This essay is meant to be taken as a whole, but it is comprised of 14 sections, and is rather long. Though the reader can return to the hub at any time to gain access to all other sections of the essay, each and every section is also written to be a standalone essay, should the reader choose to read only that.
Section 2: Clearly Seeing the Effects of Gradual Practices
Having discussed the gradual and painful effects of following the doctrines of those schools that "do not understand the truth,"(2.49) this section will look at the philosophical underpinnings of why Huangbo rejects gradual enlightenment. We will seek to understand why these practices are false, what the real nature of "attainment" is, and what are better solutions for those who still seek enlightenment.
Huangbo says that all practices, and progress by stages, are illusory, and that there are no jewels to be found to adorn the Void.(1.19) They are quite dismissive of people who think otherwise, saying:
2.37.As for those people who seek to grasp it through the application of some particular principle or by creating a special environment, or through some scripture, or doctrine, or age, or time, or name, or word, or through their six senses—how do they differ from wooden dolls?
These people are wasting time, according to Huangbo. They go on to say:
1.13.The eighty-four thousand methods for countering the eighty-four thousand forms of delusion are merely figures of speech for drawing people towards the Gate. In fact, none of them have real existence.
These false doctrines fail because they misunderstand the nature of Mind, as discussed later in another section. Huangbo would have us see how those who have settled the matter see these practices in the context of Zen:
2.54.When the lotus opened and the universe lay disclosed, there arose the duality of Absolute and sentient world; or, rather, the Absolute appeared in two aspects which, taken together, comprise pure perfection. These aspects are unchanging reality and potential form. For sentient beings, there are such pairs of opposites as becoming and cessation, together with all the others. Therefore, beware of clinging to one half of a pair. Those who, in their singleminded attempt to reach Buddhahood, detest the sentient world, thereby blaspheme all the Buddhas of the universe. The Buddhas, on manifesting themselves in the world, seized dung-shovels to rid themselves of all such rubbish as books containing metaphysics and sophistry.
These dung shovels will be discussed later as the practice of non-conceptualization.
Huangbo explains the real nature of attainment almost right away, saying "That there is nothing which can be attained is not idle talk; it is the truth."(1.06) This is where gradual progress to enlightenment goes wrong. Huangbo quotes and comments on the words of Chih Kung;
1.34.‘The Buddha is really the creation of your own Mind. How, then, can he be sought through scriptures?' Though you study...until your mind is full of them, you will merely be balancing yourself between ‘ordinary' and ‘Enlightened'. Not to see that all methods of following the Way are ephemeral is samsāric Dharma.
Huangbo sees that people naturally want to pick something up to play with; but all the strenuous efforts masks the nature of enlightenment, which will be discussed in the last section of the essay. They denigrate those who seek practices, quoting Ch‘ing Ming:
2.26.There are people with minds like those of apes who are very hard to teach; people who need all sorts of precepts and doctrines with which to force their hearts into submission.
These people wish to attain something, and do so in the best way they know how. They do not understand what Huangbo says; that there is nothing to attain. To them, Huangbo says:
2.26...all dharmas such as those purporting to lead to the attainment of Bodhi possess no reality. The words of Gautama Buddha were intended merely as efficacious expedients for leading men out of the darkness of worse ignorance. It was as though one pretended yellow leaves were gold to stop the flow of a child's tears.
In their effort to help those who are struggling, Huangbo offers better ways of seeing and practicing that will clarify the issue faster, and less painfully, than the various methods taught in the Buddhist schools. They warn us that:
1.30.Above all it is essential not to select some particular teaching suited to a certain occasion, and, being impressed by its forming part of the written canon, regard it as an immutable concept. Why so? Because in truth there is no unalterable Dharma which the Tathāgata could have preached. People of our sect would never argue that there could be such a thing. We just know how to put all mental activity to rest and thus achieve tranquillity. We certainly do not begin by thinking things out and end up in perplexity.
As Huangbo has said previously, it is not impossible to discover enlightenment through these various methods, but that they fail to see the issue for what it is; One Mind; no attainment. Huangbo cites the story of Elder Shên Hsiu as a warning:
1.36.Q: The Sixth Patriarch was illiterate. How is it that he was handed the robe which elevated him to that office? Elder Shên Hsiu occupied a position above five hundred others and, as a teaching monk, he was able to expound thirty-two volumes of Sūtras. Why did he not receive the robe?
A: Because he still indulged in conceptual thought—in a dharma of activity. To him ‘as you practise, so shall you attain' was a reality.
Practice, then attain. This is not the school of Bodhidharma.
Huangbo wants us to understand that these are worthless attempts at something that needs no tricks, no great difficulties, to comprehend. Just see things the way they do:
2.42.I assure you that all things have been free from bondage since the very beginning. So why attempt to explain them? Why attempt to purify what has never been defiled?
No great process over many reincarnations; just to reach a complete understanding now, where we are standing. We know we are at the gate "When a sudden flash of thought occurs in your mind and you recognize it for a dream or an illusion, then you can enter into the state reached by the Buddhas of the past..."(2.37)
Submitted October 09, 2020 at 04:57PM by surupamaerl https://ift.tt/3lqP8t6
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