The Real Shobogenzo: Concentration

From Dahui's Shobogenzo, translated by Cleary:

When meditation master Hai of Shao province first met the sixth patriarch, he asked, “’Mind itself is Buddha’—please provide instruction.”

The patriarch said, “When the preceding thought is not produced, this is mind itself; the following thought not passing into extinction is Buddha. Formulating all descriptions is mind, detachment from all descriptions is Buddha. If I were to explain in full, it would take eons and still not be finished. Listen to my verse:

Mind itself is called insight;

Being Buddha is concentration.

When insight and concentration are maintained equally,

In the mind is purity.

Understanding this teaching

Depends on the nature you’ve developed.

Its function is rooted in no origination;

Twin cultivation is correct.”

Twin cultivation?

Lu Yan (829-874), Turning the Light Around and keeping to the Center:

The terms stopping and seeing basically cannot be separated. They mean concentration and insight. Hereafter, whenever thoughts arise, you don't need to sit still as before, but you should investigate this thought: where is it? Where does this come from? Where does it disappear? Push this inquiry on and on over and over until you realize it cannot be grasped; then you will see where the thought arises. You don't need to seek out the point of arising any more. "Having looked for my mind, I realize it cannot be grasped."

This is correct seeing; whatever is contrary to this is false seeing. Once you reach this ungraspability, then as before you continuously practice stopping and continue it by seeing; practice seeing and continue it by stopping. This is the twin cultivation of stopping and seeing. This is turning the light around.

The turning around is stopping, the light is seeing. Stopping without seeing is call turning around without light; seeing without stopping is called having light without turning it around. Remember this.

This is the twin cultivation of stopping and seeing. This is turning the light around.

Turning the light around is Kensho, or is Jianxing (in Chinese), which means seeing nature, as in the four statements of Zen:

a special transmission outside the scriptures (jiaowai biechuan, 教外別傳); not established upon words and letters (buli wenzi, 不立文字); directly pointing to the human heartmind (zhizhi renxin, 直指人心); seeing nature and becoming a Buddha (jianxing chengfo, 見性成佛).

Submitted November 27, 2018 at 11:46AM by Dillon123 https://ift.tt/2zo3C7u