Essays in Zen Buddhism
D.T. Suzuki
2,061 passages indexed from Essays in Zen Buddhism (D.T. Suzuki) — Page 15 of 42
License: Public Domain
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1835
7.27. 夢想國師. 遺誡曰. 我有三等弟子. 所謂猛烈放下諸緣. 專一究明己事. 是爲上等. 修行不純. 駁雜好學. 謂之中等. 自昧己靈光輝. 只嗜佛祖涎唾. 此名下等. 如其醉心於外書. 立業於文筆者. 此是剃頭俗人也. 不足以作下等. 矧乎飽食安眠放逸過時者. 謂之緇流耶. 古人喚作衣架飯嚢. 旣是非僧. 不許稱我弟子出入寺中及塔頭. 暫時出入尙以不容. 何况來求掛塔乎. 老僧作如是說. 莫言欠博愛之慈. 只要他知非改過. 堪爲祖門之種草耳.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1426
According to the philosophy of the Kegon (Avatamsaka) school of Buddhism, there is a spiritual world where one particular object holds within itself all other particular objects merged, instead of all particular objects being absorbed in the Great All. Thus in this world it so happens that when you lift a bunch of flowers or point at a piece of brick, the whole world in its multitudinosity is seen reflected here.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 557
The Buddha’s psychological experience of life as pain and suffering was intensely real and moved him to the very depths of his being, and in consequence the emotional reaction he experienced at the time of Enlightenment was in proportion to this intensity of feeling. All the more evident therefore it is that he could not rest satisfied with an intellectual glancing or surveying of the facts of life.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1523
Tauler made spinning and shoe-making and other homely duties gifts of the Holy Ghost; Brother Lawrence made cooking sacramental; George Herbert wrote:
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 585
The knowledge the knower has of himself, in himself, that is, as he is to himself, is unattainable by any proceedings of the intellect which is not permitted to transcend its own conditions. Ignorance is brought to subjection only by going beyond its own principle. This is an act of the will. Ignorance in itself is no evil, nor is it the source of evil, but when we are ignorant of Ignorance, of what it means in our life, then there takes place an unending concatenation of evils.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1039
The principal ideas of Hui-nêng, which make him the real Chinese founder of Zen Buddhism may be summed up as follows:
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 626
That the Buddha was very much against mere knowledge and most emphatically insisted on actually seeing and personally experiencing the Dharma, face to face, is in evidence everywhere in the Nikāyas as well as in the Mahayana texts. This has been indeed the strongest point in the teaching of Buddhism.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1996
[f136] This historical temple was unfortunately destroyed by the earthquake of 1923, with many other buildings.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 644
He knows as it really is: ‘This is pain.’ He knows as it really is: ‘This is the origin of pain.’ He knows as it really is: ‘This is the cessation of pain.’ He knows as it really is: ‘This is the path that leads to the cessation of pain.’ He knows as they really are: ‘These are the Defilements.’ He knows as it really is: ‘This is the origin of the Defilements.’ He knows as it really is: ‘This is the cessation of the Defilements.’ He knows as it really is: ‘This is the path that leads to the cessation of the Defilements.’ To him, thus knowing, thus seeing, the heart is set free from the Defilement of Lusts (_kāma_), is set free from the Defilement of Existence (_bhāva_), is set free from the Defilement of Ignorance (_avijjā_).
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 933
The object is an object for the subject, The subject is a subject for an object: Know that the relativity of the two Rests ultimately on the oneness of the void.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 399
Nirvana is conceived as a spiritual state in which all passional turmoil is quieted; Tathāgatagarbha is more psychological than ontological; Citta is used as belonging to the series of mental terms such as Manas, Manovijñāna, and other Vijñānas, and is not always synonymous with Bodhi or Pratyātmajñāna unless it is qualified with adjectives of purity; Śūnyatā is a negative term and distinctively epistemological, and Buddhist scholars, especially of the Prajñāpāramitā school, have been quite fond of this term, and we see that the _Laṅkāvatāra_ too has indulged in the use of it.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1428
We now come to the most characteristic feature of Zen Buddhism, by which it is distinguished not only from all the other Buddhist schools, but from all forms of mysticism that are ever known to us. So far the truth of Zen has been expressed through words, articulate or otherwise, however enigmatic they may superficially appear; but now the masters appeal to a more direct method instead of verbal medium.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 356
Besides these eight Samāpatti (“coming together”) exercises, technically so called, the Buddha sometimes refers to still another form of meditation which is considered to be distinctly Buddhist. This is more or less definitely contrasted to the foregoing by not being so exclusively intellectual but partly affective, as it aims at putting a full stop to the operation of Samjñā (thought) and Vedita (sensation), that is, of the essential elements of consciousness.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1450
Haikyu (P‘ai-hsiu)[6.73] was a local governor in Shinan (Hsin-an) before he was appointed a state-minister. He once visited a Buddhist monastery in his district. While going around in the premises of the monastery, he came across a fine fresco painting and asked the accompanying priests whose portrait this was. “He was one of the high priests,” they answered.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1341
But if it is committed to paper and ink, nowhere is our religion to be found.” Something analogous to this we have already noticed in Hakuin’s interview with Shōju Rōnin. Being a living fact, Zen is only where living facts are handled. Appeal to the intellect is real and living as long as it issues directly from life. Otherwise, no amount of literary accomplishment or of intellectual analysis avails in the study of Zen.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1028
When Hui-nêng further asked the monk from the north as to the teaching of his teacher in regard to morality (_śīla_), meditation (_dhyāna_), and wisdom (_prajñā_), the monk said, “According to my master Hsiu, morality consists in not doing anything that is bad; wisdom in reverently practising all that is good; and meditation in purifying the heart.” Replied Hui-nêng: “My view is quite different.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 347
They are _Saṁpatti_ (coming together), Samāhita (collecting the thoughts), Śamatha (tranquillisation), _Cittaikāgratā_ (concentration), _Dṛishta-dharma-sukha-vihāra_ (abiding in the bliss of the Law perceived), _Dhāraṇi_ or _Dhāraṇa_ (abstraction), etc.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1481
“Ping-ting T‘ung-tzŭ comes for fire.” This made his eyes open to the truth of Zen quite different from what he formerly understood of it. He was now no more a second-hand “pedant” but a living creative soul. I need not repeat that Zen refuses to be explained but that it is to be lived. Without this, all talk is nothing but an idea, woefully inane and miserably unsatisfactory.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1447
Dōgo Yenchi (Tao-wu Yüan-chih) and Ungan Donjo (Yün-yen Tan-shêng) were standing by the master Yakusan (Yüeh-shan) as attendants, when Yakusan remarked,[6.69] “Where our intellect cannot reach, I verily tell you to avoid talking about it; when you do, horns will grow on you. O Yenchi, what will you say to this?” Yenchi thereupon rose from his place and left the room. Ungan asked the master, “How is it, sir, that Brother Chi does not answer you?” “My back aches to-day,” said Yakusan, “You better go to Yenchi himself, for he understands.” Ungan came to his brother monk and inquired thus, “O Brother Senior, why did you not answer our master now?” “You better go back to the master himself and ask,” was all that poor Ungan could get out of his senior brother.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 68
The ultimate standpoint of Zen, therefore, is that we have been led astray through ignorance to find a split in our own being, that there was from the very beginning no need for a struggle between the finite and the infinite, that the peace we are seeking so eagerly after has been there all the time. Sotoba (Su Tung-p‘o),[1.8] the noted Chinese poet and statesman, expresses the idea in the following verse:
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 344
Great becomes the fruit, great the advantage of intellect when it is set round with earnest contemplation. The mind set round with intelligence is set quite free from the intoxications (_āśrava_), that is to say, from the intoxication of sensuality (_kāma_), from the intoxication of becoming (_bhāva_), from the intoxication of delusion (_dṛishti_), from the intoxication of ignorance (_avidyā_)[f40].”
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1860
We read in one of the Sutras belonging to the Agama class of Buddhist literature, which is entitled _Sutra on the Cause and Effect in the Past and Present_ (fas. II.): “My original vows are fulfilled, the Dharma [or Truth] I have attained is too deep for the understanding. A Buddha alone is able to understand what is in the mind of another Buddha.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 701
These two events, seeing and being freed, are mutually dependent, so intimately that the one without the other is unthinkable, is impossible; in fact they are two aspects of one identical experience, separated only in our limited cognition. Paññā without jhāna is no paññā, and jhāna without paññā is no jhāna. Enlightenment is the term designating the identification-experience of paññā and jhāna, of seeing “yathābhūtam” and abandoning the dharma-raft of every denomination.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1192
The first of the following two verses is by Yōdainen (Yang Tai-nien, 973–1020), a statesman of the Sung dynasty,”[5.27] and the second by Iku, of Toryō (Tu-ling Yü),[5.28] who was a disciple of Yōgi (Yang-ch‘i, 1024—1072), the founder of the Yōgi Branch of the Rinzai School.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1317
While Kyōzan (Yang-shan, 804–890) was residing at Tōhei (Tung-ping) of Shao-chou, his master Isan (Wei-shan, 771–853),—both of whom were noted Zen masters of the T‘ang dynasty—sent him a mirror accompanied with a letter.[6.18] Kyōzan held forth the mirror before a congregation of monks and said, “O monks, Isan has sent here a mirror. Is this Isan’s mirror or mine own? If you say it is Isan’s, how is it that the mirror is in my hands? If you say it is mine own, has it not come from Isan?
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 44
Let the intellect alone, it has its usefulness in its proper sphere, but let it not interfere with the flowing of the life-stream. If you are at all tempted to look into it, do so while letting it flow. The fact of flowing must under no circumstances be arrested or meddled with; for the moment your hands are dipped into it, its transparency is disturbed, it ceases to reflect your image which you have had from the very beginning and will continue to have to the end of time.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 328
This creation, however, ceases to be a creation in its perfect sense when the creator grows conscious of its teleological implications[f36]; for here then is a split in his consciousness which will check the spontaneous flowing-out of spirit, and then freedom will be lost at its source. Such devices as have grown conscious of their purposes are no more “skilful devices,” and according to the Buddhists they do not reflect the perfect state of Enlightenment.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 14
We now know the signification of life, we know that it is not blind striving, nor is it a mere display of brutal forces, but that while we know not definitely what the ultimate purport of life is, there is something in it that makes us feel infinitely blessed in the living of it and remain quite contented with it in all its evolution, without raising questions or entertaining pessimistic doubts.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1875
[f28] In fact, the term, _prajñā_ or in _paiñña_ Pali, is not an exclusive possession of the Mahayanists, for it is also fully used by their rival disciples of the Buddha. The latter however failed to lay any special emphasis on the idea of enlightenment and its supreme significance in the body of Buddhism, and as the consequence Prajñā was comparatively neglected by the Hinayanists. Mahayanism on the other hand may be designated as the religion of Prajñā _par excellence_. It is even deified and most reverently worshipped.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 711
In the _Vajrasamādhi Sūtra_,[3.4] Bodhisattva Apratisthita[3.5] asks the Buddha why the father was so unkind as not to recall his wandering son before fifty years expired, to which the Buddha answers, “Fifty years is not to be understood as indicating time-relation here; it means the awakening of a thought.” As I would interpret, this means the awakening of consciousness—a split in the will, which now, besides being actor, is knower.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 311
This spirit of freedom which is the power impelling Buddhism to break through its monastic shell and bringing forward the idea of Enlightenment ever vigorously before the masses, is the life-impulse of the universe,—this unhampered activity of spirit, and everything that interferes with it is destined to be defeated. The history of Buddhism is thus also a history of freedom in one’s spiritual, intellectual, and moral life.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 896
Nine years passed,[4.34] and Dharma wished to return to his native country. He called in all his disciples before him, and said, “The time is come for me to depart, and I want to see what your attainments are.”
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1633
But this Zen spirit of self-suffering ought not to be understood in the Christian sense that a man must spend all his time in prayer and mortification for the absolution of sin. For a Zen monk has no desire to be absolved from sin, this is too selfish an idea, and Zen is free from egotism. The Zen monk wishes to save the world from the misery of sin, and as to his own sin he lets it take care of itself, as he knows it is not a thing inherent in his nature. For this reason it is possible for him to be one of those who are described as “they that weep as though they wept not; and they that rejoice as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy as though they possessed not; and they that use this world as not abusing it.”
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1801
4.34. 迄九年已欲西返天竺. 乃命門人曰. 時將至矣汝等蓋各言所得乎. 時門人道副對曰. 如我所見. 不執文字. 不離文字. 而爲道用. 師曰. 汝得吾皮. 尼總持曰. 我今所解. 如慶喜見阿閦佛國. 一見曾不再見. 師曰. 汝得吾肉. 道育曰. 四大本空. 五陰非有. 而我見處. 無一法可得. 師曰. 汝得吾骨. 最後慧可. 禮拜後. 依位而立. 師曰. 汝得吾髓. (傳燈錄卷三.)
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 678
We must remember that the Buddha had this discipline under his two Samkhya teachers and that even after his Enlightenment he made it a rule for his disciples to train themselves in the dhyana exercises. He himself retired into solitude whenever he had opportunities for it. This was not of course merely indulging in contemplation or in making the world reflect in the mirror of consciousness. It was a kind of spiritual training even for himself and even after Enlightenment.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 939
When you are not prejudiced against the six sense-objects, You in turn identify yourself with Enlightenment; The wise are non-active, While the ignorant bind themselves up; While in the Dharma itself there is no individuation, They ignorantly attach themselves to particular objects. It is their own minds that create illusions— Is it not the greatest of self-contradictions?
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 424
By way of example, young men of good family, let there be the atoms of earth of fifty hundred thousand myriads of kotis of worlds; let there exist some man who takes one of these atoms of dust and then goes in an eastern direction fifty hundred thousand myriads of kotis of worlds further on, there to deposit that atom of dust; let the man in this manner carry away from all those worlds the whole mass of earth, and in the same manner, and by the same act as supposed, deposit all those atoms in an eastern direction.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 354
There are further four stages of dhyana called “Arūpa-vimoksha” which are practised by those who have passed beyond the last stage of dhyana.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 561
In truth as long as we confine ourselves to intellection, however deep, subtle, sublime, and enlightening, we fail to see into the gist of the matter. This is the reason why even the so-called primitive Buddhists who are by some considered positivists, rationalists, and agnostics, were obliged to assume some faculty dealing with things far above relative knowledge, things that do not appeal to our empirical ego.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 259
How extensively and intensively the concept of Enlightenment influenced the development of Mahayana Buddhism may be seen in the composition of the _Saddharmapuṇḍarīka_, which is really one of the profoundest Mahayana protests against the Hinayana conception of the Buddha’s Enlightenment. According to the latter, the Buddha attained it at Gayā while meditating under the Bodhi-tree, for they regarded the Buddha as a mortal being like themselves, subject to historical and psychological conditions.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1709
What are they that you call the four elements and the five aggregates? I speak thus, but it is no more than the talk of an old woman from a remote village. If I suddenly happen to meet a monk thoroughly trained in this matter, he will, on learning what I have been talking to you, carry me off the feet and throw me down the steps. And for this would he be blamed? Whatever this may be, for what reason is it so? Don’t be carried away by my talk and try to make nonsensical remarks.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 138
Superficially, indeed, there is something in Zen so bizarre and even irrational, as to frighten the pious literary followers of the so-called primitive Buddhism and to make them declare that Zen is not Buddhism but a Chinese anomaly of it.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1408
In fact the cry came to be so abused by his followers that he had to make the following remark[6.46]: “You are all so given up to learning my cry (_hê_), but I want to ask you this: Suppose one man comes out from the eastern hall and another from the western hall, and suppose both give out the ‘Kwats!’ simultaneously; and yet I say to you that subject and predicate are clearly discernible in this. But how will you discern them?
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 537
Let us see what record we have of this experience, and what were its antecedents and consequences.[f48]
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1108
“If you wish to seek the Buddha, you ought to see into your own Nature (_hsing_); for this Nature is the Buddha himself. If you have not seen into your own Nature, what is the use of thinking of the Buddha, reciting the Sutras, observing a fast, or keeping the precepts?
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 4
On the other hand, the Zen masters so called are unable to present their understanding in the light of modern thought. Their most intellectually-productive years are spent in the Meditation Hall, and when they successively graduate from it, they are looked up to as adepts thoroughly versed in the kō-ans.[2] So far so good; but, unfortunately from the scholarly point of view, they remain contented with this, and do not show any lively intellectual interest in the psychology and philosophy of Zen. Thus Zen is left to lie quietly sealed up in the “Sayings” of the masters and in the technical study of the kō-ans; it is thus incapacitated to walk out of the seclusion of the cloisters.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 584
In his search for the “builder” (_gahākara_), the Buddha was always accosted by Ignorance, an unknown knower behind knowing. He could not for a long time lay his hands on this one in a black mask until he transcended the dualism of knower and known. This transcending was not an act of cognition, it was self-realisation, it was a spiritual awakening and outside the ken of logical reasoning, and therefore not accompanied by Ignorance.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1894
[f47] For this and the following, see the Essay entitled, “History of Zen Buddhism from Bodhi-Dharma to Hui-nêng,” p. 151 ff.
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 1982
A monk asked Keisan (Ch‘i-shan), “When relations are dissolved, all is reduced to emptiness; but where is emptiness reduced?” The master called out to the monk, and the monk responded, “Yes,” whereupon the master called his attention, saying, “Where is emptiness?” Said the monk, “Pray, you tell me.” Keisan replied, “It is like the Persian tasting pepper.” While the one light is an etiological question as long as its origin is the point at issue, the questions here referred to are teleological because the ultimate reduction of emptiness is the subject for solution. But as Zen transcends time and history, it recognises only one beginningless and endless course of becoming. When we know the origin of the one light, we also know where emptiness ends. (Ch. N., [7].)
Essays in Zen Buddhism, passage 236
Like a true Indian the Buddha’s idea of ascetic meditation was to attain Vimoksha (or simply Moksha, deliverance) from the bondage of birth and death. There were several ways open to him to reach the goal. According to the Brahman philosophers of those days, the great fruit of deliverance could be matured by embracing religious truth, or by practising asceticism or chastity, or by learning, or by freeing oneself from passions.