Author: Zen Fools

Those who can realise this, do so at once, without training or testimonial, without gain or loss. There is no other Dharma. Were there a special one, I say it is like a phantom and a dream. This is all that I teach.

 

Commentary:

‘Those who can realise this’ means those who can see and hear things as they are without being deluded by their names, that is, those who can attain enlightenment. ‘Do so at once, without training or testimonial’ implies that enlightenment comes suddenly, not gradually in the way knowledge is acquired through academic training, or by testimonial.

‘Without gain or loss’ means that enlightenment is not to gain good things and lose bad things but to realise that we are already so perfect that there is nothing to be gained to compensate for our deficiency, and nothing wrong to be removed for our perfection. So, Buddha, according to the Diamond Sutra, said, “I’ve never gained anything at all, even the smallest thing. My highest enlightenment is just a name.”

 

‘Were there a special one, I say it is like a phantom and a dream’ means that we should be able to see everything as empty without any exception, including Buddha, which is more often than not compared to seeing things as a dream. According to the Diamond Sutra, Buddha said, “If you see things as a dream, you will see the true-Self.”

 

Student: “How can we see Buddha if you ask us to see even Buddha as an illusion?”

Master: “That’s the way you can see Buddha?”

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

 

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A. When you say that your trying to stay in the present moment feels unbearable, do you mean that you are thrown into the future or the past against your will? How miraculous it would be if it were really possible! How many old people are anxious to return to their past, their youth, and how many young people long to see what their futures will be like?

To stay in the present moment generally means to focus your attention on the work you are doing at this moment without wasting your time and effort struggling with your irreversible memories of the past, or worries about the future which has not yet come.

However, if you, following the words literally, try to stay in the present moment, what is the present moment you seek to stay in when everything changes every moment without respite? You should know better than to be dazzled and deluded by such plausible sounding rhetoric. Trying to stay in the present moment is not different from trying to obtain the horn of a rabbit because there is, in reality, no present moment. This is namely to be deluded by the illusion of ‘present moment’.

Buddhist teaching doesn’t tell you to stay in the present moment but teaches you to realise that present, future and past are empty since they are all imaginary lines.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

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According to the Sutras, Buddha once said, “I transmit the true Dharma that I have, to my student, Mahakasyapa.” before the congregation one day. Regarding this, a monk asked Master Heung-hwa, “What did Buddha transmit to Mahakasyapa then?” The master answered, “One person transmitted falsely, and ten thousand people transmitted truly.”

 

Student: “What’s the difference between what was truly transmitted and what was falsely transmitted?”

Master: “I transmit the true Dharma to you now. I hope you are quick to take it.”

Student: “Thank you, but I don’t know how to take it.”

Master: “Why do you try to take truly what I falsely transmitted?”

 

Commentary:

What can be transmitted or taken is not the true Dharma.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

A monk asked: “What are Buddha and Mara?”

The master said: A moment of doubt in your heart is Mara. But if you can grasp that the ten thousand things are unborn and that the heart is like an illusionary fantasy, then nothing even of the size of a speck of dust exists — everywhere is purity — this is Buddha. It may be said that Buddha and Mara present the pure and the tainted state; yet as I see it there is no Buddha, no living being, no past, no present.

Commentary:

‘A moment of doubt in your heart’ means to identify all things with their names and mistakenly regard these names as the essence of the things, that is, to be deluded by words. ‘The ten thousand things are unborn’ implies that nothing comes into existence on its own and that everything is of our own imaginary creation. ‘The mind is like an illusionary fantasy’ means that the ‘mind’ regarded as the true-Self by practitioners is also a kind of name, an imaginary label created by us and that it is originally nameless. If you can see everything in this way, you realise that nothing even of the size of a speck of dust exists on its own and that everything is empty. ‘As I see it there is no Buddha, no living being, no past, no present’ means that although Buddha and Mara are said to present the pure and the tainted states respectively, Master Rinzai himself is aware that there is no Buddha, no living being, no past, no present since he can see everything as empty without being deluded by their illusions, names.

 

Student: “What is the difference between Buddha and Mara?”

Master: “What changes is Mara and what never changes is Buddha.”

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

 

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A. It depends on how you see. If you confine yourself to your physical body as separate from the world, you are in the world. If you eliminate all names from yourself and remove the boundary of you that defines your body as you, there is nothing, not to mention the world, that is not in you.

 

Seeing and hearing everything in the former way is seeing things as forms and seeing and hearing everything in the latter way means seeing things as Emptiness. The ability to see things in both ways at the same time, just as we can see a cup and porcelain at the same time when seeing a porcelain cup, is enlightenment.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

 

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Master Dae-ja asked, “Where are you going?” when a monk said farewell. The monk said, “I am going to my hometown.” The master said, “Can you take me there with you?” The monk answered, “I can’t take not just you but also even one who is superior to you.”

 

Student: “Why can’t the monk take the master with him?”

Master: “Because even he can’t go there if he takes anyone or anything with him.”

 

Commentary:

Going there takes no time. What takes time and makes the trip difficult is to abandon all people and everything.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

 

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For if Buddha and Mara happen to appear in one form, he could not differentiate them. Yet, as the gander king knows how to drink only the milk from a mixture of milk and water, so does the clear eye.

Followers of the Way, just beat up both Buddha and Mara. For if you love the sacred and hate the worldly, you go on floating and sinking in the ocean of birth and death.

Commentary:

Buddha is to Mara as Emptiness is to forms. Buddha and Mara are not different and separate from each other but one in the same way Emptiness is the same as forms. So, an ancient master would say, “There is a precious treasure hidden amidst forms between the sky and the earth.” Buddha and Mara always appear as one. That’s why they are said to be as difficult to distinguish from each other as milk and water are to distinguish from each other in a mixture of milk and water. An enlightened man is compared to ‘the gander king’ which can drink just the milk out of a mixture of milk and water.

‘Just beat up both Buddha and Mara’ means that we should not be tempted to cling to Buddha and the sacred, or to hate and avoid Mara and the worldly since all of them are only illusions. In fact, all the labels, imaginary lines, including Buddha and Mara, are just illusions, which are also known as Mara. The state without any illusions is Buddha.

Student: “How can I beat up Buddha and Mara?”

Master: “You don’t have to try in vain to remove the horns of a rabbit.”

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

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A. Every moment is the end of something and the start of something new at the same time. Nothing is what it was yesterday since everything is in ceaseless change. It’s why a philosopher said that no one can swim in the same river twice. In Buddhism, it is said that everything that comes into being is bound to perish sooner or later.

 

The essence of Buddhism is to realise what survives the end of, not only the earth, but also all the other things.

 

Student: “What survives the end of the earth?”

Master: “The earth is from it.”

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

 

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When a monk asked Master Sulbong, “How can I take a boat that can cross the ocean of birth and death?”, the master answered, “If you get on a raft, it will sink to the bottom, and if you get on a boat, it will sink, too.”

 

Student: “Why do a raft and a boat sink whenever we board them?”

Master: “Because no vehicle is large enough to accommodate you.”

Student: “Then, how can I cross the ocean?”

Master: “Why don’t you jump over it?”

 

Commentary:

In order to reach your destination, you should know where you are now above all.

 

©Boo Ahm

 

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

 

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One cannot call them true leavers of home; they are just ordinary laymen. A man who has left home should know how to see clearly and calmly, should know Buddha from Mara, the true from the false, the worldly from the sacred. If he has got this knowledge, he can truly be called a leaver of home. If he does not know Buddha from Mara, then in effect he leaves one home only to enter another, and is what is called a karma-producing living being. He cannot yet be called a true leaver of home.

 

Commentary:

‘Them’ in ‘one cannot call them true leavers of home’ refers to the people who avoid crowded and noisy places and stick to only quiet places in order to enter the Path.‘Leavers of home’ has two meanings. One means those who have become monks for the purpose of attaining enlightenment. The other means enlightened people who have escaped home, that is, a burning house that symbolises the mundane world full of suffering. So, true leavers of home here means enlightened monks. ‘Know Buddha from Mara, the true from the false, the worldly from the sacred’ means to see and hear everything in both ways; as Emptiness and as forms. ‘In effect he leaves one home only to enter another’ means that leaving crowded places and sticking to only quiet places is like getting out of one home of ‘crowded’ illusions and entering another of ‘quiet’ illusions. This means that he is still being deluded by illusions of ‘crowded’ and ‘quiet’. That’s why he cannot yet be called a true leaver of home.

Student: “How can I be a true leaver of home?”

Master: “That’s another home.”

 

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

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