Applying the teachings of The Mumonkan to the Zen forum: Don't you know that the real Zen student commands sounds, controls forms, is clear-sighted at every event and free on every occasion?

The Mumonkan: When the Bell Sounds [16th Case]

​

Unmon said, "The world is vast and wide.

Why do you put on your seven-piece robe at the sound of the bell?"¹

​

Mumon's Comment

In studying Zen, you should not be swayed by sounds and forms.²

Even though you attain insight when hearing a voice or seeing a form, this is simply the ordinary way of things.

Don't you know that the real Zen student commands sounds, controls forms, is clear-sighted at every event and free on every occasion?³

Granted you are free, just tell me: Does the sound come to the ear or does the ear go to the sound?

If both sound and silence die away, at such a juncture how could you talk of Zen?

While listening with you ear, you cannot tell. When hearing with your eye, you are truly intimate.

______________________________________________________________________

Wandering Ronin commentary and questions:

1. Why do you put on your seven-piece robe at the sound of the bell? In part, this speaks directly to conditioning, or habitual reactions that we may fall into when certain situations come up. As often taught in Zen, freedom is in the direction of not reacting to phenomena as they appear, and in not being bound by conceptual thinking or the restrictions of emotion. To react with emotion to a condition is to be controlled by that condition and to immediately lose freedom. Loss of freedom leads to suffering, and more importantly, can create a vicious cycle that becomes even harder to leap clear of. This is why the dropping of conceptual reasoning is so crucial.
2. In studying Zen, you should not be swayed by sounds and forms. One great benefit of seeing the Zen forum as a part of one's practice is that it is a meeting of minds and all types of understandings. There are going to be discussions, debates and even challenges. The more I learn here, the more I see that there should be no upset or argument regarding someone else's understanding; problems can only arise if someone is here with no interest in Zen, or if they try to unskillfully establish their particular understanding as the right understanding. That isn't Zen, but the antithesis of Zen, which is merely egocentric and self-centered reasoning.
3. Don't you know that the real Zen student commands sounds, controls forms, is clear-sighted at every event and free on every occasion? Something crucial that one may eventually come to an understanding of in Zen is that we are directly and ultimately responsible for each and every reaction that we have to the myriad things. How could it be otherwise? Yes, people are responsible for their actions and yes there are consequences, but with true understanding, we decide what our reactions to these phenomena are going to be. Nothing whatsoever means anything until we grant it meaning, which is a responsibility and power that can be very difficult to accept.

Submitted October 30, 2019 at 07:14PM by WanderingRoninXIII https://ift.tt/2JyRB4g