A monk asked Joshu, “Has a dog the Buddha Nature?” Joshu answered, "Emptiness.”
Mumon’s Comment
In order to master Zen, you must pass the barrier of the patriarchs. To attain this subtle realization, you must completely cut off the way of thinking.
If you do not pass the barrier, and do not cut off the way of thinking, then you will be like a ghost clinging to the bushes and weeds.
Now, I want to ask you, what is the barrier of the patriarchs? Why, it is this single word “Emptiness.” That is the front gate to Zen.
Therefore it is called the “The empty gate of Zen. If you pass through it, you will not only see Joshu face to face, but you will also go hand in hand with the successive patriarchs, entangling your eyebrows with theirs, seeing with the same eyes, hearing with the same ears.
Isn’t that a delightful prospect? Wouldn’t you like to pass this barrier? Arouse your entire body with its three hundred and sixty bones and joints and its eighty-four thousand pores of the skin; summon up a spirit of great doubt and concentrate on this word “Emptiness.”
Carry it continuously day and night. Do not form a nihilistic conception of vacancy, or a relative conception of “has” or “has not.”
It will be just as if you swallow a red-hot iron ball, which you cannot spit out even if you try.
All the illusory ideas and delusive thoughts accumulated up to the present will be exterminated, and when the time comes, internal and external will be spontaneously united. You will know this, but for yourself only, like a dumb man who has had a dream.
Then all of a sudden an explosive conversion will occur, and you will astonish the heavens and shake the earth. It will be as if you snatch away the great sword of the valiant general Kan’u and hold it in your hand.
When you meet the Buddha, you kill him; when you meet the patriarchs, you kill them.
On the brink of life and death, you command perfect freedom; among the sixfold worlds and four modes of existence, you enjoy a merry and playful samadhi.
Now, I want to ask you again, “How will you carry it out?” Employ every ounce of your energy to work on this “Emptiness.” If you hold on without interruption, behold: a single spark, and the holy candle is lit!
My notes
Avalokiteśvara states, "Form is empty. Emptiness is form", and declares the other skandhas to be equally empty – that is, dependently originated. If we look at the Heart Sutra, we see the same word/character used in Case 1 as Joshu's answer to the question “Has a dog the Buddha Nature?”
Dependent origination, or dependent arising, states that all dharmas ("things") arise in dependence upon other dharmas: "if this exists, that exists; if this ceases to exist, that also ceases to exist." Teachings, while accurate descriptions of conventional truth, are mere statements about reality – they are not reality itself – and that they are therefore not applicable to the ultimate truth that is by definition beyond mental understanding. Hence the comparison of Buddha to teachings and the raft.
Shakyamuni became enlightened because of the realization of Emptiness.
The Bodhisattva of Compassion, When he meditated deeply, Saw the emptiness of all five skandhas And sundered the bonds that caused him suffering.
Indeed to concentrate on the Emptiness and dependent-origination brought Buddha enlightment. The empty gate of Zen is the way of no-way.
"There is no suffering, no accumulation, no cessation, no Way. And no understanding and no attaining because nothing is attained, the Bodhisattva, through reliance on Prajna paramita, is unimpeded in his mind because there is no impediment, he is not afraid, and he leaves distorted dream-thinking far behind. Ultimately he attains Nirvana! "
As stated in the Diamond Sutra: "As to any truth-declaring system, truth is undeclarable; so an 'enunciation of truth' is just the name give to it."
To attain this subtle realization, you must completely cut off the way of thinking.
As Shakyamuni said: "Who seeks me by form, Who seeks me in sound, Perverted are his footsteps upon the way; For he cannot perceive the Absolute."
If you do not pass the barrier, and do not cut off the way of thinking, then you will be like a ghost clinging to the bushes and weeds.
As stated in the Diamond Sutra: "Those who aspire to the consummation of incomparable enlightenment should recognize and understand all the varieties of things in the same way and cut off the arising of conceptual views,".
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Submitted August 01, 2017 at 06:20PM by 3DimenZ http://ift.tt/2f4CmUg
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