The Sutra of the Golden Eternity

The question sometimes comes up, “When did you start practicing?” I was speaking to someone at a Tibetan meditation center once, and neither of us could date it any more accurately than the date of our first precepts. I'd been what I call a “book Buddhist” for quite some time with no live and in-person sangha. But while doing my reading, I came to realize that the Zen writers provided me with the teachings that felt most comfortable. I'd say that it made sense more than Tibetan or Theravada, but let's face it, a more absurd statement could hardly be made. Eventually I found a Zen sangha, eventually took the Bodhisattva Precepts, and another set, and another set, and here I am.

But then the question came up why and how I even stumbled into Buddhism at all. In college, I'd tended more toward Existentialists and Chinese history, and a linear progression from that to Zen could make sense. That's not how it happened though. After graduation, my voracious reading material became the “Beats.” That, combined subliminally with the other two, were how my exposure to Buddhism budded. I probably have read everything Jack Kerouac wrote; most of these books I still have. Gary Snyder and Philip Whalen were both Beat and Zen monks/priests/lay monks, Ginsberg became more formally associated with Buddhism eventually by way of Naropa University if nothing else, but Kerouac may have been the first to delve into it.

“Dharma Bums” and “Satori in Paris” are two obvious Kerouac-penned titles, then there were “Wake Up!” and the “Scripture of the Golden Eternity,” which were seriously Dharma-influenced, and there's always “Some of the Dharma” for an overtly Dharma-titled piece. I could have pulled material from any and all of them, but then this might have just become an academic exercise, and that would precisely be not-the-point. Kerouac's Dharma writings are anything but academic.

For this, I went with “Golden Eternity” for a few reasons. While most of the others are for the most part prose, and as such involve plots, “Golden Eternity” is somewhere between prose and poetry, much like the Sutras can be. So I culled verses that, at least at the moment I was culling, stuck out to me as worthy of culling. And here they are:

1
Did I create that sky? Yes, for, if it was anything other than a conception in my mind I wouldnt have said "Sky"-That is why I am the golden eternity. There are not two of us here, reader and writer, but one, one golden eternity, One-Which-It-Is, That-Which- Everything-Is.
3
That sky, if it was anything other than an illusion of my mortal mind I wouldnt have said "that sky." Thus I made that sky, I am the golden eternity. I am Mortal Golden Eternity.
6
Strictly speaking, there is no me, because all is emptiness. I am empty, I am non-existent. All is bliss.
8
You are the golden eternity because there is no me and no you, only one golden eternity.
11
If we were not all the golden eternity we wouldn't be here. Because we are here we cant help being pure. To tell man to be pure on account of the punishing angel that punishes the bad and the rewarding angel that rewards the good would be like telling the water "Be Wet"-Never the less, all things depend on supreme reality, which is already established as the record of Karma earned-fate.

14
What name shall we give it which hath no name, the common eternal matter of the mind? If we were to call it essence, some might think it meant perfume, or gold, or honey. It is not even mind. It is not even discussible, groupable into words; it is not even endless, in fact it is not even mysterious or inscrutably inexplicable; it is what is; it is that; it is this. We could easily call the golden eternity "This."....

Both the word "god" and the essence of the word, are emptiness. The form of emptiness which is emptiness having taken the form of form, is what you see and hear and feel right now, and what you taste and smell and think as you read this. Wait awhile, close your eyes, let your breathing stop three seconds or so, listen to the inside silence in the womb of the world, let your hands and nerve-ends drop, re-recognize the bliss you forgot, the emptiness and essence and ecstasy of ever having been and ever to be the golden eternity. This is the lesson you forgot.
17
It came on time.
21
"Beyond the reach of change and fear, beyond all praise and blame," the Lankavatara Scripture knows to say, is he who is what he is in time and time-less-ness, in ego and in ego-less-ness, in self and in self-less-ness.
25
Though it is everything, strictly speaking there is no golden eternity because everything is nothing: there are no things and no goings and comings: for all is emptiness, and emptiness is these forms, emptiness is this one formhood.
28
Roaring dreams take place in a perfectly silent mind. Now that we know this, throw the raft away.
30
Sociability is a big smile, and a big smile is nothing but teeth. Rest and be kind.
32
"The womb of exuberant fertility," Ashvhaghosha called it, radiating forms out of its womb of exuberant emptiness. In emptiness there is no Why, no knowledge of Why, no ignorance of Why, no asking and no answering of Why, and no significance attached to this.
35
The words "atoms of dust" and "the great universes" are only words. The idea that they imply is only an idea. The belief that we live here in this existence, divided into various beings, passing food in and out of ourselves, and casting off husks of bodies one after another with no cessation and no definite or particular discrimination, is only an idea. The seat of our Immortal Intelligence can be seen in that beating light between the eyes the Wisdom Eye of the ancients: we know what we're doing: we're not disturbed: because we're like the golden eternity pretending at playing the magic cardgame and making believe it's real, it's a big dream, a joyous ecstasy of words and ideas and flesh, an ethereal flower unfolding a folding back, a movie, an exuberant bunch of lines bounding emptiness, the womb of Avalokitesvara, a vast secret silence, springtime in the Void, happy young gods talking and drinking on a cloud. Our 32,000 chillicosms bear all the marks of excellence. Blind milky light fills our night; and the morning is crystal.
37
When the Prince of the Kalinga severed the flesh from the limbs and body of Buddha, even then the Buddha was free from any such ideas as his own self, other self, living beings divided into many selves, or living beings united and identified into one eternal self. The golden eternity isnt "me." Before you can know that you're dreaming you'll wake up, Atman. Had the Buddha, the Awakened One, cherished any of these imaginary judgments of and about things, he would have fallen into impatience and hatred in his suffering. Instead, like Jesus on the Cross he saw the light and died kind, loving all living things.
38
The world was spun out of a blade of grass: the world was spun out of a mind. Heaven was spun out of a blade of grass: heaven was spun out of a mind. Neither will do you much good, neither will do you much harm. The Oriental imperturbed, is the golden eternity.
45
When you've understood this scripture, throw it away. If you cant understand this scripture, throw it away. I insist on your freedom.
47
The-Attainer-To-That-Which-Everything-Is, the Sanskrit Tathagata, has no ideas whatever but abides in essence identically with the essence of all things, which is what it is, in emptiness and silence. Imaginary meaning stretched to make mountains and as far as the germ is concerned it stretched even further to make molehills. A million souls dropped through hell but nobody saw them or counted them. A lot of large people isnt really a lot of large people, it's only the golden eternity. When St. Francis went to heaven he did not add to heaven nor detract from earth. Locate silence, possess space, spot me the ego.
"From the beginning," said the Sixth Patriarch of the China School, "not a thing is."
53
Everything's alright, form is emptiness and emptiness is form, and we're here forever, in one form or another, which is empty. Everything's alright, we're not here, there, or anywhere. Everything's alright, cats sleep.
58
Look at your little finger, the emptiness of it is no different that the emptiness of infinity.
65
This is the first teaching from the golden eternity.
66
The second teaching from the golden eternity is that there never was a first teaching from the golden eternity. So be sure.

 

Kerouac, Jack The Scripture of the Golden Eternity. New York, NY Corinth Books, 1960

There's a bit of the Dharma of Jack Kerouac, Jack's Sutra, as Gary Snyder suggested he write. Better known as a devout Catholic than Buddhist, he penned his Sutra with the heart of a Bodhisattva. Not a fan of Zen, but he quoted the Sixth Patriarch anyway. There are snippets of the Diamond, Lankavatara, and Surangama Sutras as well. He called it the Golden Eternity, you can call it the Dharmakaya, or Mind, or Buddha, doesn't matter. He calls it empty, or the Void; you may call it emptiness, form and formless realms, openness, it doesn't matter. You've just created those things and those words with your mind, just like you created the “sky.” Regardless of whether all are one, one is many, many are one, it just doesn't matter. Throw it all away. Smile, show your teeth, be kind. 

You can listen to the  Dharma Talk by clicking the title, or by navigating here:
https://soundcloud.com/onemindzen/sutra-of-the-golden-eternity 

Buddha-Nature, and Not-Buddha-Nature

Zen, like other Mahayana schools of Buddhism, has at its core Buddha Nature. Tagathagarbha is one word associated with Buddha Nature, as in the womb of the "thus-come." Dharmadhatu sometimes comes into play also, as in the Buddha-realm, the Absolute Reality, the Dharmakaya.

But getting back to Buddha Nature....We often hear phrases such as, "You're already Buddha," or, "You're perfect just as you are" (and Suzuki-Roshi wisely added, 'And you need a little work.')" So, am I perfect just as I am? Am I really already Buddha, or a Buddha, or what? If I'm already Buddha, then you must also be Buddha, and everyone else is, so who are all these Sentient Beings we Bodhisattvas are supposed to be saving anyway?

The good news is, just like Chao-chou's dog, we have Buddha Nature (Mu notwithstanding). But just what exactly is that? I certainly don't feel like Buddha. Not feeling particularly awakened this morning. My thus-come-ness just hasn't come today. (Why is it always late?!?) Innately, yes we are Buddha. We have the potential for awakening, we have the Nature of a Buddha within, just as a seed has the nature of becoming a flower within. But a seed is a seed, and a flower is a flower. You are in the womb of the Buddhas, just waiting to be awaked. We can all become enlightened, of conducting our lives fully in the Dharma Field (not that we aren't already, maybe we just don't realize it).

But if you've read any of the biographies of the Buddha, if you've read any of the old Suttas and legends, it becomes very apparent that even Gautama had a lot of work to do before he woke up as the Buddha. Now granted, he only had unenlightened teachers wandering the forests in his time, so he had to do the work on his own, without the aid of the glut of books we have today with his name, Zen, or mindfulness in their titles. (No wonder it took six years!)

Just because we've heard the term "Buddha Nature," and think it sounds kinda cool--who wouldn't want to be a Buddha--and maybe we think that we're living in reality, already in the Dharmadhatu.The fact that we become puffed-up about being Buddha, or thinking it's cool, maybe that it makes us a little special, at least more special than those poor bastards who've never heard that they're already Buddha--all these things make us "not-the-Buddha," at least for this moment. (That's as impermanent as anything else, give or take 84,000 kalpas or so).

We're already living in the Dharma-field, all dharmas are Buddhadharmas, but that includes the dharmas that we still struggle, we still have greed, and anger, and delusion, and aversions, and while they're all very un-awakened qualities and practices, we do indeed have that germ that may sprout into Buddhahood, that actual point at which we're doing right more than wrong, we're doing more good than not, being helpful more than turning a blind eye to the suffering of the world. A teacher of mine once referred to Buddha-Nature as what's there...underneath all the layers of crap (karma) we've gathered onto ourselves.

But Suzuki-Roshi had it right. There is work to be done! Don't think that since we're already Buddha, why bother practicing? Dogen already did that math a lot of centuries ago, and his school (Soto) practices "just sitting." Rigorous sitting at that, in fact. And if, in fact, there is no attainment to be done, and nothing to attain, doesn't mean we've already not-attained not-it. A few lines later in the Heart Sutra we find out that all Buddhas depend on prajnaparamita and attain Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi--Unexcelled Perfect Enlightenement.
So get on the cushion, then get off the cushion, and BE Buddha, not just rest on your laurels THINKING you're Buddha and being sloppy about life and practice. Do the work! (Save a sentient being or two while you're at it, even if there are no beings, and no saving to be done, OK?)

Deep bows to you, Buddha.

Just Verbs

Words: Nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs. A few other parts of speech (I'm being fonding of gerunds). Grammar, syntax, predicates, subjects, clauses, (I'm really fond of parenthetical statements). Bodhidharma, First Patriarch of Ch'an (Zen) that Awakening is beyond words...among other things. But of course, he said something—maybe that, somebody remembered what he said, someone else wrote it down. And it was communicated with those damn words. So given the inevitable game of telephone (if you're too young to know what that refers to, look it up!), and throw in a few centuries and languages worth of translation, Bodhidharma may have said “The Great Way is a bowl of rice, maybe a little cumin thrown in,” somebody else says, “Yeah, that doesn't have the same ring as 'Vast emptiness, nothing holy,' so I'll just massage it a little bit,” and thus begin the paradoxical statements associated with Zen. Or not, I wasn't there, so I'm only going by hearsay when you get down to it.

The Buddhist Sutras speak of the “Third Dharma-Ending Age,” during which people will be morally corrupt, unable to actually receive the Dharma, Shakyamuni's words will lose all ability to save people from their struggles. In some texts, Ksitigarbha (Jijang Bosal in Korea, Jizo in Japan, Dayuan Dizang Pusa in Mandarin) vows to take on the task of keeping things going until Maitreya comes along. (And also to empty hell, but that's another story). Now I'm sure there are some Buddhist “end-of-the-worlders” out there saying, “Yep, that's where we are now, degenerate age, corrupt people, 'why can't they just get it?,” the end times when you just want to go out on the corner of 47^th Street and Park Ave, and join the guy who screams at the Pan Am building about the “End Being Nigh” (he's been there a while).

These days Israelis are shelling Palestinian schools and hospitals, Palestinians are lobbing rockets into anywhere they'll reach in Israel, Sri Lankan and Burmese Buddhists are conducting pogroms against Muslims, Russia is either doing or not doing something in Ukraine, and there are any number of other conflicts and outright wars going on elsewhere in the world, so yep, this must be the Dharma Ending Age. Or not. Depending on your time-line frame of reference, there are those who might point out to the Crusades, the Feudal Warlord period of Japanese history, Stalin, British colonization, Hitler, the anti-Buddhist pogroms in China in either the 800's or the Cultural Revolution, and many other periods that could possibly fall into the “corrupt” and downright ignorant ages. 

Personally I don't put too much stock in any of that as signifying the End, as that's just a mental construct based in perceptions of what good and bad are supposed to be, more perceptions of what right and wrong are. After all, whoever was on the winning side of any of those events thought it was fine...until they lost, in which case the other side could say that they were right all along and were suffering at the hands of their oppressors and have since liberated “their” people. All these conversations going on in everybody's heads, each thinking the other knows exactly what they're talking about, and even than that, that the meaning of what they're talking about is coming through loud and clear.

Upon examining all this, Awakening being beyond words is looking pretty promising. Our innate Buddha-nature (a verbal description that is totally inaccurate and incapable of describing it) would say that we are already awakened, but maybe just a few layers of delusion need to be scraped off, some of the habits need to be broken. The point is, except in some rare cases, we all “know” how to behave—not an intellectual knowing, but the internal gyroscope of balanced behavior knowing—that sometimes gets buried by our preference for greed, anger, aversion, delusion and all those other things we do that we think will make us happy, but never quite get there, and if they do, not for long. If you look at any number of Buddhist forums, invariably there will be a point at which discussion goes way off the expedient means rails and heads into the ravine of, “I'M right! That's not what the Dharmakaya is, it's this! How can I save you, sentient being, if you're so stupid!?!”(The problems with the preceding being the dualism of right vs. wrong, the reification of Dharmakaya, the duality of that being different from any other -kaya, and “I'M” probably being the biggest mistake of all. And there will be those who quibble about “problems” and “mistake” being dualistic as well).
It's all fine just as it is, how could it be any other way that it is right now, including that type of interchange? Accepting the status quo as reality as it happens to be presenting itself in this moment, but without settling for the status quo, figuring out how, when present moves into the past and there's a new present presenting itself, what are the Buddha-things I can think and do that will lessen the struggle in the world in this moment. But what can I say....

Better come up with something. We're stuck with words. More often than not, there's a narrator inside my head, who if he isn't talking to me about what's going on at the moment, is doing a running commentary on what the other narrator is saying, and second-guessing half of it. That “thinking about thinking” issue, which more likely might be talking about thoughts in conversation with other voices describing the thoughts, but being the description of the thought rather than the thought itself. But every now and then there are those moments of what I assume to be clarity, when there are no nouns, no adjectives or adverbs. The sentence has no subject, there are definitely no pronouns, the only conjunction is “and” with no “or” or “but.” In those moments when all there are is verbs (and maybe gerunds if not descriptive), it doesn't feel so much like the Dharma-Ending Age, in fact it doesn't feel like any age in particular at all. It's just tasting, just seeing, just typing, just trying to figure out a way to use the correct words where words are totally inadequate. It's all “IS” with no “it's.” And that's all fine.

So Many Fingers

“What is Zen?” A question asked many times over the centuries, sometimes by non-practitioners—who need a definition, sometimes by practitioners who need a smack, a shout, silence, or any number of answers—and not-answers. By definition, Zen is a school of Buddhism (specifically Mahayana Buddhism) that emphasizes meditation and intuition.

That's the description I use when I give the 15-minute history of Zen Buddhism any time someone who has never practiced Zen before walks into the sangha for the first time. I start with Old Age, Sickness and Death, the Four Noble Truths, the Eightfold Path, the skip ahead to Bodhidharma. The Sanskrit word Dhyana, which translates as “meditation,” transliterated into Ch'an when it came to China, Seon in Korea, Thien in Vietnam, and in Japan, and now in the West, Zen. So “Zen Meditation” is redundant. And I go on briefly from there about the story of our order, the teachers in the lineage, and that lineages are meaningless, but somehow important among Zen practitioners.

For me, Zen is the above definition, and a means to end the struggle of people right here, right now. (I'll go with “struggle” as the translation of “dukkha” rather than the more common “suffering”). Most importantly, Zen practice is a means to end the struggle. We take the Bodhisattva vows, study Sutras, debate endlessly, get involved in semantic arguments, and do and say lots of things, which quite often miss this point. Zen is no more/no less a skillful means than any other school of Buddhism, and quite possibly any and all other traditions that by-and-large are concerned with the well-being of their fellows.

But for whatever reason, Zen monks asked the “What is Zen” question...and “What is Buddha,” and “Why did Bodhidhama come from the West,” and so on. And that's when they might get a pithy answer like “Mind is Buddha,” or “Ordinary Mind is Buddha,” or maybe hit with a fly-whisk, a shout, a raised finger, and whatever the expedient means the Master might have deemed appropriate at that moment. So many fingers, but how much moon?

Here's the moon: From Bodhidharma on, it is said that realization of one's True Nature is to be Awakened. And to realize Awakening is to have the struggle snuffed out. And at one moment, that could be to maintain a peaceful equanimity in the face of all situations, or it can be not struggling against moments of struggle. And, most importantly, it is “How may I help you?”

“Zen” is admittedly a noun today. To me, “Zen” is a verb, and definitely not an adjective. And it's not a part of “The Zen of....” But it is also all these things. The practice of Zen Buddhism is the practice of saving all sentient beings, but does that actually mean anything? It is the realization of the interconnectedness of everything, the interdependence of everything, the impermanence of everything, the emptiness of everything.

But it is also the individuality of everything, that feeling that I am me, and that I really can't imagine the world going on without me. It's thinking about my job that “they really have to pay me to do this, because otherwise....” It's greed, ignorance, anger, aversion, all the afflictions. It's fighting against all this, and it's ending the struggle of all this...in this moment. I've heard (yet another) statement that Zen practice is to directly experience reality form moment to moment, in the here&now.

And if your reality is a feeling of instant awakening, or of confusion, of disgust with even more paradoxical statements that confuse you, that is wonderful! Be totally confused, be thoroughly disgusted, be fully awakened, but then let them pass into impermanence, watch them come and go, then feel fully whatever comes next. And, if you can, do it without judging about what it is to have those feelings. Then, maybe, see the moon, and see the fingers. See the fingers are the moon! And not the moon. But just see! When I write about Zen, that's not Zen (noun). But when I write about Zen, that is Zen (verb).

Then I try to put it all down, have breakfast, wash my bowl, brush my teeth, go to work, say, “Man, they really have to pay me to do this,” then come back home...and while I'm at it, save all sentient beings. And yeah, there are no beings, and no saving to be done, but screw that. That as a concept isn't reality any more than those beings I think are separate from me, and no less real either.

May all beings be happy...by whatever means necessary.

Satisfaction (I Can't Get No)

The Rolling Stones as Dharma Gate? The Buddha's first Noble Truth points to dukkha, the human condition variously translated as suffering, anxiety, dis-ease, and, you guessed it, Dis-Satisfaction. Describing the 45-year teaching career, in the Alagaddupama Sutta the Buddha states, "I have taught one thing, and one thing only: dukkha and the cessation of dukkha."

I believe I can safely state that the Stones were never associated with the Middle Path. Sure, they did start out poor, and have certainly ended up wealthy, but along the way the way, the Middle was only that brief moment between one extreme and the other. Ascetic is a word I've never seen used an adjective to describe them. Likewise, I can't recall the Stones ever being described as Bodhisattvas. But there it is, in the song that made them a big-time band, the First Noble Truth; the human condition where there is this feeling that there's something I don't have, that my getting it will make me happy, that happiness will be lasting, and it will validate my "self" is spelled out right there. ( Maybe we can throw in "You Can't Always Get What You Want" as a follow-up First Noble Truth song. So the Second, Third and Fourth Noble Truths haven't shown up so far in a Stones song, but there's still a chance).

Originally, I was going to call this Enlightenment (I Can't Get No), because I read a lot of blogs and posts about Buddhism, Buddhists, "Buddhists," and one of the threads that pops up fairly often is the topic of Enlightenment. (I usually prefer the term "awakened," but Enlightenment is more universal as a term). Non-Buddhists don't seem so concerned about whether there is Enlightenment, whether one "has/is" it, but among the Buddhists, it's a major topic. Different schools will get into it based on Buddha-Nature, and whether that is variously "empty," and whether that means that we're all already buddhas.

The thing that starts it all is the definition of the word "buddha," one of which is "the Awakened one" or "the Enlightened one." Whether that also means that the cycle of samsara is ended, that nirvana has been achieved are of secondary importance for this case. The ending of "greed. aversion and desire" is certainly appropriate, as that's how nirvana is usually described, and the lack thereof, and that dukkha is the presence of greed, aversion and desire ties it all together.

If one considers themselves to be a Buddhist, then at some point this whole Enlightenment thing is bound to come up. How much time is spent in a state of dukkha because of what would typically be the end of dukkha is as paradoxical as any Zen kong-an. The feeling that there is this thing called Enlightenment, that I don't have it, and that I'm lacking something because I'm Not Enlightened, pretty much defines dukkha. I not only see that as ironic, but also paradoxically that in and of itself, this basically proves dukkha and provides that sense of dis-satisfaction.

In the Mahayana branch of Buddhism, and especially in Zen, there's the pervasive teaching of Buddha-Nature. Dogen Zenji had his quandary of "If I'm already Buddha, why practice?" There was the Huineng era split over sudden versus gradual enlightenment, then sudden enlightenment with gradual cultivation. And of course, there's even some discussion of what Buddha-Nature actually is, whether there even is an "is" to it, whether it's something that one "has," and what can even "have" "it." (The "Does a dog have Buddha-Nature?" "Wu!" kong-an is a prime example). All that being said, it's pretty obvious why tathagata-garbha doesn't come out as a teaching until one is some way along the path. No sense in introducing paradox before one is ready to confront it and become comfortable with it!

Various teachers have had equally paradoxical statements about Buddha-Nature/Enlightenment, from Suki-Roshi's "You're all perfect the way you are...and you need a little work," to Seung Sahn's collection of talks called, "Wanting Enlightenment is a Big Mistake," the irony there being that Seung Sahn had his enlightenment experience, after which he spent the rest of his life cultivating it. He had "Don't-Know Mind," Suzuki-Roshi had "Beginner's Mind." Do these teachings lead to Enlightenment, are they Enlightenment itself, or do they say something else altogether?

Does objectification of Enlightenment lead to dukkha, by way of dualism? So far as I'm concerned, absolutely. So far as absolutes go, in the Absolute, putting separation between "me" and everything else is delusion. Does "things-as-it-is" mean there's dialectic rather than dualistic, so far as Reality goes? Certainly seems so to me.

Jianzhi Sengcan, 3rd Zen (Ch'an) Patriarch wrote the poem Xinxin Ming in the late 6th Century CE. Here's a bit of it:

"The Great Way is not difficult                                  
It only excludes picking and choosing
Once you stop loving and hating
It will enlighten itself....

Don't waste time in doubts and arguments
that have nothing to do with this.
One thing, all things: move among and intermingle,
without distinction.To live in this realization
is to be without anxiety about non-perfection.
To live in this faith is the road to non-duality,
Because the non-dual is one with the trusting mind".

"And I tried and I tried and I tried and I tried, Can't get no...Satisfaction."

And that's OK. It's just the way things are. I don't have to suffer more dis-satisfaction just because sometimes I'm dissatisfied. When picking and choosing about whether picking and choosing is good or bad is gone too, then the Way indeed becomes smooth.

Dharma Gate...or Dharma Game

This statement, attributed to Bodhidharma, has set the tone for Zen practice for a millennium and a half:
Zen is..."A special transmission outside the scripture, not founded upon words and letters, by pointing directly to one's mind, it lets one see into one's own True Nature and thus attain Buddhahood."
Sure has been a lot of words, letters, and so on written and spoken about it though. I'm doing it right now. If you're reading this, you may have some interest in words about Zen also. Not good/not bad, just how things are. The words, though provisional, are what we have. They can be the Dharma Gate that ends suffering. They can be part of the Dharma Game to cause more.

Now there are lot of ways to spread the Dharma. My preference (however dualistic that may be) is for face-to-face, mind-to-mind communication. I'm fortunate enough to have a sangha that's nearby, and has a dharma-vibe that fits with me, and I fit with. At this point, I suppose I am part of the dharma-vibe. Again, not good/not bad, just how things are. The priest, Doshim Dharma, gives weekly Dharma Talks, which we record and put on our website (which you can link to from here: www.originalmindzen.com) and as a free podcast on iTu**s. (No commercial endorsements here, but I'm not going to make it difficult for you to hear the talks either).

The virtual sangha may have to suffice, or blogs, or websites, or books, or a couple magazines, semaphore signals across the ocean; the choices are almost endless. (I'll probably hit the impermanence of digital media elsewhere). Weeding through them can be a bit endless as well. Being inundated by information can be intimidating. Sorting through them as to what's a legitimate teaching versus nonsense may not be readily apparent, so there can sometimes be a lot of misleading words before actual Dharma is encountered. I'm firmly in the "all dharmas are buddha-dharmas" camp, but I also realize that all those buddha-dharmas are not necessarily really the Buddha's Dharma.

To put that in some context, from Section 17 of the Diamond Sutra (Red Pine translation):

"The Tathagata did not realize any such dharma as unexcelled, perfect enlightenment. Furthermore, Subhuti, in the dharma realized by the Tathagata, there is nothing true and nothing false. Thus, the Tathagata says, 'all dharmas are buddha-dharmas....All dharmas, Subhuti, are said by the Tathagata to be no dharmas. Thus are all dharmas called 'buddha-dharmas.'"

Admittedly one of the more paradoxical quotes to throw out there, and maybe one that a teacher should actually explain. Really briefly, all dharmas (all things, phenomenal, noumenal, and otherwise), are reality. No picking, no choosing; the most irrational, delusional, hideous stuff is no less a buddha-dharma than the most lovingkind, altruistic act ever performed, even one by Shakyamuni or Avalokiteshvara/Kwanseum-bosal/Quanyin/Kannon. NO PICKING NO CHOOSING!

There's this dharma called "Spiritual Materialism." Chongyam Trungpa referred to is as a way of accumulating spiritual achievements as if they were possessions. That's bad enough, but then to ostentatiously display them like a spiritual McMansion. And then there are also the ones who have decided to use (in the case of this blog's context) "Zen" and Zen as a way to earn a buck. Just because a "teaching" is spouted, regardless of its being as legitimate from an "existence" point of view (purely conditional/provisional/empty & impermanent) as a buddha-dharma, it doesn't mean that it's "words to live by." (As an aside, there's even a "fake Buddha quotes" website out there, which is really quite amusing).

And I'm not a big "What the Buddha said..." guy. I've found a lot of Sutras entirely inscrutable, and would need to have a teacher get the point across to me. I didn't get through the Diamond Sutra on my own, after all. So, in that case, what my teacher said counts as much as what the Buddha said. I've gotten a lot from Ch'an Masters, Huayan Masters (Fazang!), teachers that have come to the US from Asia (deep bows to Seung Sahn & Shunryu Suzuki-Roshi), and American teachers as well. All their Dharmas are Buddha-dharmas. We could be reading the Wonji Sutra someday along side the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch and the Avatamsaka Sutra. If it's legit, it's legit--and that's not picking and choosing. So far as I'm concerned, if it exhibits the Three Dharma Seals (Anicca/Impermanence, Dukkha/Suffering/Dissatisfaction, and Anatta/No-Self), it's legitimately "Buddhist" teaching. And there are plenty of non-Buddhist teachings that work too--we don't have the market cornered on "Truth." I'm not too concerned with them here.

My concern is whether any of the glut of words that call themselves "Zen" are misleading. Do they concern themselves with ending suffering? Do they show the impermanence of all dharmas, and in such a way that doesn't somehow cause more suffering? Do they exhibit a sense that Self-less is also selfless, as in feeling the interconnectedness among all us sentient beings? Or are the books and websites and forums and posts and so on, just a way to show off a kensho merit-badge? Is it an "I've got satori and you don't" ego-massage--as if there were something to be had? And even worse, "I've got Enlightenment, you don't, so you should pay me a high price to be in my presence, sit on a mat facing a wall for twelve hours a day, eat some rice in silence, and don't forget to buy my book and DVD on the way out."

Just because something has "Zen" in the title doesn't make it Zen. Great Doubt, Great Faith, Great Determination (Great Vow is thrown in sometimes too). Great Doubt--not necessarily skepticism of all things, but rather a realization of impermanence, that the firmness of my "self" isn't turning out to be true; Great Faith--in the Dharma, our teachers  (Shakyamuni and beyond), a sangha (physical or virtual) that will support us; Great Determination--that practice, practice, practice is an end in and of itself, no Great Payoff, no Great Merit, but practice, practice, practice anyway. And save all sentient beings while you're at it.

I've found that Zen works for me. But try it all on for size. Maybe Zen isn't for you.  And maybe some of what hasn't felt "right" has been because it isn't "right." You can use the Great Doubt for this also--that maybe the not-right teaching isn't right because it just doesn't stand up, that it's no more permanent than our lifespans. All teaching is provisional, all need to be suitable for the "taught" as well as the teacher. I've just seen a lot of stuff out there that I regard as questionable teaching, either missing a Dharma Seal, or in some cases just plain delusional to the point where it will cause more suffering rather than end it. I try to be more concerned with helping people avoid mistakes that either I've made, or have seen others make.

If it seems that a teacher is more adept at playing a Dharma Game rather than acting as a Dharma Gate, maybe it's because they are. Find another teacher. Don't necessarily write off Zen or Buddhism just because a certain teacher doesn't resonate. But seriously try it on for size before buying the Zen Hoodie.