Tag: Zen

Hogen of Seiryo monastery was about to lecture before dinner when he noticed that the bamboo screen lowered for meditation had not been rolled up. He pointed to it. Two monks arose from the audience and rolled it up.
Hogen, observing the physical moment, said: `The state of the first monk is good, not that of the other.’

Mumon’s Comment: I want to ask you: Which of those two monks gained and which lost? If any of you has one eye, he will see the failure on the teacher’s part. However, I am not discussing gain and loss.

When the screen is rolled up the great sky opens,
Yet the sky is not attuned to Zen.
It is best to forget the great sky
And to retire from every wind.

In a dream Kyozen went to Maitreya’s Pure Land. He recognized himself seated in the third seat in the abode of Maitreya. Someone announced: `Today the one who sits in the third seat will preach.’
Kyozen arose and, hitting the gavel, said: `The truthof Mahayana teaching is transcendent, above words and thought. Do you understand?’

Mumon’s Comment: I want to ask you monks: Did he preach or did he not?

When he opens his mouth he is lost. When he seals his mouth he is lost. If he does not open it, if he does not seal it, he is 108,000 miles from the truth.

In the light of day,
Yet in a dream he talks of a dream.
A monster among monsters,
He intended to deceive the whole crowd.

A monk asked Fuketsu: `Without speaking, without silence, how can you express the truth?’
Fuketsu observed: `I always remember spring-time in southern China. The birds sing among innumerable kinds of fragrant flowers.’

Mumon’s Comment: Fuketsu used to have lightning Zen. Whenever he had the oppurtunity, he flashed it. But this time he failed to do so and only borrowed from an old Chinese poem. Never mind Fuketsu’s Zen. If you want to express the truth, throw out your words, throw out your silence, and tell me about your own Zen.

Without revealing his own penetration,
He offered another’s words, not his to give.
Had he chattered on and on,
Even his listeners would have been embarassed.

When he became emancipated the sixth patriach received from the fifth patriach the bowl and robe given from the Buddha to his successors, generation after generation.
A monk named E-myo out of envy pursued the patriach to take this great treasure away from him. The sixth patriach placed the bowl and robe on a stone in the road and told E-myo: `These objects just symbolize the faith. There is no use fighting over them. If you desire to take them, take them now.’

When E-myo went to move the bowl and robe they were as heavy as mountains. He could not budge them. Trembling for shame he said: `I came wanting the teaching, not the material treasures. Please teach me.’

The sixth patriach said: `When you do not think good and when you do not think not-good, what is your true self?’

At these words E-myo was illumined. Perspiration broke out all over his body. He cried and bowed, saying: `You have given me the secret words and meanings. Is there yet a deeper part of the teaching?’

The sixth patriach replied: `What I have told you is no secret at all. When you realize your true self the secret belongs to you.’

E-myo said: `I was under the fifth patriach for many years but could not realize my true self until now. Through your teaching I find the source. A person drinks water and knows himself whether it is cold or warm. May I call you my teacher?’

The sixth patriach replied: `We studied together under the fifth patriach. Call him your teacher, but just treasure what you have attained.’

Mumon’s Comment: The sixth patriach certainly was kind in such an emergency. If was as if he removed the skin and seeds from the fruit and then, opening the pupil’s mouth, let him eat.

You cannot describe it, you cannot picture it,
You cannot admire it, you cannot sense it.
It is your true self, it has nowhere to hide.
When the world is destroyed, it will no be destroyed.

Anada asked Kashapa: `Buddha gave you the golden-woven robe of successorship. What else did he give you?’
Kashapa said: `Ananda.’

Ananda answered: `Yes, brother.’

Said Kashapa: `Now you can take down my preaching sign and put up your own.’

Mumon’s Comment: If one understands this, he will see the old brotherhood still gathering, but if not, even though he has studied the truth from ages before the Buddhas, he will not attain enlightenment.

The point of the question is dull but the answer is intimate.
How many persons hearing it will open their eyes?
Elder brother calls and younger brother answers,
This spring does not belong to the ordinary season.

A monk asked Ummon: `What is Buddha?’ Ummon answered him: `Dried dung.’

Mumon’s Comment: It seems to me Ummon is so poor he cannot distinguish the taste of one food from another, or else he is too busy to write readable letters. Well, he tried to hold his school with dried dung. And his teaching was just as useless.

Lightning flashes,
Sparks shower.
In one blink of your eyes
You have missed seeing.

Shogen asked: `Why does the enlightened man not stand on his feet and explain himself?’ And he also said: `It is not necessary for speech to come from the tongue.’

Mumon’s Comment: Shogen spoke plainly enough, but how many will understand? If anyone comprehends, he should come to my place and test out my big stick. Why, look here, to test real gold you must see it through fire.

If the feet of enlightenment moved, the great ocean would overflow;
If that head bowed, it would look down upon the heavens.
Such a body hsa no place to rest….
Let another continue this poem.

Joshu asked Nansen: `What is the path?’
Nansen said: `Everyday life is the path.’

Joshu asked: `Can it be studied?’

Nansen said: `If you try to study, you will be far away from it.’

Joshu asked: `If I do not study, how can I know it is the path?’

Nansen said: `The path does not belong to the perception world, neither does it belong to the nonperception world. Cognition is a delusion and noncognition is senseless. If you want to reach the true path beyond doubt, place yourself in the same freedom as sky. You name it neither good nor not-good.’

At these words Joshu was enlightened.

Mumon’s Comment: Nansen could met Joshu’s frozen doubts at once when Joshu asked his questions. I doubt that if Joshu reached the point that Nansen did. He needed thirty more years of study.

In spring, hundreds of flowers; in autumn, a harvest moon;
In the summer, a refreshing breeze; in winter snow will accompany your.
If useless things do not hang in your mind,
Any season is a good season for you.

A monk asked Tozan when he was weighing some flax: `What is Buddha?’

Tozan said: `This flax weighs three pounds.’

Mumon’s Comment: Old Tozan’s Zen is like a clam. The minute the shell opens you see the whole inside. However, I want to ask you: Do you see the real Tozan?

ThrZee pounds of flax in front of your nose,
Close enough, and mind is still closer.
Whoever talks about affirmation and negation
Lives in the right and wrong region.

Chu, called Kokushi, the teacher of the emperor, called to his attendant: `Oshin.’
Oshin answered: `Yes.’

Chu repeated, to test his pupil: `Oshin.’

Oshin repeated: `Yes.’

Chu called: `Oshin.’

Oshin answered: `Yes.’

Chu said `I ought to apologize for you for all this calling, but really you ought to apologize to me.’

Mumon’s Comment: When Old Chu called Oshin three times his tongue was rotting, but when Oshin answered three tiems his words were brilliant. Chu was getting decrepit and lonesome, and his method of teaching was like holding a cow’s head to feed it clover.

Oshin did not trouble to show his Zen either. His satisfied stomach had no desire to feast. When the country is prosperous everyone is indolent; when the home is wealthy the children are spoilt.

Now I want to ask you: Which one should apologize?

When prison stocks are iron and have no place for the head, the prisoner is doubly in trouble.
When there is no place for Zen in the head of our generation, it is in grievous trouble.
If you try to hold up the gate and door of a falling house,
You also will be in trouble.