The Living Design

 Ideas, thoughts, opinions, interpretation, obsessions, doubts that seems to be “mental” and “mind” are not personal.  Buddha is tree, bird, sky, wind, water, you, thoughts; …there is no Buddhism outside mundane things, and after realization, With every thought you are consulting infinite teachers  [Yuanwu]

…Zen is obvious everywhere in the world, with the totality of everything everywhere turning into its great function. [Yuanwu]

…the living meaning of Zen is the design of life itself. [Xuedou]

Awakening suddenly bursts forth when there is nowhere to anchor self and there is perception of the ocean of your own essence [Yangshan] of the “ocean of inherent awareness” [after Huanglong] and the silent knowledge of transcendent wisdom as Zen [Huanglong].

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…if it is the supreme vehicle, even the sages stand aside, buddhas and Zen masters disappear. [Yangqi]

Correct attention to thought, dust and objects, but We do not teach you to annihilate random thoughts, suppress body and mind, close your eyes, and consider this Zen. [Foyan]

…not annihilation  or detachment or blows and shouts [Ying-an]

Stilling body and awareness as emptiness is not itself the emptiness that Siddhartha calls the dharma or ultimate truth. [after Yuanwu]

No careerist, no religionist, no sect, no lectures, no doctrine to be transmitted, no rank, no art,

Can anyone discern?  If you can, you will recognize the disease of “Buddhism” and the disease of “Zen.” And, If people cannot enter, they not only cannot help themselves, they cannot help others.[Huanglong]

The Source Of Zen

THE ESSENCE OF “YOU” is vast.

Mindfulness, present moment, mindlessness, talk, release have nothing to do with it.

            If I were to explain the source of Zen, there wouldn’t be a single person

            around, let alone a group of five hundred or seven hundred.  If I talk

            about this and that, however, you race forward to pick it up.  This is like

            fooling a child with an empty fist—there is not reality in it.

                        Yangshan

            At Zen centers they say there is a Way to be practiced and a religious

truth to be realized.  Tell me, what religious truth is realized, what way

is practiced?  In your present functioning, what is it you lack?  What would

you fix?

            Younger newcomers, not understanding this, immediately believe

These mesmerists and let them talk about things that tie people up.

            Linji

Who Can Say It?

TODAY’S PUBLISHING ZENKEI’S AND ROSHI’S speak about fear and other feelings, and explore nuances of what Siddhartha admonished us—noting, for example, how one tiny word in translation can alter meaning—to make sure one is not deceived.  Sub-Zenkes and roshis really like “presence” and “compassion/bodhisattva,” and “health benefits of Zen” for the way in which they calm and heal and bring folks together.   And yet, “nuances of words: Siddhartha’s life or very existence is opaque—especially details—with so many, many years oral history without a written account.  By then, who is talking?  Is it Zen, or literati, or …  There is perhaps more clarity centuries later when Zen entered China and brightened existing ontological perspectives already present (and replicated insights from a multitude of cultures both pre-dating and following Siddhartha.

As opposed to everyday chatter, all of this “a-little-more-intuitive-talk” obscures original direct experience of Siddhartha, or someone “Siddhartha-like.”   In contemporary Buddhism, Siddhartha is an image, a God, (often gold-encrusted:: where is the true “buddah,” not unlike…pick your religion—a  religious “motif.”   In Cambodia or Thailand or China or Korea or Japan, for most, “Buddha” is an ultimate God-like spirit who might intervene against everyday dilemmas and more horrific demons.

A Zenkei or “lesser” roshi question for study, such as, for example, In Zen, are experiences of fear OK or not OK might be a red flag shouting… “Off Track!”

Against this, first, Hui-neng’s world “where no dust can alight,” and then the significance of perhaps “Zenkei” or “roshi” as a red flag,

but digging down,

“fear,” into “Zenkei” (super-awakened being) into “roshi (rare awakened one),”

BUT THEN, without title or concept, beyond fear or titular zenkei or roshi,

What is this one thing that is not obscured by fear or nuances or title?

What is dustless yet right in front of you?

Who can say it?

Fear, nuances, rivers, mountains, bird flight, lake:  It might be good, hitting more like a burning ember that indirectly kicks awakening, or not.

            You sit by rivers; you climb mountains, you see birds fly through the

            air; you swim in lakes, and yet, none of these things exist.  How can

            that be?

How can rivers, mountains, birds, lakes not exist in Zen realization and yet the world of mountains, birds, and lakes be real?

And why is this important,

...critical to an end to suffering?