Vines growing on a tree—Dahui often used this metaphor he inherited from his teacher as spoke out against the Zen of his time; his understanding was that his words were entangling, but his concern for the people studying Zen, and his contempt for those who misappropriate the authority of Zen to teach lies, compelled him to hold accountable the usurpers of the teaching. This is an exegesis of Dahui's "Not-Zen".
In various letters, Dahui discusses Zen "illnesses" and "divergences," ranging from his criticisms of the contemporary Silent Illumination School, to the scholarly approach of the official-class, including (1.1.5; 2.16.1; 2.20.2):
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“engirding mind," or maintaining a "mirror-like reflection" of what is presently manifest;
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forcibly “stopping-to-rest” [“silence-as-illumination”], or maintaining an "empty quiescence of quelling delusive thought;"
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attempting to reach a state of not-thinking/not-knowing, mistaking Zen for annihilation;
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accepting all conditions, and focusing on one's self-experience;
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being "bold and unconstrained," or maintaining "naturalness as the ultimate dharma;"
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considering Zen to be "one more line at the very end of a question-and-answer exchange;"
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forming groups to debate the old stories, saying this and that and other such comments;
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believing Zen's essential teaching is that all reality and the teachings are of “consciousness-only;”
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following the teachings of silent illumination.
Morton Schlütter, in How Zen Became Zen, traces the history of the formation of the Song Dynasty Caodong school. Before 1135, due to the popularity of Linji and Yuanwu, the Linji school dominated the Zen landscape of China, having already subsumed the Guiyang and Yunmen schools. The Caodong lineage had whittled down to one man, Dayang Jingxuan, who passed his teaching on to Fayuan, a member of the Linji school, before he died. Fayuan carried the lineage, without leaving the Linji school, naming Touzi Yiqing Jingxuan's successor.
After 1135, due to the popularity of Touzi's students, Furong Daokai and Dahong Baoen, the Caodong school revived—the demographics began changing, until nearly half of all Zen adherents thought of themselves as inheritors of Dongshan and Caoshan. This was the world Dahui lived.
In his discussion of the school, Dahui saw their method of concentration on stillness as heterodox. Silent illumination, to Dahui, was attempting to use mind to subdue mind, turning potential Zen students into holders of the "most inferior" views and method, droning on and on, saying, “empty! empty! quiescent! quiescent!," and attempting to search out their "ultimate peace and joy (2.8.1)." He saw these people as closing their eyes and shutting their mouths in silence, calling this the "inconceivable matter,” in terror of falling into the present, and "because they themselves have had no entrance into awakening," they did not believe there was any such thing (2.16.1; 1.5.2).
Dahui calls this "hogwash;" with no stable footing themselves, silent illumination taught people to practice "stillness-sitting" to unify the mind in silence; "Truly pathetic" (1.7.1). He saw this practice as perpetuating more delusive mental anxiety (1.1.3), and opened up the practioner to the danger of being lured through their preferences for "purity and indifference to worldly desires (1.8.3)." The consequence was that when they stopped engirding their minds, and temporarily restraining their bodies, their thoughts would grow rampant again, "still swirling about like wild horses (1.4.1)."
Dahui saw meditation as misunderstood; he called sitting "simply one instance of providing medicine in accordance with [the illness] (1.1.4)." Dahui said, "[meditation is] good medicine for stopping the mind," telling one individual, "If you can stop mind, then stop it for a little while (1.11.1)." He noted that when life became "noisy," it is beneficial to remember the stillness of the "sitting cushion," especially when the additional cacophony of preferring stillness and disliking noisiness began to subsume the mind (1.1.7); when restlessness or lethargy are present, pivot to the phrase one is working on (1.4.7). Otherwise, sitting does not create carefree rest, and fails to arrest cultivation, perpetuating struggle (1.9.2). At the last, doing phrase study, stillness-sitting, or otherwise, enlightenment is the measuring stick, and all methods are subsumed; Dahui says (1.4.5):
If you want true quietude to manifest, you must, in the midst of blazing arising-extinguishing, abruptly—in one bound—jump clear...if the mind of samsara is smashed—stillness will come of its own accord.
In like form to the adherents of silent illumination, who sought to sidestep enlightment, or shortcut the distance in perpetuity, Dahui saw the scholar-officials of his time as meandering down cul-de-sacs in search of an edge to overtake enlightenment. Dahui admonishes one recipient, saying (2.7.1):
If you’ve been getting tastiness from [discussions of such topics as] “principle and nature,” ...the sutra teachings, ...the sayings of the Chan patriarchal masters, ...sense objects you see and hear, ...raising your feet and progressing by steps, ...[or from] the functioning of your intellect, you’ve accomplished nothing whatsoever.
These scholar-officials suffer from another facet of the Zen illness; they attempt to repulse the uncertainty of action and meaning (1.10.2), and therefore draw a blank whenever asked about anything that is not discussion and reflection—seeking to achieve understanding, not realizing they've made a mistake. They've failed to see that raising quotations and sutras, even in perfect exegetical clarity, is an empty lifestyle (2.3.3; 2.14.1), where one is "pursued relentlessly by these words and phrases—until they are topsy-turvy (2.3.2)."
Dahui offers medicine for this disease; he says not to "casually poke and pry" into the ancient sayings (1.3.1), but rather concern yourself with becoming a buddha; ability to speak and respond and lead other beings will come naturally (1.2.3). Do not become impatient in one's desire to understand, misconstruing the fact that this, "on the contrary, is a matter of not clearly understanding (2.5.5)." Being unwilling to listen to the instruction of a good teacher, thinking one has "suddenly understood" before even a word has been uttered (1.10.4) is failure, as is accepting the easy "seal" of "imitation [Zen] (2.23.1)."
Through empty-headed meditation worshippers to pedantic know-it-alls, Dahui attempts to steer the discussion back towards recognizing delusive thinking, avoiding consumptive cultivation, and seeking out enlightenment first. In one of his few letters to Zen teachers, he expressed his concern that, of hundreds, not one Zen monk had broken through the case of Zhaozhou's dog (2.23.2). He felt he was attempting to help those who sought Zen in a time that, he feared, "the buddhadharma [was] on the point of extinction.” To one layman, he lays out in full the danger these people faced (1.8.4):
[Before Yama], the ability to discuss [texts] with unobstructed ease will be of no use. A “mind like wood or stone” will also be of no use. [When standing before Yama] you must be a person whose mind of samsara is smashed. If your mind of samsara is smashed, what further need is there to talk about “clarifying the spirit and settling the thoughts”? What further need is there to talk about “unrestrained ease”? What further need is there to talk about Buddhist and non-Buddhist texts? One comprehension will be all comprehensions, one awakening all awakenings, one realization all realizations. It is like cutting a bundle of silk threads—with one cut all-at-once severed.
The next sections will delve into Dahui's actual teaching, first by looking at the legend of the destruction of the Blue Cliff Record and Dahui's actual approach to study, and gongfu, Dahui's actual discussion of cultivation.
Submitted September 09, 2021 at 01:51AM by OneoftheUnfettered https://ift.tt/2VpfjJh
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