... Chapter 15 ....... Contents ...
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| 14. To you who does everything you can to get satori. |
We don't practice in order to get satori. It's satori that pulls our practice. We practice, being dragged around by satori.
You don't seek the way. The way seeks you.
You study and do sports, for you it's a matter of satori and illusion - in this way even zazen becomes a marathon for you, and satori the finish line. Yet because you try to grasp it, you miss it.
Only when you stop meddling like this, does your original, cosmic nature realize itself.
You say you're seeking the way, but what does it mean if you're seeking the way just to satisfy yourself?
Running after satori and running away from illusion is buying and selling shares of one and the same company.
Doing zazen because you want to become buddha or to experience satori is running after an object. Zazen is to stop wanting to become buddha or to experience satori.
Hishiryô [beyond-thinking] has nothing to do with seeking satisfaction. It means being firmly settled in here and now.
Buddha-Dharma can not be attained by human effort.
Outside of a special group, saying, "We must attain satori!" is just as strange as saying, "We must behold God!"
The buddha-dharma doesn't mean personal satisfaction. That's why Shakyamuni said, "Myself and everything living on the Earth attain the Way together. Mountains, rivers, grasses and trees are all buddha."
The buddha-dharma isn't about trying to get a personal satori.
People want even their satori made to order.
The buddha-dharma means no ego [muga].
Everyone has their own personal ego. But it's completely backwards to try - even in zazen - to get a personal satori. 'No self' isn't personal.
So you want your own personal satori - peace of mind only for yourself?
Do you really think the buddha-dharma exists just for you?
If you aren't careful, you might start thinking that your individuality is the most important thing in the world. And then you'll forget that which fills the whole universe.
When I say 'satori', you think that I'm talking about some personal 'satori'. So let's get it straight: that which cannot even be called 'satori' is satori.
You want to become a buddha? There's no need to become a buddha!
Now is simply now. You are simply you.
And tell me, if you're leaving this place right here, where is it exactly you want to go?
Wanting to become a buddha through zazen is like somebody who's taking the train home, and because he wants to get home as soon as possible, starts to run inside the train.
Getting satori through practice: that's how the world likes to imagine it. But no matter what sutra you read, you'll never find anything of the sort. No buddha has ever become a buddha through practice. Buddhas have been buddhas from the beginning.
We don't start practicing now in order to get satori later. Every single one of us has always been a buddha, lacking nothing. It's just that somewhere along the line we've forgotten that, we've lost our way, and now we get all worked up over nothing. Our practice means nothing other than to practice being the buddha, who we have, in reality, always been.
The just sitting [shikantaza] practiced by the buddhas and patriarchs does not mean striving to become a buddha.
If you believe that buddha or satori exists outside of zazen and you think that you can strive towards this, you're making the mistake of self-idolatry. Buddhist practice means putting buddha into practice. When we look for buddha somewhere else, that's just idolatry.
"What does in mean to practice the way of buddha?" - "It means becoming buddha!"
Wrong! Practicing the way of buddha means putting the way of buddha into practice.
Zazen means just sitting without even thinking of becoming buddha.
When you sit zazen, you attain the way without thinking at all about attaining the way.
The title of the Lotus Sutra is actually Sutra of the Lotus Flower of Wonderful, Unthinkable Dharma [Footnote: "Wonderful" and "unthinkable" are actually the same word in Japanese ("fukashigi").] In the wonderful, unthinkable dharma, cause and effect are one. Practice and satori are one.
This is explained with the image of a lotus flower: a lotus flower contains seeds, and if you open one of the seeds you will see the future leaves and a simple stem rolled up inside.
Practicing zazen in accord with the buddha-dharma is the same thing. We don't gradually approach satori through practice. Practice is satori. We practice satori.. We sit the zazen of the buddhas and patriarchs.
We don't achieve satori through practice: practice is satori. Each and every step is the goal.
Eternal satori appears only in the practice of this instant. That's why it says in the Lotus Sutra, "A young father conceives an old baby." [Footnote: This means that the young and fresh practice of this instant (young father) conceives eternal awakening (elderly baby)]
We've got to go all the way with our practice. Who cares if some 'satori' is waiting for us as a reward or not?
Most people have lost their soul. They don't move a muscle unless they're paid or praised. And if you don't hold any satori in front of their noses, they won't practice either.
In this way many people have lost their soul - its' not only a problem for the woman in Mumonkan [footnote: case 35 - 'about a woman whose soul was split in two and who didn't know which was her real self' - to look up]
Master Seigen Gyôshi asked the Sixth Patriarch, "What practice goes beyond ranks and stages?"
The world is full of ranks and stages: rich and poor, important and unimportant. What goes beyond all this is the buddha-dharma.
The Sixth Patriarch responds, "What have you been doing the whole time?"
Seigen answers, "I'm not even practicing the noble truths."
That means, "I haven't even had satori."
The Sixth Patriarch expressed his deep approval, "When you don't even practice the noble truths, what ranks and stages could there still be?"
In zazen there is no better and worse, no ranks and stages. Only when you practice zazen to get satori are there ranks and stages.
A person gets satori: that's something people can talk about. What people don't talk about is zazen.
Dropping off body and mind means that individual practice and individual satori disappear.
It seems there are some who try to put the buddha-dharma to work for people. The same way everyone these days is interested in self-improvement, they are trying to improve themselves with their practice and get satori. Yet it's clear that there can't be any dropping off of body and mind as long as we don't give up this human ambition.
If you're trying to get into paradise through your own effort, you've got to call out Amithaba Buddha's name 24 hours a day without stopping. But then what happens when you fall asleep and stop breathing for a moment? Do you fall into hell?
No, of course not. To invoke Buddha's name means to invoke it with the conviction that you are surrounded by the light of the Tathagata, that this suffuses the entire universe, and that it is completely impossible to fall out of it.
When your practice of reciting buddha's name or doing zazen is like manufacturing some product on an assembly line, then it isn't worth anything.
The buddha-dharma is ungraspable [fukatoku]. So don't grasp for it - let go.
The moment you hold on to it, you fall into hell. What are you grasping for anyway? You think you've got something in your hand, but look: you're holding onto horseshit.
Because you try to make things your own, you're lost in the labyrinth of transmigration.
The buddha-dharma is ungraspable [fukatoku]. There's nothing to be gained [mushotoku]. But you, you're always looking for something. That's the reason you're lost.
That illusion or satori exists, that's the way the world gossips - that's something they can grasp.
The buddha-dharma cannot be grasped - it's beyond all that [hi].
In the practice of the way of buddha there is neither illusion nor satori. Illusion and satori are things people can talk about. Distinguishing between illusion and satori is human work. But sensory perception is nothing more than sensory perception, discrimination is nothing more than discrimination - it isn't buddha-dharma.
The buddha-dharma doesn't mean destroying illusions to get satori. Zazen means not running after and not running away.
The buddha-dharma is limitless. If you don't understand this limitlessness, you won't understand the buddha-dharma. And what's more, if you think in terms of understanding or not-understanding, you miss entirely the point of limitlessness.
That's why there is no illusion outside of satori and no satori outside of illusion.
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