Category: zen

Part 17-8
“Subhuti, ‘all things’ are not all things; therefore, they are called ‘all things.’”

Commentary:
This scripture means that all things are not things at all in essence but just names, imaginary labels and that the Buddha used all things as expedient means for the purpose of revealing the true-Self. This is why ancient masters would say that everything is a rabbit-horn.

We should realise what the Buddha tried to show to us beyond words, through words that are imaginary labels. Ancient masters would say that words are not the true-Self but that the true-Self is not separate from words. This implies that form is Emptiness and Emptiness is form, and that illusions are enlightenment and vice versa. Form is not different and separate from Emptiness, but one.

In short, all things are one as the true-Self, but they appear to be many and different from one another because we divide it into many by words, imaginary labels and because we, being deluded by the words, see them as distinct and separate from each other.

Student: “How is it when we realise that all things are not things but just called all things?”
Master: “Who can ask whom what?”

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

I am very sorry for your loss. Who in the world could avoid the sadness you are going through now? However, from the Buddhist perspective, your mother is and will be with you all the time just as she used to be. I advise you to pay more attention to how to feel your mother who is with you, rather than think that she disappeared for good. Once a monk asked his master, “Sir, what is the Buddha?” The master answered, “How dare you disregard the Buddha before you?” This means that the master blamed the monk for trying to see the Buddha without recognising the Buddha who is right before him all the time.

Remember that your mother is always with you just as the Buddha who passed away two thousand and five hundred years ago is always with you.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Dongshan Liangjie once invited head monastic Tai to have fruit with him and asked, “There is something that holds the sky above and the ground beneath. It is as black as lacquer. It is always in activity but cannot be received within activity. Tell me, where is the fault?” The head monastic said, “The fault is activity.” Dongshan shouted and then had the attendant take the fruit away.

Student: “What was the head monastic’s fault?”
Master: “When Dongshan pointed to the moon, he looked at his finger instead of the moon.”
Student: “What would you have said if you had been the head monastic?”
Master: “I would have said, ‘I have neither eyes nor ears’.”

Commentary:
Seeing and hearing are the source of all faults.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Part 17-7
Therefore, the Realised One says that all things are Buddha’s teachings.

Commentary:
As noted earlier a couple of times, everything is both the Buddha and his teaching, just as a dancer and her dance is one. This is why all things are referred to as the Sutra as well.

As the Avatamsaka Sutra says, “The Buddha makes his appearance in worldly things all around the world. There is no one who cannot see His body. He leads sentient beings to nirvana with a variety of expedients whilst showering the rain of dharma on sentient beings with a voice like a thunder”, all things that we can see and hear are the Buddha. There is nothing that is not the Buddha. We are being showered with his teaching all the time and no one can stop facing Him even for a moment.

However, as the Avatamsaka Sutra says, “It is because sentient beings’ karma is heavy that they, not having seen the Buddha for hundreds of kalpas, have suffering in the ocean of birth and death”, we can’t recognise the Buddha because of our heavy karma that we have been deluded by illusions and attached to them for kalpas.

So, whilst they appear to be separate things from one another when we can’t see things as they are, they appear to be one and the same when we can see them as they are.

If we do appreciate the scripture ‘all things are Buddha’s teachings’, each of these words should appear to be the Buddha.

Student: “If all things are the Buddha’s teachings, how should I hear the sounds of birds?”
Master: “You should see them as the Buddha above all.”

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

A. The Buddha said that everything is imaginary like dreams and not real. Even scientists say that all things are different from each other and that there are not two things that are the same, adding that we just imagine there are things that are the same. When we say, for example, “I have three cups that are the same”, the three cups, although appearing the same in colour, size, price and weight, are actually different from each other, for example, in the number of molecules and the time when each of them was produced. However, we use numbers as if there are many things that are the same; ten pencils and one hundred cups, imagining that they are the same. 

In the same way, an ordinary life is also a kind of imaginary concept, not an absolutely concrete concept, and what it is like varies depending on beholders’ perspectives. This is why what seems to be an ordinary life to you can appear to be extraordinary, or special to others. For example, the life that the middle-class people in developed countries such as the United States, Great Britain and Japan think of as an ordinary life can be quite different from the life that the middle-class people of extremely poor countries regard as an ordinary life.

The root of the ordinary and the special is Emptiness.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

One day a monk asked Master Woonmun, “What is the Buddha?” He answered, “He is a rude man.” The monk said, “What is his Dharma talk?” The master said, “It’s a talk about something.” The monk asked, “What is the right eye that can see it?” The master said, “Wide.”

Student: “What is the something the Buddha talked about?”

Master: “Woonmun talked about it as well.”

Commentary:

The Buddha and all ancient masters talked about nothing but themselves.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Part 17-6

If anyone says that the Realised One has attained unexcelled complete perfect enlightenment, Subhuti, really there is no such thing as the Buddha attaining unexcelled complete perfect enlightenment. Subhuti, in the unexcelled complete perfect enlightenment attained by the Realised One, there is neither reality nor unreality.”

Commentary:

It is well known that that the Buddha attained the unexcelled complete perfect enlightenment. And it is one of the most attractive and tempting words that entices Buddhists to be attached to since attaining it is the reason why they are Buddhist.

In order to stop people from being deluded by the words ‘unexcelled complete perfect enlightenment’, he gives a little more detailed explanation about the enlightenment that people think the Buddha attained, by saying that there is neither reality nor unreality in it. This means that it is the state without illusions that doesn’t permit any word such as reality, or unreality.

In fact, his description of enlightenment is true of not just his enlightenment but also all other things. There is neither reality nor unreality in essence of everything.

Student: “What is the unexcelled complete perfect enlightenment attained by the Buddha?”

Master: “Although my eyes, ears and mouth are full of it, it can’t be spoken.”

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

A. It is not God’s will but the results of their causations. There is nothing beyond effect without cause.

In a class, for example, students can be sorted into four groups; students who get high scores in an examination without working hard in the class, students who get good scores due to working hard in the class, students who fail to get a good grade despite working harder than the former, and students who don’t work hard and get poor scores.

We are talking about the first and the third groups. The reason why the first group of students can get handsome scores despite scant work in class is that they worked hard and learned in advance somewhere else before the class that which is supposed to be taught in class. The third group of students can’t understand what is taught in class since they lacked the basic knowledge for the class because they didn’t prepare anything beforehand.

What we are now is the effect of how we lived and how we accept what we are at this moment is the cause of what our lives will be like in the future. So, ancient masters would say, “I can know a person’s past and future by seeing how he lives now.”

The lives of the people you mentioned may seem to make no sense, but they are all the results of their causations that is referred to as karma in Buddhism. That’s why we say that every accident is inevitability disguised as an accident.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

One day a monk asked Master Woonmun, “What is the Buddha?” He answered, “He is a rude man.” The monk said, “What is his Dharma talk?” The master said, “It’s a talk about something.” The monk asked, “What is the right eye that can see it?” The master said, “Wide.”

Student: “Why did the master say that the Buddha is a rude man?”

Master: “I didn’t hear that.”

Student: “What did you hear?”

Master: “The master said that the Buddha is an impostor.”

Commentary:

When words disappear, the true-Self appears.

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway

Part 17-5

“Why? Because the Realised One means one who sees all things as they are.”

Commentary:

The Realised One signifies an enlightened man who can see and hear everything as it is. Such a man is never deluded by any illusions.

This is why the Realised One had no thought that he attained enlightenment from Dipankara Buddha.

The point here is whether we can see all things as they are. The purpose of this Sutra is not to let us know the fact that the Buddha can see everything as it is but to lead us to see things as they are just as the historical Buddha did. No matter how many Buddhas who can see all things as they are we may know, it has nothing to do with us unless we can see in that way too. Reading the Sutra literally is just like drooling whilst looking at a picture of flavourful food.

Student: “What is the meaning of the Realised One?”

Master: “No matter how delicious a picture of food may appear, it cannot satisfy your hunger.”

©Boo Ahm

All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway