Dongshan’s record series #13
The prior returned from a visit to Shih-shih. Yün-yen asked him, "Since you entered the Stone Caverns, you shouldn't return just so, should you?"
The prior made no reply.
Dongshan replied for him, "Someone had already occupied his place there."
Yün-yen said to Dongshan, "And what will you do when you go?"
The Master said, "One should not break with customary etiquette."
Firstly – sorry for the SHOUTING in previous post titles. And thanks to u/dustorlegs for pulling me aside.
Shih-shih means “Stone Caverns” – where Yunyen met Dongshan. The question from Yunyen was referring to both a person and a place. Not at all unusual in Zen. Powell suggests that the one the prior had visited at the caves was probably Shih-shih Shan-Tao1:
What is returning “just so”? This is probably a play on Tathata, the ultimate, or “Suchness” – Just this! Powell suggests that it may be referring to Huineng questioning Nanyue Huairang:
“When Huairang first arrived, Master Huineng asked, “Where did you come from?”
Huairang said, “From Mt. Song.”
The master asked, “What is it that has come?”
Huairang was stuck and couldn't answer. He then decided to stay and practice there.”
There is some “copy of a copy” recursion there. Imagine a zen text doing that! /s
If the “thus-come-one” is the Tathagata, the Buddha herself, then why shouldn’t the prior be returning “just so”? I think Yunyen is prodding the Prior to not make a nest of suchness – to not attach to the one who doesn’t come or go. But...I don't know.
Like Nanyue, the Prior doesn’t answer, so Dongshan steps in, saying “Someone had already occupied his place there.” Does this echo the way “the son” was talked about in the prior case? - always answering, always faithful - the son 'exists' where space is completely occupied, without any way to get even a needle in. By his answer, Dongshan gets in Yunyens crosshairs: “And what will you do when you go?” If the place is already occupied, how will you deal with this matter of coming and going? What will you be like on entry and exit? Dongshan says he will "not break with customary etiquette."
Question: We all live in the light of extraordinary wonders. We open up and we see them displayed throughout the cosmos. But, when we return, although we know forever that it is “just so” – how do we walk back into our homes/offices/land? Truly - it is the practice of a lifetime.
1 “Note 35(part: According to accounts of him in) TTC5 and CTL14, he was a mid-ninth-century monk who, at the end of the great Buddhist purge of 845, did not reassume his robes, but took up residence in the Stone Caverns of Yuhsien, living as an ascetic. As a form of practice, he operated a foot-driven millstone. See Blue Cliff Record, case 34.”)
Submitted April 26, 2021 at 10:40AM by bigSky001 https://ift.tt/2R2wlKY
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