In tonight's Dharma talk, Dae'An Citta discuses the book "The Nature & Rationale of Zen/Chan Enlightenment - The Mind of a Pre-Natal Baby," by Professor Ming Gong Du. While this is an interesting approach, the author arrives at the destination in a less than convincing manner. In Zen we refer to one's Original Face, or your Face Before Your Parents Were Born, so the term pre-natal baby seems to fit that. There's also No Mind, Pre-Conceptual Mind, so it would seem promising.
However, there are a number of points where the book misses the mark, including some fairly major areas. He contends that Chan/Zen is more Daoist than Buddhist to the point where it isn't Buddhism at all, that it's an entity of its own, that it didn't start with Bodhidharma but with Huineng, among other points. But our Zen practice is "Don't Know Mind," and our direction is "How may I help you?"
The aspect of compassion in the practice is wholly overlooked in the book, and it could be argued that it's the most important element in Zen. ZM Seung Sahn is noted for saying, "Try, try, try for 10,000 years, become enlightened, and save all beings." The Bodhisattva vows are important! It's where we put our practice into action. It's fine to sit on a cushion and consider yourself enlightened, but what does that mean in the big picture if it stays there and isn't shared in the world. We have to be as comfortable in the world as we were in the womb. The Buddha and all the Zen Masters made saving all beings through their teaching their act of compassion. To be fully awake is to be fully compassionate.
