UnMind 70. Finding Your Way Trio 1: Dhyanayana I

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Amongst the many,
there is only one true Way:
the natural Zen!

“Dhyanayana: a Practical Guide Among the Ways Of Zen,” the first chapter in “Mokurai,” our collection of Matsuoka Roshi’s later talks, is unusually long. I suspect it was given to a large audience, such as at a university or symposium, rather than as a weekly address at the temple, which typically ran to 15 or 20 minutes. Owing to its length and detail, we will devote three segments to touching on its highlights.

It begins with the historical introduction of Zen to America:

In 1893, Rinzai Zen Master, Soyen Shaku journeyed to Chicago to attend the World Parliament of Religions. His presence and presentation sparked an immediate interest in Zen among some of the Americans attending the Parliament. As historical records have it, that was the first formal contact between Zen teaching and America. Much has transpired in the almost 100 years since Shaku Roshi came to America. Now, as more and more Americans are taking up the practice of Zen as a way of life, I would like to address a few words of advice to you about the right approach to the study of Zen.

Pretty straightforward and not much need for comment, other than that Shaku Roshi was of the Rinzai sect, as was his disciple Sokei-an, who would later establish a famous center in New York in the 1930s, the same decade that Sensei came to America.

He then touches on the inchoate Americanization of Zen:

Zen first gained a popular foothold in the cultural life of the United States a half-century after Soyen Shaku’s visit. Among some of the intellectuals of that time, among the circle of beat poets and authors, Zen became something of a philosophical fancy. It was portrayed in Jack Kerouac’s book, On the Road, as a philosophical motif in the dialogue of a group of itinerants touring across America) against a backdrop of their personal drama and social commentary. For the beat generation of the fifties, Zen was used as nothing more than a justification for new or non-conventional behavior. This was called “Beat Zen.” It was never really a school of Zen as are Rinzai and Soto, which are both founded in a tradition of serious practice. Nonetheless, “Beat Zen” did much to focus popular and literary attention toward Zen, just as the writings of Dr. Daisetsu Suzuki, a disciple of Soyen Shaku Roshi, did much to focus academic attention toward Zen. And so, from the popular discussion of Zen without direct experience that ensued, Americans created a mystique around Zen from all they had heard.

He then goes into an exhaustive list of all the terms and concepts associated with Zen from that period — such as “complete freedom,” “enlightenment,” “satori,” “insight,” “awakening,” “kensho,” and “liberation,” “nirvana,” “shunyata,” “emptiness” — which fill an entire paragraph. I take this as an example of his extensive research into the record of Zen in a second language, and an alien culture, the USA.

He summarizes his introduction:

These are all names used in connection with the culture of Zen. Most of them come from their origins in India, China and Japan. What they may mean depends on who explained them to you, or whether you learned them directly from your own experience and found a word to describe it later. I don’t want even to attempt to explain them all now, but I do want to shed some light on the practice of the three modern Zen sects — Rinzai, Obaku and Soto — that are practiced in America now. My hope is that my advice might serve as a practical guide in your choice of following one of the Zen paths. Further, I hope that it will confirm your own practice of Zen, and encourage you to renew your efforts.

This is vintage Matsuoka — basing your understanding on your own experience first, and finding words to describe it later — along with his intention to help us — you — in the assimilation of Zen in America, by emphasizing the traditional, but radical, Soto approach to direct experience. This is not a scholarly essay, but an exhortation to practice, Sensei’s manifestation of the Bodhisattva vow in action:

The way to study Zen is through your own direct experience in meditation. That is the primary path and essential characteristic of all the schools of Zen. Zen means meditation. The original Sanskrit word for meditation was “Dhyana,” translated into Chinese as “Chan,” then translated into Japanese as “Zen.” All of these words refer to the meditation school of Buddhism which began with the historical Buddha, Gautama Shakyamuni’s practice of meditation as the means to complete realization of the meaning of his life and of all life. The practice of zazen, or sitting meditation, is the necessary way of cultivation.

So there we have it. The manifesto of Dogen’s Zen in America is the same as his mission in the Japan of the 13th century: the promulgation and propagation of the simple, but difficult, meditation of Buddha.

Then he uses zazen to illustrate some critical differences between the existing sects of Zen itself:

The Zen sects differ as to the purpose of zazen in that Rinzai views zazen as a means to enlightenment; whereas Soto views zazen as the expression of enlightenment. Nonetheless, the Rinzai, Obaku and Soto sects all agree on the prime importance of zazen. Secondly, all the Zen sects agree that it is important to study with an authentic teacher or Zen master. It is through a living interchange between master and disciple that a disciple comes to a mastery of Zen in his or her own right. This interchange, called heart to heart transmission, whether long or short in time duration, is only effective if the Zen student has prepared him or herself adequately through the assiduous practice of zazen.

A clear and compelling exposition of the connection between zazen, the teacher-student relationship in Zen, and the often mystified transmission from heart to heart of the lineage going back to Buddha. In five brief but dense paragraphs, Matsuoka Roshi encapsulates the essential history of Zen, and its advent in the USA.

In what follows, Sensei covers some of the highlights of the historical transmission as recorded in writing, including Bodhidharma, Hui Neng and Hung Jen, the sixth and fifth ancestors in China, jumping to Hakuin in the 18th century, and the connection of the five houses of Zen in the Tang era to the later sects in contemporary Japan. Alternating with history, he drives home certain salient and eternal points:

For most of us, the chaos of this age of industrial progress — global economic and military turbulence; likely nuclear disaster from power plants or bombs; rapid erosion of the earth’s resources; the unbalancing of environmental patterns, unbalancing in its turn terrestrial life; and, finally, blinding, rapid social change — is too much for us to handle in a balanced way. Our minds and emotions are not simple, but rather are most confused, conditioned, and cluttered not only by our common human condition, but more so by all the accelerated turmoil of our time.

The only point of history, from Sensei’s perspective, is to learn from it and apply its lessons to the present. He compares and contrasts our current causes and conditions, contextualizing the masters of the past, while admonishing those of us in the present to recognize our advantages, as well as what we are lacking in pursuing Zen as a lifestyle:

From a statistical point of View, by far the largest group of Zen practitioners are those who begin the practice of Zen, and then because of a lack of conviction, initial difficulties or a lack of self discipline, discontinue their practice. Most of the Zen Temples in the United States are populated by this latter group. And really, the Zen sanghas of historic and modern India, China, Japan, Korea and Viet Nam are, and were, probably very similar. It is very easy to see when observing this group of Zen practitioners who start, then stop, that there is no LIVING enlightenment in them. Surely, some of these people, depending upon their abilities, their consistency, their intensity and their duration of practice have differing degrees of insight into various parts of their lives; and this is a good, and important, effect.
Zen, however, does not radiate through them body, mind, and moment. They do not continually remember their own original nature, and act freely out of it and through it. That is a pity. I suppose that it is also the law of averages. Like anything effective on planet earth, Zen teachers from Shakyamuni Buddha to today have had to adapt the teaching as pointed at by Bodhidharma to the culture, language and status of those students of the Zen way that they seek to lead. They have also had to adapt their teaching to the level of gifts and to the level of intensity of their Zen disciples.
The historically earlier teachers of Zen talked of two things: the essence of Zen, and the means to transmit this understanding. Teaching methods were referred to as “upaya” in Sanskrit; sometimes translated as “artificial means.” The teaching ways were sometimes called “upayakausalya” or skillful means. These were the ways that Zen masters used to charm, disarm, disprove, disagree, disengage, dissuade, dismember, or disabuse the disciple’s limiting habits and views so that he or she could become free to see with the eye of enlightenment.

I have always thought that all I need is a better class of student; thank you, Sensei. Seriously, though, it is still amazing to me every time I re-read his talks, how contemporary his message, how consistently he hits upon this note of unflinching dedication to zazen as what is missing in most people’s practice. I am also stuck by the difficulty of skipping over any part of that message, and can only encourage you to follow up with your own reading of these excellent teachings. He will return to the idea of upaya, and Soto Zen’s emphasis on meditation, as the upaya for our times.

He touches on his personal history:

Dr. D. T. Suzuki, who was my teacher at Columbia University, classified the Zen teaching methods as verbal and direct. Verbal methods involve paradox, transcending opposites, contradiction, affirmation, repetition and exclamation. Direct teaching involves shouting, beating, creating art works, practicing martial arts, or exhibiting some form of unorthodox behavior intended to show a student the Way. Ultimately, what form the upaya take are the conjunction of a particular teacher, and all that he or she is, with a particular student or group of students and all that they are. In the free flow of Zen the teaching will teach itself as long as the teacher doesn’t interfere, and as long as the student is receptive. Of course, as long as the student resists at all, the teaching is poured out to awaken her or him until it is successful, or until the student quits or the teacher dies. I am not even sure in those cases if the teaching really does stop.

Note how Sensei expands the concept of “teaching” and learning Zen to include following others who are not necessarily in your lineage, as well as non-verbal and unorthodox approaches. The statement that, “In the free flow of Zen the teaching will teach itself as long Zen’s method to its ultimate foundation — following the natural revelation of the truth, rather than having to force it. Let this guide our approach.

We will have to leave it here for now. In the next segment, we will begin with the conclusion that Matsuoka Roshi draws from the above. A real Zen cliffhanger. Tune in next time.