynasty  59, 63, 68, 284Leian Zhengshou. See Ri FumaRaian Shōju

Li Fuma.

lion seat, throne  344, 345, 354, 355Linji Yixuan. lineage(s) (Hōgen  315Dōgen  53, 129Rinzai  315Sōtō  315of emptiness  148, 310Igyō  315Unmon  53, 31565276, 69, 86, 123, 138, 233, 234, 259,see alsoSee Rinzai Gigensect)  48, 50, 53, 55,

Lofty Banner  343, 344Liu Song dynasty  175local deities hall  92, 100, 110lion’s roar  12, 30, 355

Long Nails (lotus flower(s)  315lotus posture  34Lokakṣema  40DaibadattaAnrakugyōblue (Practice”) chapter  69see also utpalasee also23(“Devadatta”) chapter  25,, 33, 111, 114, 199, 200,Chōso)  279)  203, 213, 340   231

Lotus Sutra216, 260, 285, 289, 297, (“Peaceful and Joyful

Hiyu282167(“A Parable”) chapter  175, 281,(“Expedient Means”) chapter339200

Hōben

Ju-gaku-mugaku-nin-kiJoof Students and People Beyond109(“Introductory”) chapter  , 231, 248, 282, 297, (“Affirmation

Kanzeon-bosatsu-fumonsal Gate of Bodhisattva Regarder ofStudy”) chapter  27 (“The Univer-

Kejō-yuchapter  20077the Sounds of the World”) chapter, 340(“Parable of the Magic City”) Lotus SutraMyō-shōgun-ō-honjiKen-hōtōKing Resplendent”) chapter  200Stupa”) chapter  233((“Seeing the Treasurecontinued(“The Tathāgata’s Life)(“The Story of -

Nyorai-juryō

Yaku-ō-bosatsu-honjiShingeBodhisattva Medicine King”)  29chapter  34time”) chapter  154, 248, 339(“Belief and Understanding”(“The Story of)

Lucknow  113Luoyang (see also Western Capital)  127

M

Mahā deva  233Magadha  31, 87, 107, 203 Madhi. Madai  192, 203See Madaisee also Avalokiteśvara;

Mahā kāśya pa 21, 32, 40, 43, 83, 101,Mahā karuṇā (Great Compassion)  30103, 104, 108, 115, 133, 148, 153, 194

Mahānāma (Mahā māyā  204Mahānāma)  197, 201, 206, 243, 247,see also five bhikṣus; Śākya-

Mahānāma-Koliya  206250 (see also Dai -

Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtrahatsunehangyō; Sutra of the Great nirvāṇa260Demise; Sutra of the Great Pari -, 307)  131, 137, 175, 202, 214,

mahāprajñāpāramitā Mahāprajāpatī  204     (see also prajñā -

Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstraMahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra75pāramitā Daihannyakyō; Great Prajñā Sutra, 153, 154) 93   (see also76 ) Mahāprajñā pāra mitopadeśaDaichodoron)  27, 154, 199(see also

Mahāsaṃghika school  232, 233Mahāratnakūṭa-sūtra. See Daihōshakkyō

Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra. See Daishūkyōmahāsattva

Mahayana (188, 189, (see alsos)  93, 148, 149, 155, 172,345

Majestic Sound (Maitreya  18, 33, 93, 111, 35533, 165, 247, see also251Great Vehicle)  3,King Majestic

    Sound)  8     see also

Makahannyahara mitsukyō MakashikanMajestic Virtue (210Pañcamitā-sūtravimśati sāhasrikā prajñā pāra -260)  202, 281, 284, Ādityateja)(see also285175, 281,

MakasōgiritsuMakashikanhogyōdenguketsu233282, , 283, 284, 285, (see also Sōgiritsu286   )  232,

materialism, materialist, materialisticMaster Dogen’s ShobogenzoMarx, Karl  xv, 261Maskari-Gośalīputra (Manzan  327 maṇiMañjuśrī  18, 33, 93, 103, 104, 110, 111,mandala(s)  167, 307tic, two extreme)  25, 232, 261, 282,(Buddhist teachers)  282112see also189, 115, 234, 203view, cutting-off, materialis-134(see alsosee alsodemon)  246, 250xviiisix nonmāra-pāpīyas

Medicine King  283Maudgal yāyana  32, 160, 167, 208284    138 See Baso Dōitsu

Mazu Daoyi.

Meihoki

merit(s)  64, 80, 92, 93, 156, 162, 177,180190226241, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 189,, 195, 214, 215, 219, 223, 225,, 227, 235, 236, 237, 238, 239,, 242, 244, 246, 270, 275, 305

of leaving family life  16, 17, 177, 180,181

Micchaka  77of taking refuge in the Three Devotions,Three Treasures  235, 238, 239, 240,199, 242, 243, 244, 246, , 183, 187, 188, 190, 192, 193,, 206       see also netherworld)304358

241 middle existence (

mind  3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16,Migasīsa (middle way  xv 1745161–62–18, 20, 23, 25, 27, 28, 33, 42, 44,, 64, 68, 73, 74, 76, 77, 81, 87, 96,, 102, 103, 104, 112, 114, 117, 118,see also, 163, 167, 281, 304, Deer Head)  286

129159189100119221244290304, 120, 121–22, 123–24, 126, 128,, 130, 135, 138, 148, 150, 158,, 168, 177, 178, 179, 186, 187,, 190, 191, 195, 203, 215, 217,, 222, 226, 227, 234, 236, 242,, 245, 254, 265, 266, 267, 275,, 292, 293, 294, 295, 300, 303,, 311, 315, 317, 319, 320, 321,, 333, 334, 335, 336, 337, 340,

fine, of nirvana  74, 79, 80, 198, 321body-  8, 15, 16, 17, 18, 42, 44, 50, 79,buddha-, of buddha(s), Buddha  14, 77,bodhi-alone  336, 340332345147121, 346, 347, 348, 349, 353, , 198, 294, 300, 309, 332, 337  , 122, 123, 126, 332, 334, 121, 182, 255, 258, 351356349

mindfulness  9, 10, 11, 12, 21, 23, 25, 27,29350, 186, 193, 205, 275, 319, 346, 349, four abodes of  3–6, 23, 349, 356

Minshū  257mind-seal  99, 117, 147, 198, 309Mingjiao Shaoli. mindful recitation  92, 93, 99, 100right  13, 21, 52, 319, 351See Myōkyō Shōri

Mizōuinnenkyō. See MizōukyōMiscellaneous Āgama Sutra. See Zō agon -gyō       244see also, 250monk; nun)  31

Mizōukyō

monk(s) (Monier Monier-Williams, Sir  23, 201,monastics (xvii, 3, 13–14, 15, 17, 20, 25, 26, 29,31527595108232117128277315141153200227263, 32, 33, 34, 40, 41, 47, 48, 49, 50,, 54, 57, 58, 63, 64, 67, 68, 69, 71,, 79, 80, 81, 84, 89, 91, 92, 93, 94,, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103,, 118, 119, 120, 122, 126, 127,, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114,, 131, 132, 133, 134, 138, 139,, 265, 267, 269, 271, 274, 276,, 201, 202, 203, 204, 206, 224,, 281, 282, 284, 285, 286, 292,, 158, 177, 182, 192, 196, 199,, 322, 323, 332, , 233, 234, 235, 247, 252, 259,, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147,see also bhikṣu; śramaṇa334       )

mountain  86head  55, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97,attendant  90, 91, 95, 96, 20498, 99, 100, 109, 111, 113, 164, 324 senior  53, 75, 113supervising  58, 89–90, 91, 92, 93, 97,patch-robed  143, 25398, 109, 252, 259

Moon Light  270, 283monks’ hall  21, 34, 92, 96, 110, 111, 112,veteran  90, 97, 99330                          see also Girirāja)  209

Mountain King (

Mount Hyakujō (Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa (Mount Gayā (Mighty Peak; Hyakujō Mountain,Peak)  89 see alsosee alsosee also Gayāśīrṣa)  160Great andVulture

Mount Kassan (tain)  301Hyakujōzan)  259see also Kassan MounMount Sōkei (Mount Kinka  138Mount Śita  244, 250129   see also Sōkei Mountain)

Myōkaku (Myōkyō Shōri (mystical  8, 9, 48, 49, 247 Musai (Mount Sumeru  26, 83, 166, 200, 230,mulberry tree (power(s)  5, 24, 26, 68, 117, 123, 179,ability, four bases of  8–9, 349 flower)  205249180, see also250, 229, 298, 307, see alsosee also uḍumbaraSekitō Kisen)  217 139Setchō Jūken)  119,Ri)  52, 360349

124, 128, 134, see also

N

Nāgārjuna  55, 114, 137, 154, 170, 177,182271, 199, 217, 218, 254, 255, 263,, 282    217, 218, 232, 244, 250, 307

Nansen Fugan  28, 128, 133, 137, 138,Nanyang Huizhong. Nangaku Ejō  51, 55, 65, 69, 76, 123, 129,namasNanda  194, 197, 204Nangaku Eshi  220, 233, 360167133, 138, 192, 310, 315, 340, , 297, 334, 339, SeeSeeNansen FuganDaishō; Echū;360Nan’yō Echū360

Nanquan Puyuan.

Nan’yō Echū (204National Master)  55, 117, 127, 128,, 332, 360see also Nepal  233National Master (Nanyue Huisi. Nanyue Huairang. Nan’yō district  117Nan’yō Echū)  117, 118, 119, 120,121, 122–23, 124–26, 128, see alsoSeesee alsoSeeNangaku Eshimiddle existence)Nangaku EjōDaishō;129 Nirgrantha-Jñatiputra (Ningbo  137niraya Nikāyas, five  250nihilism, nihilist(s), nihilistic  7, 232,netherworld (Buddhist teachers) 282255263, , 264, (Seesee also 270Sun Light267hell)  264, 276, 281see also six non-

Nikkō.

nirvana  101, 137, 163, 177, 179, 197,fine mind of  74, 79, 80, 198, 321202, 204, 323, 333, 355

Nishijima, Gudo Wafu  xv, xvii, xix, 25Nirvana Sutranirvana hall  58, 63, 67, 252, 259seal of  187, 188, 202gyō; Great Nirvana Sutra; Mahā-parinirvāṇa-sutra(see also Daihatsunehan -)  137, 172, 255 non-Buddhism, non-Buddhist(s)  7, 21,46150238268311, 59, 60, 64, 88, 101, 119, 121, 143,, 330, 332, 333, 335, , 169, 170, 175, 185, 202, 232,, 246, 248, 254, 255, 256, 260,, 272, 273, 277, 278, 282, 292,see also anāgāmin336 )  69, 94,

North Star  299non-returner (112, 142, see also śrāmaṇera160160    )  16, 17, 98, 108,)  69, 94,323

novice(s) (112, 142, see also bhikṣunī

nun(s) (114, 153, 182, 199, 202, 235, 315, 39

Nyojōoshōgoroku

O

Ōbaku Kiun  49, 55, 58, 65–66, 67, 69,offering(s)  17, 92, 141, 142, 143, 148,158242127, 187, 190, 207–28, 229, 231, 239,, 276, 304, 305, 307, , 138, 204, 252, 259, 310360

once-returner (Old Pure Criteria. See Koshingiten kinds of  220–26see also sakṛdāgāmin)

one hundred and eight gates of Dharmaillumination  343–54260, 281

order(s) (One Vehicle  170, 17520943109, 46, 47, 48, 49, 53, 73, 75, 90, 103,, 216, 264, 265, , 113, 114, 123, 143, 172, 208,see also lineage)  20, 28, 32,316 ordination  178, 185, 191, 207, 268, 271Buddha’s, Buddhist  33, 107, 113, 114,of Buddhist patriarchs, patriarchs’  14,101147, 102, , 201, 233, 247, 250, 143       309

Ōryū Shishin (O Reichi  115 see also Shishin)  86, 107,

Ōryū Soshin  107360

P

Pāli-English DictionaryPāli  25, 30, 232, 247, 286Pakistan  166pagoda (Padmottara (canon  250see alsosee alsostupa)  232, 233, 234Flowers Above)  22930

Panshan Baoji. Pangyun. Pañcavimśatisāhasrikāprajñāpāramitā-Pāli Text Society  25, 30mitsukyōsūtra (see also Makahannyahara -)  199, HōunSee202Banzan Hōshaku

See

Pāpīyas  268, 281Paramārtha  273, 284(s) (see also

Patna  167, 286pātrapatriarch(s)  3, 6, 11, 14, 15, 18, 21, 32,parinirvāṇapāramitā337414824630432183351, 37, 41, 44, 49, 50, 53, 63, 65, 73,, 79, 85, 86, 102, 119, 121, 147,, 90, 109, 110, 147, 148, 309 (see also, 352, , 189, 192, 194, 198, 225, 233,, 254, 257, 260, 272, 276, 292,, 310, 311, , 323 194357almsbowl)  14, 79–81,, 204, 222, 224, 320,315six pāramitās)  345,

Buddhist  xvi, 5, 8, 9, 13, 14, 15, 16,ancestral  164, 170, 253, 3101746, 48, 49, 50, 63, 64, 65, 71, 74,, 18, 19, 21, 36, 37, 41, 43, 45,–80, 81, 85, 86, 88, 89, 99, 101,, 104, 121, 122, 123, 125, 132,

79102139227, 143, 148, 156, 164, 190, 196, fifty-first (fifth (305see also, 235, 246, 253, 258, 272, 273,, 310, 311, 313, 331, 334,

second (nineteenth (fourth (founding  16, 310fourteenth (five venerable  119, 122, 123, 125, 128first (199see also, 231, 260, 263, see alsosee alsosee alsosee alsosee alsoMahākāśyapa)  153, 197Dhītika)  203Upagupta)  190, 281 Ānanda)  108, 201Dōgen)  108Nāgārjuna)  137,Kumāralabdha)Saṃghanandi)271 335

seventeenth (see also seventh (191     see also

third (sixth (six, of Tang China  147, 198201see alsosee also Śāṇavāsa)  24Micchaka)  77Vasumitra)  74, 166, patriarch(s) (twenty-eighth (twenty-eight, of India  101, 147, 197,twelfth (269, 279 see alsocontinuedsee alsosee alsoAśvaghoṣa)  166Gayata)  156, 165)       Bodhidharma) twentieth (

       101           see also

Patriarch (Persians  12piṇḍavanatwenty-fourth (Buddha)  22, 36, 37, 50, 86, 99, 101,104–105see also109, 135, 139, 252, 259, 269, , 139, Bodhidharma;206 Siṃha)  167274

Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch’sPiṇḍola  27daishi hōDharma Treasurebōdangyō()see also Roku so-   269, 282

Kōshōji edition  282Korean edition  282

plum flower(s)  12, 30  power(s)  10, 11, 28, 67, 68, 126, 127, 183,Platonic  232Dharma  95, 100Tonkō edition  282187278, 194, 215, 216, 219, 244, 254, 259,, 289, 298, 319, 332, 349, 192                                          350

of learning in practice  277, 279bodhi-five  10–28, 121, 122, 356mystical  5, 24, 26, 68, 117, 123, 179,180, 229, 298, 307, 349, 352

six  121, 122, 179, 180, 182, 186, 298,ten  194, 204, 205, 352307

practice(s)  3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10, 14, 19, 20,to know past lives  259, 272to know others’ minds  117–26, 129214886132, 22, 23, 32, 37, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46,, 49, 54, 57, 60, 62, 65, 72, 79–80,, 90, 91, 99, 102, 103, 109, 122,, 133, 139, 141, 143, 151, 160, 162191263310, 164, 166, 167, 170, 171, 178,, 196, 226, 246, 252, 255, 257,, 277, 279, 282, 283, 293, 295, ascetic, hard (352, 318, 320, 330, 331, 335, 351,, 354 see also dhūta

place  99, 311, 313  great  57–59, 62, 66, 69, 251, 252, 256109, 115, 135, 201, 247, 248)  34, 53,

of the truth  117, 177, 333, 334  three  33

practice and experience  5, 23, 41, 43,Zen  52, 252  of zazen  3, 85, 113, 130, 35844149, 73, 76, 89, 101, 123, 124, 138,, 164, 189, 194, (see also wisdom; 334pāramitās, six) prajñāpāramitā Prajñāpāramitā hṛdaya-sūtra Prajñāpāramitā literature, sutras  202prajñāxvii, 33, 76, 205, 297, 323Heart Sutra)  149, 189, )  (202see also mahā prajñā -358 (see also pāramitā

precepts  15, 17, 18, 20, 26, 33, 52, 63,pratyekabuddhavihārapratyekabuddhaPrasenajit, King  27, 113, 223, 224, 233Dharma  148, 310Buddhist  150, 309, 310ceremony  248, 309bhikṣubodhisattva  20, 148, 153, 202, 249,64147–48179186197248211310, 89, 90, 91, 92, 96, 108, 112, 113,, 249, 271, 279, , 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185,, 187, 188, 190, 191, 194, 195,, 198, 206, 238–39, 242, 243, 247,, 264, 309–13, 315, 346, , 311, 313, 315, 313, 149, 150, 153, 167, 177, 178,, 316(s)  125, 129, 175, 210,29790316, 127 351

five  180, 199, 250

śrāvakaten (lay  177, 185Ten Serious Prohibitions)  187, 249,see also20, 148, Ten Bodhisattva Precepts;310

Pūraṇa-Kāśyapa (Protector of Illumination  343, 344, 353,two hundred and fifty, for monks  75,three hundred and forty-eight, for nunsBuddhist teachers)  282355199199312–13(s). , 202, 315, 316  , 202, See hungry ghosts315see also six nonpreta

Pure Net Sutra

Puṣya  208, 209Pūrṇa  32Pūrvavideha (Pure Land  181, 199Pure Criteria for Zen Monasteries. See285Zen’enshingi, 324 see also89, 108four continents)

Q

Qingyuan Xingsi. See Seigen Gyōshi

R

Rakan Keichin (Rājagṛha  107, 165, 166, 200Raitaku Lake  108Raian Shōju (Rāhulata. Rāhula  32, 184, 194, 197, 200, 206 Seesee alsoZenrita Shōju)  282, 360

Ratnavyūharāja. Ratnaśikhin (Raku River (rākṣasa231273, (285s) (see alsosee alsosee alsosee alsoSeedemon)  238, 248,King TreasureYiraku)  286Jewel Topknot)Keichin; Shinō) 

Regarder of the Sounds of the World (alsoAdornmentAvalokiteśvara)  93, 336, 340 see RentōeyōReiun Shigon  30Reitō (see also Sōkei Reitō)  227

retreat(s)  31, 85–105, 107, 109, 112,summer  63, 69, 83, 85–90, 97, 99,113100173, 114, , 101, 102, 105, 107, 113, 114,, 198, 228, 246, 258, 24, 30, 322 68       279

Retsuden. See Biographies

Rhymes of Good Fortune. See InzuiṚg-vedareward body(ies) (187, 188, (see also202 see also saṃbhoga kāyaVedas)  284                 )

Rhys Davids, T. W.  25see alsosee alsoMyōkō Shōri)  46

Rinzai Gigen (Ri Junkyoku (right Dharma-eye treasury  21, 37, 43,Ri Fuma (Ri (6035874310353, 69, 75, 138, 204, 298, , 79, 80, 81, 125, 197, 198, 298,, , 358, 321 360see alsoRi Junkyoku)  14, 32,Ri Fuma)  259,204

Rinzaieshōzenjigorokusee also Gigen)  26, 33,

robe(s) (Rinzai sect  53, 55, 69, 76, 129, 138, 315RisshūshingakumyōguRo (Rinzai-in Temple  193109196237234see also, 147, 178, 179, 182, 188, 190,, 210, 213, 219, 224, 231, 234,, 245, see also kaṣāyaDaikan Enō)  192, 204, 228,309       248)  4–5, 80, 90,360

three  147, 195, 309of golden brocade  36, 40Dharma  132, 180, 195

Rokusodaishihōbōdangyōtransmission of  11, 277(see also arch’s Dharma TreasurePlatform Sutra of the Sixth Patri-) 282 RongoRokutō (see also

Round Realization  102root(s)  5, 9, 10, 28, 32, 178, 202, 205, 318Roshi. Ronriki. five  9–10, 27, 195, 205good  15, 32, 156, 171, 175, 180, 183,nonvirtuous  194, 195187235see also274, 194, 195, 202, 205, 208, 219,, 242, 247, 257, 261, SeeTower Arrival, 285Debating PowerLaozi)  282283Deer Head)  286321

Rōshi (

RōshidōtokukyōSee

Russia  67, 259Ryō (Ryō (see alsosee also Tandō Bunjun)  47, 54Seizan Ryō)  73

S

saint(s) (Śailendrarāja (sahāsacred monk image  92, 96, 110229214kingdom, nation(s), world  49,125,131–35see alsoarhat)  13, 121, 183,, 137Mountain King) saindhavasee also

Sakei Genrō  255, 260, 360184, 185, 186, 267

Śakra, Śakra-devanam-indra  16, 18, 25,64243–44, 102, 185, 190, 200, 210, 230, 240,

sakṛdāgāmin318, 344, 244–45, 249, 271, 275, 279,

Śākya-Mahānāma (Śākya  208, 213Śākya clan, Śākyas  184, 197, 201, 204,243206returner)  260, 263, 250 (see alsosee alsofour effects; once-Mahānāma)

Śākyamuni  6, 9, 13, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20,58150, 59, 62, 92, 93, 104, 111, 123, 125,, 156, 180, 182, 184, 186, 190, 195215238, 199, 201, 209, 212, 213, 214,, 216, 217, 218, 219, 231, 237,

Samantabhadra (samādhiśūraṃgamadiamond  4, 23of experiencing the self, of receiving33332352and using the self  41, 118, 123,, 39, 41, 128, 205, 294, 335, 351,, 242, 269, 317, 320, 321, 322,, 333, 334, (, s)  xvi, xvii, 23, 24, 28, 29, 30,128 4, see also24353                                              Universal

124

saṃbhogakāyasaṃbodhiSāma-vedaVirtue)  111272(see also(see alsoVedas)  284body, reward)

Śāṇavāsa  5, 24Saṃghanandi  191–92, 203Saṃyuktāgama Sutra110–11127, , 231 202127, 247, 158, 224, 233, 241, 169, 170  249 saṃghārāmasaṃnāha 236

Sanghadeva  249Sangha (Sandōkaisangha  31, 32, 90, 141, 143, 145, 160,166Sangha; Three Treasures)  179, 226,, 236, 237, 238, , 223, 247, 249, 252, see also Buddha, Dharma, andsee also311 266six non-

235

Sañjaya-Vairāṭīputra (

Sanskrit  xvii, xviii, 3, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27,Sanron sect  2842876114165Buddhist teachers)  282, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 35, 51, 53, 68,, 79, 83, 85, 108, 109, 110, 111,, 115, 127, 131, 137, 139, 153,, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 220,, 230, 231, 232, 233, 234, 237,, 248, 249, 260, 261, 263, 281,, 166, 167, 168, 175, 199, 200,

201229247

283

Sarvāstivāda school, Sarvāstivādin (Śāriputra  18, 32, 160, 167, 178–79, 183,Sanzō (Śānta (Sanskrit-English Dictionarysutra(s), text(s)  39, 40, 42, 68, 202,also188120315234, 284, 285, 286, 303, 307, 313,, 323, 324, 340, 355, 356, 357, see also, 200, 202, 209–12, 267–68, , 122, 123–26, 127, 128, see alsoExistence school)  166, 233–34, 323 see also Good Serenity)  230Daini Sanzō)  118–119,Seeing All25, 201, 129281see358232

Sārvatha darśa (

sect(s)  76, 234Second Patriarch (Secret ShōbōgenzōScripture of the Merit of the Dao ofscripture(s) (Rinzai  53, 55, 69, 76, 129, 138, 315five  73, 76Hōgen  76, 315Igyō  76, 315nine  101Laozi. See Rōshidōtokukyō169Forms)  230, 271, 276, see also284see also325sutra)  35, 39, 40,, 326–27, Taiso Eka)  329

Sanron  284Sōtō 76, 260, 315

Zen  14Unmon  53, 76, 315Tendai  68, 233, 255, 260, 281, 282

Seeing All Forms (secular  63, 153, 175, 177, 192, 204, 206,darśa)  212260285, 268, 270, 271, 273, 276, 279,see also Sārvatha -

Seigen Gyōshi  55, 123, 129, 231, 259,Seidō Chizō  29, 40, 71, 72, 73, 75, 76,Seidō (title)  90, 91, 109310360, 315, 360 Sekkō province (Sekitō Kisen (SekimonrinkanrokuSekimon’s Forest Record. See Sekimon-Seizan Ryō (Seizin-in Monastery  117Seizan Mountain  73, 74Seikyō. Seigenzan  50rinkanrokuSee Western Capitalsee alsosee also298Ryō)  71, 76, 360Musai)  26, 27,  316

Sekkō River  29828, 32, 55, 204, 217, 231, see also Zhekiang)  298

self  3, 5, 6, 9, 12, 13, 27, 41, 42, 43, 44,45118149292, 48, 50, 51, 52, 53, 72, 75, 103,, 122, 123, 124, 126, 128, 130,, 202, 211, 225, 256, 284, 290,, 346, 356       126 Sempukuji  117original, primeval  7, 60--discipline  46, deception, delusion  48, conceit  205, 263, 265, command, -control  52, 54, 107, 52       347347

--

Senshū  46Sensu Tokujō  301Seppō Gison  53, 128, 340Setchō Jūken (sense(s), sense organs  44, 52, 75, 317,Senika  279, 286five  204six. 46139349, 53, 119, 128, 132, 133, 134, 137,See, 360 six sense organssee also Jūken; Myōkaku)

Shakkyō Ezō  29, 40, 71–72, 73, 75, 360seven limbs of the balanced state of truthSeven Buddhas (Setchōzan  124, 13411ancient)  14, 17, 32, 41, 42, 79, 101,–12, 269  see also buddhas, seven

125

shashu, shashu monjinShaolin Temple  277137    96, 97, 110, 112,

Shin district  108ShikiShibi Manor  296Shigong Huicang. See Shakkyō Ezō285

Shin era  108(see also Zen’enshingi Shinji-shōbōgenzōShinjinmeiShingyōShingi2977339 (see also Heart Sutra29        24, 25, 26, 27, 28,))  89, 92,   76, 77 93

Shinjō Kokubun  53, 30, 32, 34, 51, 67, 68, 69, 75, 76,, 127, 138, 204, 259, 298, 301, 324,, 340, see also341       Yōka Genkaku)  5,

Shinkaku (

Shinsai (

ShōbōgenzōShintō  283Shishin (Shinryū era  36, 40Shinko (255, 260see alsosee alsosee also(see also Secret Shōbō-Taiso Eka)  277, 286Jōshū Jūshin)  334, 339Ōryū Shishin)  86, 107

Bonshin edition  327108298genzō, 138, 141, 153, 155, 168, 176,, 322, ) xv–xix, 33, 40, 51, 67, 68, 77,324 Bendōwa xvi,

Chapter Three (Vol. I), Chapter Two (Vol. I), Chapter One (Vol. I), haramitsu357xvii, 127, 141, 165, 260, 286, 29876, 111, 202, 229, 323,Maka-hannya-Genjō-kōan

Chapter Five (Vol. I), Chapter Four (Vol. I), 2523, , 67, 68, 128 301   Jū-undō-shikiIkka-no myōjo

Chapter Six (Vol. I), butsu141, 15332, 165, 286Soku-shin-zeChapter Eight (Vol. I), Chapter Seven (Vol. I), 76, 340      Raihai-tokuzuiSenjō 51, 54,

Chapter Nine (Vol. I), 69204 Shoaku-makusaKeisei-sanshiki

Chapter Fourteen (Vol. I), Chapter Twelve (Vol. I), Chapter Ten (Vol. I), 512426028, , 32, 127, 153, 167, 199, 202,, 53, 286, 307, 51       324   BussoKesa-kudokuSansuigyō53, 77,

Chapter Seventeen (Vol. I), Chapter Sixteen (Vol. I), Chapter Fifteen (Vol. I), hokke139231, 249, xvii, 111, 114, 175281 ShishoShin-fuka-Hokke-ten-52,

Chapter Eighteen (Vol. I), toka (The Former)

Chapter Nineteen (Vol. I), toka (The Latter)    77 Shin-fuka-

Chapter Twenty-one (Vol. I), Chapter Twenty (Vol. I), 316       128KokyōKankinBusshō51

Chapter Twenty-two (Vol. II), 24, 26, 114, 127, 138, 283

Chapter Twenty-four (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-three (Vol. II),Gyōbutsu-yuigi 204                                              Bukkyō

Chapter Twenty-five (Vol. II), 2451, 26, 32, 129, 259, 298,      307DaigoJinzū

Chapter Twenty-six (Vol. II),

Chapter Twenty-seven (Vol. II), 261shin52, 285, 26, 29, 31, 32, 137, 138, 260,297       Butsu-Zazen-

Chapter Twenty-eight (Vol. II), kōjō-no-ji 129, 325, 329 Chapter Thirty (Vol. II), Chapter Twenty-nine (Vol. II), 20451, 76, , 234, 340286       GyōjiKai-in-Inmo28,

Chapter Thirty-two (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-one (Vol. II), zanmai 83 Juki 32,

Chapter Thirty-three (Vol. II), 3051, 69, 76, 111, 298, 340 Haku-Kannon

Chapter Thirty-five (Vol. II), jushi

Chapter Thirty-seven (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-six (Vol. II), 76, 128   KōmyōShinjin-34 Chapter Thirty-eight (Vol. II), setsumugakudō 3451, 138  DōtokuMuchū-

Chapter Forty-five (Vol. II), Chapter Forty-four (Vol. III),Chapter Forty-two (Vol. III), Chapter Forty (Vol. II), Chapter Thirty-nine (Vol. II), Kobusshinxvii, 33, 6825, 206 83, 339 GabyōBodai- TsukiKūge32 28 Chapter Forty-three (Vol. III),

     satta-shishōbō 358         Kattō

Chapter Forty-seven (Vol. III), Chapter Forty-six (Vol. III), yuishin51, 138, 340260                             Sesshin-Sangai-34,

Chapter Fifty (Vol. III), Chapter Forty-nine (Vol. III), Chapter Forty-eight (Vol. III), xix, 23, 54, 23253sesshō, 76 52, 261 Shohō-jissōMitsugoButsudō

Chapter Fifty-two, (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-one (Vol. III), 51137        Bukkyō Chapter Fifty-five (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-six (Vol. III), 10826, 33, 75, 325   SenmenDaraniZazengi

Chapter Sixty-two (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-eight (Vol. III), Chapter Fifty-nine (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-one (Vol. III), 673151, 69, 107, , 52, 77, 127, 138, 325, 259    Kenbutsu340HensanBaikeGanzei27

Chapter Sixty-three (Vol. III),

Chapter Sixty-four (Vol. III), 3330, 51, , 53, 5483    ShunjūKajō 26,

Chapter Sixty-eight (Vol. III), Chapter Sixty-six (Vol. III), 3233, 79, 130, 139, 205, 234 , 39, 53, 261                   Hotsu-Udonge287

Chapter Seventy (Vol. III), bodaishin 52, 83, 247, 285,

Chapter Seventy-one (Vol. III),Chapter Seventy-two (Vol. III), Chapter Seventy-three, Chapter Seventy-four, 35Nyorai-zenshinbon-bodai-bunpōmai-ō-zanmai–37, 54, 76, , 75, 129, 204, 205, 248, 355,, 357, 358 261xvii 285Jishō-zanmaiTenbōrin Sanjūshichi-Zan-24, 52356 xvii, 3–22, 51,

Chapter Seventy-five,

Chapter Seventy-seven, Chapter Seventy-six, 2941, 57–66, –50, 76, 138, 259 261Dai-shugyō Kokū 28, 29,27,

    40, 71–74                Hatsu-u

Chapter Seventy-nine, Chapter Seventy-eight, 8579–105  –81, 153   Ango 54, 83, ShōbōgenzōChapter Eighty-two, Chapter Eighty-one, Chapter Eighty, 55204, 131–(continued35      TashintsūŌ-saku-sendabaJi-kiun-mon)   26, 117–26,

       141–44                 Shukke

Chapter Eighty-three, 147–51, 199, 206, Sanji-no-gō31,

Chapter Eighty-five, Chapter Eighty-four, Shime315 325  67,

Chapter Eighty-eight, Chapter Eighty-seven, Chapter Eighty-six, 235–4631231287155–64, 127, 153, 154, 177–98, 229,, 234, 247, 281, 287, , , 231, 259, 287, Shukke-kudokuKuyō-shōbutsu307315169–73232, ,

175, 201, 207–28, 287, Kie-sanbō

Chapter Ninety, 205, 263–79,

Chapter Ninety-five, Chapter Ninety-four, Chapter Ninety-three, Chapter Ninety-one, Chapter Eighty-nine, xvii, 24, 287, 317–22206303–305butsu 39287, 67, 155, 165, 232, 251–58, 282,, 247, 249, 287, 309–232, 287326, 289–Shizen-biku 28796Yui-butsu-yo-Hachi-dainingakuShōji Jukai Shinjin-ingaDōshin166299–3001315367, 205,, 167,, 202,25,

Chapter Ninety-two,

Ippyakuhachi-hōmyōmon

ninety-five–chapter edition  xvii, 141,Manzan edition  327Kōzen edition  325Iwanami Bunko edition  325168287, 325, 343–, 317, 324, 325, 326, 329, 54        343 Shoki  117ShōjōhōgyōkyōShōdōkaShobutsu yō shūkyōShōbōgenzō in Modern Japanese. Seetwelve-chapter edition  205, 206, 234,sixty-chapter edition  325seventy-five chapter edition  325, 343Gen daigo-yaku-shōbōgenzō250see also, 261, 286, 324, 327, 343, 24, 273, , 75, 260, Raian Shōju)  269,270277108, 283282 358

Shōju (270–71

Shukusō, Emperor  117, 127, 192, 204Shūtō (ShuryōgonkyōShūkō, Emperor (Shōshū Fukaku (Shōkō era  46nyorai mitsu inshū shōryō gisho bosatsu -mangyōshuryōgonkyō83, 101see also(Kyōgen Chikan)  134, 138see also Daibucchō -see alsosee also)Taiso Eka)  79,  Kitan)  28339

Shuzan Shōnen  33Siddhārtha, Prince  189, 202, 203(see also

Siṃhahanu, King  197, 206Siṃha  163, 167Silk Road  176, 282śīla33, 206, see also357precepts; six Maheśvara)  33pāramitās)

six main officers of a temple  67, 109,six non-Buddhist teachers  268, 282six assistant officers of a temple  55, 109,Śiva (324111pāramitā, 259 s  323, 351–52, 357–58see alsosense)  75,sense)  75 six

Sixth Patriarch (six sense organs (six sense objects (42282304, 331    see alsosee alsoDaikan Enō)

, 51, 55, 83, 204, 255, 260, 269,, 315

Small Vehicle  3, 7, 14, 20, 46, 89, 109,skillful means (skandha. See125282139, 248, 269, 270, 271, 275, 279,, 351(see also Makasōgiritsu233five aggregates, see also expedient means)skandha)  220,s

Sōgiritsu

79, 123,

Son Chōsin  117Song dynasty  14, 18, 19, 20, 46, 50, 63,Sōkō (Sōkei Reitō (Sōkei Mountain,  Sōkeizan (see alsoSōkei (Sōjiji  326    5068Mount  Sōkei)  83, 234, 255175221, 80,127, 132, 133, 135, 143, 144,see also, 254, 257, 259, 268, 269, 274, , 232, see also228see alsoDaie Sōkō)  46–48, 49,Daikan Enō)  5, 15, 41,138Reitō)  234, 360279

, 53, 54, 132,

“Song of Experiencing the Truth, The”

Soun  98, 113śramaṇaSōtō sect  76Sōzan Honjaku  340śrāmaṇera195(see also Shōdōka(s) (see also )monk)  147, 192,  255 315 , 198, 254, 269, 282, 309,

śrāvakaŚrāvastī  113, 161, 167, 191, 203313125249, 129, 148, 172, 175, 208, 248,, 250, 271, 297, (s)  xvii, 7, 14, 20, 21, 89, 103,(s) (see also310novice)  95, 96, srotāpannaŚrīvaddhi (Sri Lanka  234stream-enterer)  244, 250, 260, 263,183, 200, see also281(see alsoWealth Increaser)four effects;

(s)

stage(s)  25, 45, 128fifty-two  25, 128275

Sthavira school (ten sacred and three clever  120fourth, of a first, of a śrāvaka. Seeśrāvaka. Seesee alsofour effectsfour effects

stupa(s)  158, 216, 220, 221, 222, 223,stream-enterer (of seven treasures  183, 221, 223224–25250232, 260, 281, , 234, 226, 227, 228, 232, 233, see also srotāpanna285                                   Theravāda)) 237

Subhūti  18, 32succession (Subhadra  184, 201certificate of  46, 48, 5016, 55 see also transmission)  14,

Śuddhodana, King  197, 201, 203, 204,śūdra206185(s) , 201(see also four castes)  142, 145,

Sūgaku  310  

Sunakṣatra  194, 204summer retreat. Sukhāvatī. Sui dynasty  63, 247, 248Seesee alsosee alsoPure LandSee retreat(s), summerSūryacandra)  212Vairocana)  110,

Sun Buddha (Sun Bright (297

sutra(s) (Sūryaprabha. ŚūraṃgamasamādhinirdeśaSūryacandra (Sun Moon Light  184śūnyatāSun Light  283  260Shuryōgon kyō(see alsosee alsoSeescripture)  19, 30, 31,)emptiness)  32, 33, 75,  39, (see also Shuryōgon -49Sun Bright)  230(see also

Śūraṃgama-sūtrakyō)  36, 39, 40, see alsoSun Light40

6911432, 73, 74, 75, 76, 91, 92, 99, 108,, 33, 36, 41, 42, 43, 46, 47, 49, 51,, 137, 142, 173, 185, 199, 201, sutra(s) (forged  36, 39, 40202, 234, 238, 248, 249, 270, 283,, 315, 323, 339, 343, 355, , 206, 213, 215, 226, 227, 229,continued) 357

232284

Sutra of Dharma Phrases. See HokkukyōSutra of Bequeathed Teachings. SeeSutra (teacher(s)  10, 20, 121, 274Sanskrit  39, 68Yuikyōgyōsee also Tripiṭaka)  127, 234

Sutra of Questions and Answers betweenDaibontenōmonbutsuketsugikyōMahābrahman and the Buddha. See(see also Sutra of Rare Occurrences

Sutra of the Great DemiseSutra of the Flower of DharmaSutra of the Collected Essential TeachingsSutra of Round Realization. See Engaku- of the Buddhas. See Shobutsu yō shūkyōkyōKeukyō)  239      (305see also

Lotus Sutra)  237, 238, 260,

hatsunehangyō; Mahā pari nirvāṇa-)  137, 171, 175, 202, 231, (see also Dai -

Sūzan Mountains  16 Sutra of Unprecedented Episodes. SeeSutra of the Great ParinirvāṇaMizōukyōnirvāṇa-sūtraDaihatsunehangyō; Mahā pari -sūtra    )  131       (see also260

T

Taishō Shinshū DaizōkyōTaiso Eka (TaiheikōkiShinko; Shōshū Fukaku)  79, 83, 101,114, 167, 286, see also115 Second Patriarch;283

Tandō Bunjun  46, 50, 53, 54, 360Tan (Takkasīla (see alsosee alsoLaozi)  286360Taxila)  166

Tang dynasty  18, 63, 117, 147, 198, 204,Tanka Shijun  137, 260, 360261

Tathāgata (Tanka Tennen  313, 316, 360172gata)  xvii, 5, 15, 19, 103, 125, 129,, 141, 144, 145, 150, 156, 160, 171,see also Buddha; buddha-tathā137

195

Ten Bodhisattva Precepts (Taxila (310267230, 311, 321, 339, , 268, 271, 272, 275, 276, 279, 285,, 236, 242, 244, 245, 254, 264, 265,, 204, 205, 208, 211, 215, 216, 227,, 173, 181, 184, 187, 190, 193, 194,see also Takkasīla)  166352 see also

Tendai Mountain  260Tendai Chigi  233, 260, 281Serious Prohibitions)  249, 312–313Ten

Tendō Nyojō  26, 32, 33, 35–36, 54, 68,Tendō Temple, TendōTendai sect  68, 233, 255, 260, 281, 282ten epithets of a buddha  175, 176, 22971274, 73, 75, 80, 83, 85, 107, 132, 139,, 360                         zan  83, 132

ten great disciples  32, 167, 202, 206, 229ten evils  181, 200, 286 Ten Kings Sutra. See Jūōkyōten hell kings  47, 54

Tenpuku era  261Tennei Temple  48   see also Ten Ten Serious Prohibitions (

Tenshōkōtōroku Tenshō era  259353Bodhisattva Precepts)  108, 202, 313       14132, 67, 204, 252, 259,

Tenzo kyō kun

Third Patriarch (Theravāda  23, 232Thailand  199        see also Kanchi Sōsan) thirty-seven elements of 329–22, 23, 34, 355, 356, bodhi357, the truth three baskets (thirty-two distinguishing marks, signs69, 181, 200, 231 see also Tripiṭaka)  120,

Three Devotions (Dharma, and Sangha; Three Refuges;121, 127        see also Buddha, three forms of conduct, behavior (242–43347Three Treasures)  239, 240–41,, 355, 244, 248–49, 304, 307, 313,23, 232see

Threefold Lotus Sutra, The

three kinds of knowledge  182, 186112also, 114, 345, body, speech, and mind)  xvi,355 Three Refuges. three poisons  272, 284, 345, 355Three TreasuresSee Three Devotions;

Three Treasures (three teachings  269, 270, 271, 272, 274,Three Summarized Pure Precepts  249,275311–312, 277, 279, , 313 see also282      Buddha, tions)  64, 143, 155, 162, 188, 193,Dharma, and Sangha; Three Devo-, 227, 235–38, 239, 240, 243, 244,, 254, 269, 276, 303, 304, 311,

Tianjian, Tianjian Bridge  118, 127three vehicles. 219245–46313, 351      SeeSeevehicle(s), threeTendō Nyojō

Toin, To family  88, 108Tō Impō (Tibet  233Tiantong Rujing. see also Godai Impō)  133, 138

Tokyo  30To Moku  53Tonkō  282Tōsu Gisei  53Tōsukoku Valley  117Toku  340Toku Kunmo  115Tokusan Senkan  60, 77

Tōzan Ryōkai (Tōzan Dōbi (Tōzan Mountain  49  transmission(s) (Tower Arrival  240, 249face-to-face, one-to-one  102, 191  authentic  7, 14, 16, 43, 50, 79, 89, 101,1521850102, 40, 43, 44, 45, 46, 79, 143, 172,, 54, 55, 329, 330, , 219, 254, 277, , 125, 141, 142, 218, 227, see alsosee alsosee alsoDōbi)  46, 53, 360310Gohon)  28, 30,360succession)  11,310

Tripiṭaka (Trāyastriṃśa Heaven  89, 200, 210, 230,of the robe  11, 277239, 249see also three baskets)  127,

Tuṣita Heaven  160, 166, 343, 345, 353,twenty-eight generations (archs, twenty-eight)  79128354, , 355, 234 358   see also patri-

U

uḍum baraunderworld (205, 227, flower(s)  21, 36, 40, 196,see also234    Yellow Spring)

Universal Preaching (Universal Guide to the Standard Prac-Ungan Donjō  23, 27, 54, 55, 69, 339 Ungozan  47tice of Zazen. See Fukanzazengi196, 201  see also Vipaśyin)

Universal Protector  211231

Universal Virtue (Universal Surpassing Wisdom  184see also

Upagupta  190, 191, 203, 265, 267Unmon Bun’en  46, 53, 360Unmon sect  53, 76, 315bhadra)  93, 111        Samanta-

Upāli  32

upāsikāupāsaka103, 243, ((s) s) ((see alsosee also250      laywoman)  14, 31,layman)  14, 31, 63,

63, 103

utpalaupasaṃpadāUseikirei Peak  21, 34203(see also199lotus flower, blue)  190,

Utpalavarṇā  160, 179, 182see also Uzbekistan  176Uttarakuru (166, 200, 285 four continents)

V

Vasumitra  71, 74, 77, 166, 201vandanaVaiśālī  206, 286Vairocana (167(, , 291, 292, s) 201(191see alsosee alsosee also, 203297Benares)  13, 31four castes)  142, 145,Sun Buddha)  93, vaiśya185 Vārāṇasī (

vehicle(s) (Vedic-Brahmanist (Vedas  271, 273, 282Vehicle; Small Vehicle)  42, 297248     see alsosee alsoGreat Vehicle; OneBrahmanist) three  42, 166, 170, 175, 227, 239, 249bodhisattva  103

view(s), viewpoint  3, 13, 21, 27, 33, 35,“Verse for Laying Out the verse(s)  26, 30, 31, 42, 53, 95, 107, 108,two  119, 121, 289, 330, 332, 333, 335,49131232163216244336, 51, 60, 67, 68, 80, 81, 89, 117,, 141, 165, 193, 207, 211, 220,, 233, 253, 256, 257, 260, 266,, 168, 178, 184, 185, 191, 215,, 217, 218, 221, 222, 231, 240,, 245, 250, 264, 278, see also gāthāPātra)  24, 145, 315”  31216 four-line (

cutting-off (268348, 269, 271, 272, 273, 274, 298,, 352    see also materialism)  232,

materialistic (false  156, 162, 163, 165, 220, 239,eternity (25253232260, 232, , 254, 257, 263, 264, 267, , 256, 260, , 261see also284see alsoidealistic, idealism)261 materialism)333

nihilistic  232, 255naturalistic, of naturalism  257, 272, 284 right  13, 52, 121, 163, 350Platonic  232

Vinaya (Vimalakīrti SutraVimalakīrtinirdeśaVima  244, 250Vimalakīrti  14, 18–19, 32, 33, 145Vijñānavāda school (two extreme  260, 261wrong  139, 165, 200, 204, 205, 268,Sutra; Yuimagyōschool)  205278, 286 (see also Vimalakīrti -(see also Vimalakīrti)145  32, see also175Yogācāra

nirdeśasee also)  32, 33,

224, 225, 227, 232, 233, 234, see alsoTripiṭaka)  127, 147, 198,

231

Vulture Peak (void  71, 163, 277vow(s)  186–87, 202, 216Viṣṇu  33vīryaVipaśyin (five hundred  186, 202Mount Gṛdhrakūṭa)  99, 103, 108, 225205(see also, 323, 356, 357, , 241, 242, see also six 249pāramitāUniversal Preaching)Gṛdhrakūṭa;358 s)  26, 28, 29,309

W

Wanshi Shōgaku  26, 132–33, 137, 138,255–56, 260, 261, 360 War Chest of the School of Zen MasterWanshizenjigōrokuDaie Fugaku. See Daiefugakuzenji -137, 138

Way, the  23, 203, 252, 286, 303, 329shūmonbuko see also Śrīvaddhi)

Wealth Increaser (

Western Capital (Wei dynasty  285200, 268  see also Luoyang)  117,

Western Country, Kingdom (India)  121, 272, 273, 284127      see also India)  119,see also

Western philosophy  xvWestern Heavens (182, 284, , 196, 197, 200, 235, 264, 271,310

279

White Emperor (wheel-turning king(s)  181, 184, 199, 208,West River  118, 126209, 210, 211, 212, 213, 275, see also God of276 wild fox  118, 120, 256Widely Extending Record of the Taiheiand Hyakujō  27, 29, 57–66, 68,Era. See TaiheikōkiAutumn)  113251–52, 253, 256

wisdom (and Śakra  243, 244–45, 24920103238347, 21, 28, 31, 32, 33, 49, 52, 64, 74,, 111, 158, 178, 184, 186, 205,, 267–68, 278, 291, 304, 319, 320,, 349, 350, 352, see also prajñā353)  9, 10, 11, 15,

body of  129, 247buddha’s, Buddha’s, of the Buddha

world(s)  11, 14, 16, 49, 57, 64, 74, 88, 99,wish-fulfilling gem  24910415618422268, 114, 121, 125, 129, 137, 150, 155,, 165, 166, 169, 170, 173, 179, 181,, 190, 196, 197, 206, 211, 218, 220,, 223, 227, 234, 240, 242, 243, 244,, 114, 122, 268, 297 254275, 257, 260, 261, 264, 265, 268, 273,

Dharma, of Dharma  xvi, 125, 272,Brahmā  210, 211of desire  83, 193, 200, 230, 239, 249,318273250, 277, 282, 285, 303, 304, 307, 315,, 319, 321, 329, 334, 351, , , 285, 307, 344, 355, 331      358355

of non-matter  193, 285, 307of matter  193, 203, 230, 285, 307,human  64, 102, 142, 171, 172, 192,great-thousandfold, three-thousand,external, outside  6, 12, 13, 27, 41, 42,evil  347, 351, 355344193324three-thousandfold  22, 34, 181,20845, 50, 51, 125, , 195, 196, 200, 235, 240, 256,, 343, , 227, 267, 275, 276, 321  358, 21434552

three, triple  8, 16, 18, 28, 64, 147,sahāsecular  204, 206, 260, 269, 270, 276178275339, 182, 185, 191, 197, 198, 206,, 285, 305, 309, 330, 335, 336,, 340, 346

World-honored Buddha, One(s), Tathāgatawomb-store  304, 307  17087(see also, 88, 101, 102, 103, 104, 131, 132,, 190, 194, 195, 197, 208, 211, 212,, 134, 148, 150, 156, 160, 164, 169,Buddha; Tathāgata)  19, 35,

187133, 218, 221, 222, 223, 224, 237, 238,, 172, 173, 180, 181, 182, 183, 186,

Wudi, Emperor  176Wu, Emperor  284worldly  142, 191, 192, 196, 227, 334276240214, 278, 279, , 241, 242, 243, 244, 254, 268, 275,See281Goso HōenGodai Impō

Wuzu Fayan. Wutai Yinfeng. See

X

Xitang Zhizang. Xishan Liang. Xiangyan Zhixian. SeeSeeSeeSeizan RyōSeeSeidō ChizōKyōgen Chikan

Xuedou Chongxian. Xuanzang  40, 202Xuansha Shibei.         SeeGensha ShibiSetchō Jūken

Y

Yang Wengong. Yama, Yamarāja  185, 195, 201Yakusan Igen  14, 20, 26, 31, 55, 316,Yakusan Kō 313, 316, 360Yajur-veda360 see also(see alsoSeeBhaiṣajyaguru)  283YobunkoVedas)  284Kyōzan Ejaku

Yakushi (

Yangshan Huiji. See

YuikyōgyōYueshan Weiyan. Yueshan Gao. Yuanwu Keqin. Yōoku (Yoshida district  296Yongjia Xuanjue. Yōka Genkaku (Yōgi Hōe  128Yobunko  360Yō Bunkō (Yō Dainen  358Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda school  364YijingYellow Spring (Yellow River  298Bukkyō-ku24and , 255, 260, 282, 277yangsee alsosee also(, see also Vimalakīrtinirdeśa;317see also286286See, see alsoSeeI River; Raku River)  277see alsoYō Bunkō)  32SeeYakusan Kō)Engo KokugonYōoku) 14  Yakusan Igen360Yōka Genkaku83underworld)  205Shinkaku)  5, yin Yiraku (

See

YuimagyōVimalakīrti Sutra(“Buddha Land”) chapter323 Yuimakitsushosetsugyō. See Yuimagyō175 Yunmen Wenyan. See Unmon Bun’en

Z

zazen  xix, 3, 23, 25, 27, 31, 35, 39, 43,47113198259309, 48, 51, 52, 53, 76, 83, 85, 111,, 127, 128, 130, 138, 147, 158,, 203, 205, 233, 234, 252, 254,, 263, 264, 274, 285, 303, 305,, 310, 332, 355, 358

hall  27, 31, 67, 109, 111, 112, 113,platform(s)  96, 337114, 259

Zen’enshingiZen family (Zen  47, 193, 270“one-finger”  138  sect  14mokushōmaster(s), Master  15, 18, 31, 36, 46,kōan114309–31048119192257, 147, 153, 197–98, 206, 235, 247,, 49, 50, 52, 57, 65, 67, 71, 72,52, 124, 128, 132–33, 134, 139,, 193, 220, 227, 233, 251, 256,, 259, 299  , 138, , 138see also315(see also Shingi, 261261205Echū)  117)  108, 113,

Zhekiang province  127, 137, 261, 295,Zhang Qian  176Zenshō. Zengaku-daijitenZenrita  192, 203298 See SunakṣatraSeeSeeTandō BunjunJōshū Jūshin

Zhaozhou Congshen. Zhantang Wenzhun.

Zhou dynasty  276, 286Zhen dynasty  63

ZōagongyōZhuangzi  269, 270, 272, 273, 275, 277,282, 283(see also Saṃyuktāgama

Zuoxi Xuanlang. ZokudentōrokuSutra)  175, 286107See Sakei Genrō

BDK English Tripiṭaka(First Series)

Abbreviations

                                                                                                                                                                           Eng.:Skt.:Ch.:Jp.:    Japanese    Published title   Chinese   Sanskrit

Title                                                                                                  Taishō No. Skt.   DīrghāgamaCh.   Chang ahan jing (長阿含經)                                                                 1 Skt.   MadhyamāgamaCh.   Zhong ahan jing (中阿含經)                                                                  26

Ch.   Dasheng bensheng xindi guan jing (大乘本生心地觀經)                     159

Ch.   Fo suoxing zan (Skt.   Buddhacarita 佛所行讃)                                                                                                                                                                             192

Ch.   Zabao zang jing (Eng.  The Storehouse of Sundry Valuables雜寶藏經)                                                                 (1994)                                                                                                            203

Ch.   Faju piyu jing (Eng.  The Scriptural Text: Verses of the Doctrine, with Parables法句譬喩經)                                                      (1999)                                                                                                            211

Skt.   Aṣṭasāhasrikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtraCh.   Xiaopin banruo boluomi jing (小品般若波羅蜜經)                              227

Ch.   Jingang banruo boluomi jing (Skt.   Vajracchedikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra金剛般若波羅蜜經)                              235

Ch.   Daluo jingang bukong zhenshi sanmoye jing                                     243Skt.   Adhyardhaśatikā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra         (大樂金剛不空眞實三麼耶經) Ch.   Renwang banruo boluomi jing (Skt.   *Kāruṇikārājā-prajñāpāramitā-sūtra仁王般若波羅蜜經)                           245

405

Ch.   Banruo boluomiduo xing jing (Skt.   Prajñāpāramitāhṛdaya-sūtra 般若波羅蜜多心經)                             251

Skt.   Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtraCh.   Miaofa lianhua jing (Eng.  The Lotus Sutra (Revised Second Edition, 妙法蓮華經)                                                       2007)                                                                                                              262

Ch.   Wuliangyi jing (無量義經)                                                                   276 Ch.   Guan Puxian pusa xingfa jing (觀普賢菩薩行法經)                             277

Ch.   Dafangguang fo huayan jing (Skt.   Avataṃsaka-sūtra   大方廣佛華嚴經)                                  278

Skt.   Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanāda-sūtraCh.   Shengman shizihou yisheng dafang bianfang guang jing                   353Eng.           (The Sutra of Queen Śrīmālā of the Lion’s Roar勝鬘師子吼一乘大方便方廣經)           (2004)

Skt.   SukhāvatīvyūhaEng.  Ch.   Wuliangshou jing (         Revised Second Edition, 2003)The Larger Sutra on Amitāyus無量壽經)                                                              (in The Three Pure Land Sutras,                                                                        360

Skt.   Amitāyurdhyāna-sūtraEng.  Ch.   Guan wuliangshou fo jing (         (in The Sutra on Contemplation of AmitāyusThe Three Pure Land Sutras,觀無量壽佛經Revised Second Edition, 2003))                                          365 Eng.  Skt.   Sukhāvatīvyūha         Revised Second Edition, 2003)The Smaller Sutra on Amitāyus阿彌陀經)                                                                       (in The Three Pure Land Sutras,       366 Ch.   Amituo jing (

Ch.   Da banniepan jing (Skt.   Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra大般涅槃經)                                                          374

Ch.   Fochuibo niepan lüeshuo jiaojie jing (Eng.  The Bequeathed Teaching Sutra (in Apocryphal Scriptures,佛垂般涅槃略説教誡經2005))           389

Skt.   *Kṣitigarbhapraṇidhāna-sūtraCh.   Dizang pusa benyuan jing (地藏菩薩本願經)                                      412

Ch.   Banzhou sanmei jing (Skt.   Pratyutpanna-buddhasaṃmukhāvasthita-samādhi-sūtraEng.  The Pratyutpanna Samādhi Sutra般舟三昧經)(1998)                                                     418 Title                                                                                                  Taishō No.

Ch.   Yaoshi liuli guang rulai benyuan gongde jing                                     450Skt.   Bhaiṣajyaguru-vaiḍūrya-prabhāsa-pūrvapraṇidhāna-viśeṣavistara         (藥師琉璃光如來本願功徳經)

Ch.   Mile xiasheng chengfo jing (Skt.   *Maitreyavyākaraṇa 彌勒下生成佛經)                                    454

Skt.   *MañjuśrīparipṛcchāCh.   Wenshushili wen jing (文殊師利問經)                                                 468 Skt.   Vimalakīrtinirdeśa-sūtraEng.  Ch.   Weimojie suoshuo jing   (The Vimalakīrti Sutra (2004)維摩詰所説經)                                             475

Ch.   Yueshangnü jing (Skt.   Candrottarādārikā-paripṛcchā月上女經)                                                                480

Ch.   Zuochan sanmei jing (坐禪三昧經)                                                     614 Ch.   Damoduoluo chan jing (達磨多羅禪經)                                               618

Skt.   Samādhirāja-candrapradīpa-sūtraCh.   Yuedeng sanmei jing (月燈三昧經)                                                     639 Ch.   Shoulengyan sanmei jing (Skt.   Śūraṅgamasamādhi-sūtraEng.  The Śūraṅgama Samādhi Sutra首楞嚴三昧經(1998) )                                           642

Skt.   Suvarṇaprabhāsa-sūtraCh.   Jinguang ming zuishengwang jing (金光明最勝王經)                         665

Skt.   Laṅkāvatāra-sūtraCh.   Dasheng rulengqie jing (入楞伽經)                                                     672

Eng.  Skt.   Saṃdhinirmocana-sūtraThe Scripture on the Explication of Underlying Meaning解深密經)                                                                  (2000)      676 Ch.   Jie shenmi jing (

Ch.   Yulanpen jing (Skt.   *Ullambana-sūtraThe Ullambana Sutra盂蘭盆經(in ) Apocryphal Scriptures,                                                                    2005)                                                                                                              685

Eng. 

Ch.   Sishierzhang jing (Eng.  The Sutra of Forty-two Sections四十二章經)                                                           (in Apocryphal Scriptures, 2005)      784 Ch.   Dafangguang yuanjue xiuduoluo liaoyi jingEng.           (The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經)                                                                  (in Apocryphal Scriptures, 2005) 842

Ch.   Da Biluzhena chengfo shenbian jiachi jing                                         848Skt.   Mahāvairocanābhisambodhi-vikurvitādhiṣṭhāna-vaipulya-sūtrendra-Eng.           (         rājanāma-dharmaparyāyaThe Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra大毘盧遮那成佛神變加持經)                                                                                        (2005)

Skt.   Sarvatathāgata-tattvasaṃgraha-mahāyānābhisamaya-mahākalparājaCh.   Jinggangding yiqie rulai zhenshi she dasheng xianzheng dajiao         wang jing (The Adamantine Pinnacle Sutra金剛頂一切如來眞實攝大乘現證大教王經(in Two Esoteric Sutras,)                        2001)                                   865

Eng. 

Ch.   Suxidi jieluo jing (Skt.   Susiddhikara-mahātantra-sādhanopāyika-paṭalaEng.  The Susiddhikara Sutra蘇悉地羯囉經(in Two Esoteric Sutras,)                                                        2001)                                                                                                              893

Skt.   *Mātaṅgī-sūtraCh.   Modengqie jing (摩登伽經)                                                               1300

Ch.   Mohe sengqi lü (Skt.   *Mahāsāṃghika-vinaya摩訶僧祇律)                                                            1425

Skt.   *Dharmaguptaka-vinayaCh.   Sifen lü (四分律)                                                                                1428

Pāli   SamantapāsādikāCh.   Shanjianlü piposha (善見律毘婆沙)                                                   1462 Ch.   Fanwang jing (Skt.   *Brahmajāla-sūtra梵網經)                                                                      1484

Skt.   *Upāsakaśīla-sūtraCh.   Youposaijie jing (Eng.  The Sutra on Upāsaka Precepts優婆塞戒經)                                                           (1994)                                                                                                          1488

Ch.   Miaofa lianhua jing youbotishe (Skt.   Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-upadeśa 妙法蓮華經憂波提舍)                     1519

Ch.   Shizha biposha lun (Skt.   *Daśabhūmika-vibhāṣā十住毘婆沙論)                                                   1521 Title                                                                                                  Taishō No.

Ch.   Fodijing lun (Skt.   *Buddhabhūmisūtra-śāstraEng.  The Interpretation of the Buddha Land佛地經論)                                                                     (2002)                                                                                                          1530

Skt.   Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaCh.   Apidamojushe lun (阿毘達磨倶舍論)                                                1558

Ch.   Zhonglun (Skt.   Madhyamaka-śāstra中論)                                                                                1564 Skt.   Yogācārabhūmi-śāstraCh.   Yuqie shidi lun (瑜伽師地論)                                                             1579

Eng.  Ch.   Cheng weishi lun (         (in Demonstration of Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,成唯識論)                                                             1999)                                                                                                            1585

Skt.   TriṃśikāEng.  Ch.   Weishi sanshilun song (         (in The Thirty Verses on Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,唯識三十論頌)                                              1999)                                                                                                            1586

Eng.  Skt.   ViṃśatikāCh.   Weishi ershi lun (         (in The Treatise in Twenty Verses on Consciousness OnlyThree Texts on Consciousness Only,唯識二十論)                                                           1999)                                                                                                            1590

Ch.   She dasheng lun (

Eng.  Skt.   MahāyānasaṃgrahaThe Summary of the Great Vehicle攝大乘論)                                                              (Revised Second Edition, 2003) 1593

Ch.   Bian zhongbian lun (Skt.   Madhyāntavibhāga 辯中邊論)                                                         1600

Ch.   Dasheng zhuangyanjing lun (Skt.   Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkāra 大乘莊嚴經論)                                     1604 Ch.   Dachengchengyelun (Skt.   Karmasiddhiprakaraṇa大乘成業論)                                                    1609

Ch.   Jiujing yisheng baoxing lun (Skt.   Ratnagotravibhāga-mahāyānottaratantra-śāstra究竟一乘寳性論)                                  1611

Ch.   Yinming ruzheng li lun (Skt.   Nyāyapraveśa      因明入正理論)                                            1630 Ch.   Dasheng ji pusa xu elun (Skt.   Śikṣāsamuccaya 大乘集菩薩學論)                                       1636

Skt.   VajrasūcīCh.   Jingangzhen lun (金剛針論)                                                               1642

Ch.   Zhang suozhi lun (Eng.  The Treatise on the Elucidation of the Knowable彰所知論)                                                             (2004)                                                                                                          1645

Skt.   BodhicaryāvatāraCh.   Putixing jing   (菩提行經)                                                                  1662

Ch.   Jingangding yuqie zhongfa anouduoluo sanmiao sanputi xin lun    1665         (金剛頂瑜伽中發阿耨多羅三藐三菩提心論)

Ch.   Dasheng qixin lun (Skt.   *Mahāyānaśraddhotpāda-śāstraEng.  The Awakening of Faith大乘起信論(2005))                                                        1666

Ch.   Shimoheyan lun (釋摩訶衍論)                                                           1668

Ch.   Naxian biqiu jing (Pāli   Milindapañha 那先比丘經)                                                         1670

Ch.   Banruo boluomiduo xin jing yuzan (Eng.           (A Comprehensive Commentary on the Heart SutraPrajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya-sūtra) (2001)般若波羅蜜多心經幽賛)           1710

Ch.   Miaofalianhua jing xuanyi (妙法蓮華經玄義)                                   1716 Ch.   Guan wuliangshou fo jing shu (觀無量壽佛經疏)                              1753 Ch.   Sanlun xuanyi (三論玄義)                                                                  1852 Ch.   Dasheng xuan lun (大乘玄論)                                                            1853 Ch.   Zhao lun (肇論)                                                                                  1858

Ch.   Huayan yisheng jiaoyi fenqi zhang (華嚴一乘教義分齊章)               1866

Ch.   Yuanren lun (原人論)                                                                         1886 Ch.   Mohe zhiguan (摩訶止觀)                                                                  1911

Ch.   Xiuxi zhiguan zuochan fayao (修習止觀坐禪法要)                           1915

Ch.   Tiantai sijiao yi (天台四教儀)                                                            1931

Ch.   Guoqing bai lu (國清百録)                                                                 1934

Ch.   Zhenzhou Linji Huizhao chanshi wulu (Eng.  The Recorded Sayings of Linji (in Three Chan Classics,鎭州臨濟慧照禪師語録1999))     1985 Ch.   Foguo Yuanwu chanshi biyan lu (Eng.  The Blue Cliff Record (1998) 佛果圜悟禪師碧巖録)                   2003

Ch.   Wumen guan (Eng.  Wumen’s Gate無門關(in Three Chan Classics,)                                                                       1999)                                                                                                             2005

Eng.  Ch.   Liuzu dashi fabao tan jing (The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch六祖大師法寶壇經(2000))                                2008

Ch.   Xinxin ming (Eng.  The Faith-Mind Maxim信心銘)                                                                        (in Three Chan Classics, 1999)                                                                    2010

Ch.   Huangboshan Duanji chanshi chuanxin fayao                    

Eng.           (Essentials of the Transmission of Mind黄檗山斷際禪師傳心法要)                                                                        (in Zen Texts, 2005)                                                                                    2012A

Ch.   Yongjia Zhengdao ge (永嘉證道歌)                                                   2014

Eng.  Ch.   Chixiu Baizhang qinggui (The Baizhang Zen Monastic Regulations勅修百丈清規)(2007)                                         2025

Ch.   Yibuzonglun lun (Skt.   SamayabhedoparacanacakraEng.  The Cycle of the Formation of the Schismatic Doctrines異部宗輪論)                                                          (2004) 2031 Eng.  Skt.   AśokāvadānaCh.   Ayuwang jing (The Biographical Scripture of King Aśoka阿育王經)                                                                  (1993) 2043

Ch.   Maming pusa zhuan (Eng.           (in The Life of Aśvaghoṣa BodhisattvaLives of Great Monks and Nuns,馬鳴菩薩傳)                                                     2002)                                                                                                             2046

Ch.   Longshu pusa zhuan (Eng.           (in The Life of Nāgārjuna BodhisattvaLives of Great Monks and Nuns,龍樹菩薩傳)                                                    2002)                                                                                                             2047

Ch.   Posoupandou fashi zhuan (Eng.           (in Biography of Dharma Master VasubandhuLives of Great Monks and Nuns,婆藪槃豆法師傳2002) )                                     2049 Ch.   Datang Daciensi Zanzang fashi zhuan (Eng.           Monastery of the Great Tang DynastyA Biography of the Tripiṭaka Master of the Great Ci’en(1995)大唐大慈恩寺三藏法師傳)   2053

Ch.   Gaoseng zhuan (高僧傳)                                                                    2059

Ch.   Biqiuni zhuan (Eng.           (in Biographies of Buddhist NunsLives of Great Monks and Nuns,比丘尼傳)                                                                  2002)                                                                                                             2063

Eng.  Ch.   Gaoseng Faxian zhuan (         (in The Journey of the Eminent Monk FaxianLives of Great Monks and Nuns,高僧法顯傳)2002)                                                 2085

Ch.   Datang xiyu ji (Eng.  The Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions大唐西域記)                                                              (1996)              2087

Ch.   Youfangjichao: Tangdaheshangdongzheng zhuan                      2089-(7)         (遊方記抄: 唐大和上東征傳)

Ch.   Hongming ji (弘明集)                                                                        2102 Ch.   Fayuan zhulin (法苑珠林)                                                                  2122

Ch.   Nanhai jigui neifa zhuan (Eng.  Buddhist Monastic Traditions of Southern Asia南海寄歸内法傳)                                      (2000)   2125

Ch.   Fanyu zaming (梵語雑名)                                                                  2135 Jp.     Shōmangyō gisho (勝鬘經義疏)                                                        2185 Jp.     Yuimakyō gisho (維摩經義疏)                                                           2186 Jp.     Hokke gisho (法華義疏)                                                                    2187 Jp.     Hannya shingyō hiken (般若心經秘鍵)                                             2203

Jp.     Daijō hossō kenjin shō (大乘法相研神章)                                         2309 Jp.     Kanjin kakumu shō (觀心覺夢鈔)                                                      2312

Eng.  Jp.     Risshū kōyō (The Essentials of the Vinaya Tradition律宗綱要)                                                                     (1995)                                                                                                            2348

Jp.     Tendai hokke shūgi shū (Eng.  The Collected Teachings of the Tendai Lotus School天台法華宗義集)                                        (1995)                                                                                                                       2366

Jp.     Kenkairon (顯戒論)                                                                           2376 Jp.     Sange gakushō shiki   (山家學生式)                                                  2377

Jp.     Hizōhōyaku (Eng.  The Precious Key to the Secret Treasury秘藏寶鑰)                                                                     (in Shingon Texts, 2004)                                                                               2426

Jp.     Benkenmitsu nikyō ron   (Eng.           TeachingsOn the Differences between the Exoteric and Esoteric(in Shingon Texts辨顯密二教論, 2004)             )                                          2427

Eng.  Jp.     Sokushin jōbutsu gi (         (in The Meaning of Becoming a Buddha in This Very BodyShingon Texts, 2004)即身成佛義)                                                     2428

Jp.     Shōji jissōgi (Eng.  The Meanings of Sound, Sign, and Reality聲字實相義)                                                                 (in Shingon Texts, 2004) 2429 Jp.     Unjigi (Eng.  The Meanings of the Word Hūṃ吽字義)                                                                                  (in Shingon Texts, 2004) 2430 Eng.  Jp.     Gorin kuji myōhimitsu shaku (         and the Nine SyllablesThe Illuminating Secret Commentary on the Five Cakras(in Shingon Texts五輪九字明秘密釋, 2004) )                           2514

Jp.     Mitsugonin hotsuro sange mon (Eng.  The Mitsugonin Confession (in Shingon Texts,密嚴院發露懺悔文2004))                         2527

Eng.  Jp.     Kōzen gokoku ron (         (in A Treatise on Letting Zen Flourish to Protect the StateZen Texts, 2005)興禪護國論)                                                       2543

Jp.     Fukan zazengi (Eng.           (in A Universal Recommendation for True ZazenZen Texts, 2005)普勧坐禪儀                                                                                   )                                                              2580

Eng.  Jp.     Shōbōgenzō (         Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury         Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury         Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye TreasuryShōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-eye Treasury正法眼藏)                                                                     ((((Volume I, Volume II, Volume III, Volume IV, 2007)2008)2008)2008) 2582

Eng.  Jp.     Zazen yōjin ki (Advice on the Practice of Zazen坐禪用心記)                                                              (in Zen Texts, 2005)                                                                                      2586

Jp.     Senchaku hongan nenbutsu shū (Eng.           on the Nembutsu Chosen in the Original VowSenchaku Hongan Nembutsu Shū: A Collection of Passages選擇本願念佛集(1997))                            2608 Jp.     Kenjōdo shinjitsu kyōgyō shōmo nrui (Eng.           EnlightenmentKyōgyōshinshō: On Teaching, Practice, Faith, and(2003)       顯淨土眞實教行証文類)       2646

Jp.     Tannishō (Eng.  Tannishō: Passages Deploring Deviations of Faith歎異抄)                                                                              (1996)                                                                                                            2661

Eng.  Jp.     Rennyo shōnin ofumi (Rennyo Shōnin Ofumi: The Letters of Rennyo蓮如上人御文)                                               (1996)                                                                                                            2668

Jp.     Ōjōyōshū (往生要集)                                                                         2682

Jp.     Risshō ankoku ron (Eng.           (in          of the Orthodox Teaching and the Peace of the NationRisshōankokuron or The Treatise on the EstablishmentTwo Nichiren Texts,立正安國論2003)                                              )                                                       2688

Eng.  Jp.     Kaimokushō (Kaimokushō or Liberation from Blindness開目抄)                                                                        (2000)                                                                                                            2689

Eng.  Jp.     Kanjin honzon shō (         by Introspecting Our Minds for the First Time at the         Beginning of the Fifth of the Five Five Hundred-year Ages         (in Kanjinhonzonshō or The Most Venerable One RevealedTwo Nichiren Texts,觀心本尊抄2003)                                                                             )                                                       2692

Eng.  Ch.   Fumu enzhong jing   (         (in The Sutra on the Profundity of Filial LoveApocryphal Scriptures,父母恩重經2005) )                                                    2887

Jp.     Hasshūkōyō (Eng.  The Essentials of the Eight Traditions八宗綱要)                                                      extracanonical(1994)

Jp.     Sangō shīki (三教指帰)                                                       extracanonical

Eng.  Jp.     Mappō tōmyō ki (The Candle of the Latter Dharma末法燈明記)                                           extracanonical(1994)

Jp.     Jūshichijō kenpō (十七條憲法)                                      、

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