…The Way has to flow without obstruction. Why would you block it? The Way flows freely when the mind doesn’t dwell on anything. Once it dwells on something, it is imprisoned…
Pine, Red. Three Zen Sutras: The Heart, The Diamond, and The Platform Sutras (Counterpoints Book 7) (pp. 81-82). Catapult. Kindle Edition.
This passage was taken from a paragraph in Huineng’s Platform Sutra. It’s the first sentences that draw me in and stop me in my tracks.
…The Way has to flow without obstruction. Why would you block it? The Way flows freely when the mind doesn’t dwell on anything…
Pine, Red. Three Zen Sutras: The Heart, The Diamond, and The Platform Sutras (Counterpoints Book 7) (pp. 81-82). Catapult. Kindle Edition.
We don’t need to shoulder a shovel and swing a pickax to clear the obstruction. The obstruction is the one we construct with our own mind, and clearing it is a matter of not dwelling. By not holding on to the thought in our minds right now, we can see the Way everywhere we look.
In 1949, photographer Gjon Mili set a still film camera on a tripod in a dark room and opened the shutter for some 10 to 30 seconds while Picasso drew in the air with a flashlight. The long exposure put to film the immediately disappearing image created by the moving light. Occasional flashes of light captured Picasso, as he stretched, holding the light high to draw above his head, and catching his engagement with the act again at the end of a stroke. Picasso could not see the image he painted as he swept the light through the air. Whether his motions were true to the image he painted or not, the light moved continuously. The film recorded the light path flying through space.
We sit this week in a dark room. Without obstruction, there is only this millisecond of sound and light, flow of breath in, and flow of breath out. Without dwelling, there is no film to capture an image; there is only one point.
Our drawing is not for 30 seconds, it’s unbounded. Give yourself over to the expression, your expression. The Way flows freely. This is zazen.
There is a wonderful story of Yunmen that Madelon used in a talk several years ago:
A monk asked, “How should one act during every hour of the day such that the ancestors are not betrayed?” Yunmen said, “Give up your effort.” The monk said, “How should I give up my effort?” Yunmen said, “Give up the words you just uttered.”
Ferguson, Andy. Zen’s Chinese Heritage: The Masters and Their Teachings . Wisdom Publications. Kindle Edition.
Picture this conversation occurring within a Zen training center; let’s presume that Yunmen is not giving this monk permission to sleep through morning zazen, and not giving permission to snore in the zendo. What effort is he advising to give up? What effort is required for a seed in the earth to drink water and break its husk? What effort is required to eat when hungry and sleep when tired? There is action without effort in each of these examples. Giving yourself over to the effort of the seed in dark earth is zazen.
Returning to the passage from Huineng that I began with, I’ll read it again, this time including the two sentences that come just before the ones I read earlier.”
Deluded people attached to external attributes get hold of One Practice Samadhi and say that sitting motionless, eliminating delusions, or not thinking thoughts is One Practice Samadhi. If that were true, it would be the same as being unconscious. It would block the Way. The Way has to flow without obstruction. Why would you block it? The Way flows freely when the mind doesn’t dwell on anything. Once it dwells on something, it is imprisoned.
Pine, Red. Three Zen Sutras: The Heart, The Diamond, and The Platform Sutras (Counterpoints Book 7) (pp. 81-82). Catapult. Kindle Edition.
Words can and do confuse us; the Way can be obstructed by relying on words, and by residing in wordlessness. Even if strict and constraining laws are enacted to guide our minds, both words and wordlessness rise and fall; neither violates the Tao.
Not only is there no need to figure this out, but it can’t be figured out with the discerning mind. Our goal here is not about figuring out, it’s about seeing anew. I’m sure we all have our own stories of seeing anew; one that arises for me is about my mother. At the time of this story my father’s brother and sister were estranged following an offense and disagreement about a possession in the estate of my grandmother. Years later this came up in a conversation my mother had with my aunt, and my mother commented how sad it was that weddings and happy events come and go without the family getting together, and then at some point all will gather for a funeral. Surprisingly, my aunt heard this with fresh ears, and the family shifted.
In a more societal example, Einstein has been a hero of mine since high school for his ability to have learned the physics of his time, and yet his knowledge didn’t obstruct him from recognizing what no one had seen in the same information – he saw the theory of relativity. His new perspective was absolutely fresh, and added to rather than contradicted to the physics he was born into.
It is only you and only me who can individually release what we know, and see afresh.
If there is anything here that speaks to the mechanics of zazen, drop it. If there is an image in all this that evokes the spirit of zazen, take it. All our ancestors had their ways to point us to the very simple, that thing we’re straining our necks to peer around in order to sit, to walk the Way, to know the meaning of any of this. With a free mind, you can bow and walk at the sound of the clappers, in accord with action and non-obstruction. With ease throughout the body, you can engage in this while in accord.
I’ll stipulate right now that what I’m saying is not absolutely true. Therefore, it is not necessary to look for and think about the exceptions. Riffing off the words of Yunmen, give up the words you just uttered, and give up this thought. You already know the sense of this in body and mind – this is zazen; this is sesshin, so we have unambiguous hours to courageously drop everything. How about right now? Release…see.
Fundamentally, Yunmen is expressing the great matter in his way – “the way flows freely.” I often leave this aspect of the old stories implied in my talks, because for those I meet in dokusan, being explicit seems to distract more than it helps. Acknowledging such freedom here, on the last full day of sesshin, is my way to encourage us all to release, and release again. Let it all fall away, and there is no bottom; let it all fall away without cease. Seed, water, and dirt have all they need.
Here is another passage in the Platform Sutra; I’ll offer three translations. The first is by Philip Yampolsky:
“Good friends, each of you must observe well for himself. Do not mistakenly use your minds! The sutras say to take refuge in the Buddha within yourselves; they do not say to rely on other Buddhas. If you do not rely upon your own natures, there is nothing else on which to rely.
Philip B. Yampolsky (translation and notes); The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch; The Text of the tun Huang Manuscript, p. 146.
And this one by Red Pine:
Good friends, each of you should examine this for yourselves. Don’t misdirect your attention. The sutras simply say to take refuge in the buddha within yourself. They don’t say to take refuge in a buddha somewhere else. If you don’t take refuge in your own nature, there is nowhere else to take refuge.
Pine, Red. Three Zen Sutras: The Heart, The Diamond, and The Platform Sutras (Counterpoints Book 7) (pp. 100-101). Catapult. Kindle Edition.
And lastly, this one translated by the Buddhist Text Translation Society:
Good and Wise Friends, prajna wisdom comes from one’s own essential nature: it does not come from outside. Do not make the mistake of using will and intellect. It is called “The natural workings of the true nature.” When the self-nature is true, everything else is true.
Trans. Buddhist Text Translation Society, The Sixth Patriarch’s Dharma Jewel Platform Sutra.
“Do not mistakenly use your minds.” “Don’t misdirect your attention.” “Do not make the mistake of using will and intellect.” These are the ways three different translators understood and re-expressed what Huineng wants each of us to take to heart. Huineng isn’t making a value judgment of us or our use of mind, attention, will and intellect. He is saying don’t use a flat screwdriver on a Philips screw. It doesn’t work to shovel with a rake.
Which takes us to Huineng’s next words as rendered by the three translators:
If you do not rely upon your own natures, there is nothing else on which to rely.
If you don’t take refuge in your own nature, there is nowhere else to take refuge.
When the self-nature is true, everything else is true.
The first two can be restated affirmatively: Rely on your own nature – there is nothing else. Take refuge in your own nature – there is nowhere else. And for the third – take notice of the use of the words, “when,” and “else”: “When self-nature is true, everything else is true.” Can you tell me of a time in which self-nature is false? If so, please do!
Skipping the phrase “true nature” to avoid jargon, we’re still left with a clear statement. Rely on your own nature. Saying it this way there is no question about the current state of your nature.
Take refuge in your own nature. This is an active statement offering an invocation for this breath, this confusion, or the fatigue of the one on the next cushion. All three versions affirm for us and point us right here, there is nothing else, nowhere else, and every flower petal, rotting grape on the ground, and trash in the gutter is true, true, true.
It is with this nature that we chant the four vows and offer bows.
None of this is a promise of following winds and calm seas. It does points us to the winds and seas we have.
I don’t want all I’ve said to obscure the clear statements from Huineng that we began with. The Way flows when without obstruction from mistaken use of intellect. Release yourself to what is undeniably here, unmistakenly true.
But don’t take my word for it, nor Huineng’s word for it. Make it your own. Live it.