Previous post includes full case text, Blyth's commentary, and ewk's inscrutable top comment
[Excerpt]
[...] "I am not a human being. In the far distant past, in the time of Kashō Buddha, I was the head monk here. On one occasion a certain monk asked me whether an enlightened man could fall again under the chain of cause and effect, and I answered that he could not. Thus I have for five hundred lives been reborn a fox. I now beg you to release me from this rebirth by causing a change of mind through your words." Then he asked Hyakujō, "Can an enlightened man fall again under the chain of cause and effect or not?"
Hyakujō answered, "No one can set aside (the law of) cause and effect." The old man immediately became enlightened, and making his bows, he said, "I am now released from rebirth as a fox and my body will be found on the other side of this mountain. I wish to make a request of you. Please bury me as a dead monk."
wrrdgrrl: For five hundred lives I have returned again and again to this riddle. I ought to know by now that questions, even/especially the simplest-sounding questions, when coming from the zen dudes, are most likely a hook or a test. Returning to this case with this in mind, I'm turning over some new(er) questions:
1. Is the old man teaching Hyakujo about cause and effect? Did the questioning monk teach the old man with his question? Does cause-and-effect require two to tango? - "release me from this rebirth by causing a change of mind through your words..." Is becoming enlightened and then falling again under the chain an example of cause-and-effect? Is this even a thing, guys?
2. If cause-and-effect requires two to trap, what does that say about she who neither falls under nor sets aside the chain of cause-and-effect? Is this someone more (or less) fully rooted in reality? Is "rooted in reality" even a thing, guys?
Submitted May 14, 2020 at 12:33AM by wrrdgrrl https://ift.tt/2WU6oMB
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