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TL;DR: What does killing the ancient founders of the Zen tradition mean to you?
From Wumen’s commentary on case 1 of the Gateless Barrier:
If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha.
If you meet the ancients, kill the ancients.
We know this most famously as being translated as something like, “If you meet the Buddha kill the Buddha, If you meet the patriarchs, kill the patriarchs.”
So the first line is a falcon punch to the very roots of this tradition. What’s a Buddha? You. What’s getting killed here?
The second line about killing the ancients, the founders, the patriarchs is another deep hit as this includes the Chinese Zen Patriarchs, a crew that was closer to home for the Chan fam than the historical Buddha could ever be.
Linji, of course, originally took this to an even greater extreme by throwing our parents into the murder mix.
If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha; if you meet the patriarchs, kill the patriarchs; if you meet Arhats, kill Arhats; if you meet your parents, kill your parents; if you meet your relatives, kill your relatives; then for the first time you will see dearly.
Kill ‘em all, says Linji, and considering the contemporary culture of his time that was of course steeped in filial piety (Confucius), this was some boss fight level shit to be pulling out.
A note about translation:
逢佛殺佛
逢祖殺祖
逢 Meet by chance | 佛 Buddha | 殺 kill/murder | 佛 Buddha
逢 Meet by chance | 祖 ancestor/forefather/grandparents | 殺 kill/murder | 祖 ancestor/forefather/grandparents
Question for discussion:
What does killing the ancient founders of the Zen tradition mean to you?
Submitted November 10, 2019 at 11:30AM by madewithsticks https://ift.tt/34NalFs
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