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LICKING UP HSI-KENG’S FOX SLOBBER

Long ago, at the beginning of the Chien-yen era (1127–1131) of the Southern Sung dynasty, the Zen priest Yüan-wu K’o-ch’in, residing at the Ling-ch’üan-yüan Temple on Mount Chia in Li-chou, delivered a series of lectures in which he commented on the hundred cases of Hsüeh-tou Ch’ung-hsien.¹ His fellow priest Tap’ing sent him a letter of reproach, using a tone of language harsher than one would expect from one’s own flesh and blood.² But Yüanwu realized the justness of the criticism and ceased from writing such commentaries. This ought to be a valuable lesson for us all.

So why am I about to commence licking up all the fox slobber that Priest Hsi-keng spewed and left behind him in those ten temples where he served?³ Why am I about to brazenly ascend the high teaching seat, clutching a hossu [whisk] in my hand, to diminish the dignity of a whole hall full of senior priests?

I was blown by the winds of karma to this broken-down old temple at the beginning of the Kyōhō era (1716–1736). I have remained here, without disciples, for the past twenty years. In that time, I have been visited by students from all corners of the land, asking me to give them talks and lectures on sutras and Zen writings. Some of them brought me rosters bearing names of hundreds of students. Others submitted their requests in elaborate compositions that were twenty or thirty lines long! All together, this must have happened at least thirty times. I can’t tell you how it has interfered with my sleep!

A few of the students burned with genuine zeal and determination. They made the rounds of Zen teachers, asking them to intercede with me on their behalf. They went to lay followers, complaining of my intransigence. I saw how strongly they were committed to achieving their goal; I wanted to do what I could to respond to their needs. But my temple is extremely poor. The kitchen shelves are bare. From the far north of the country to the far south, I don’t suppose a single soul could be unaware of the poverty here at Shōin-ji.

At the same time, I am deeply concerned about the sharp decline in Buddhist practice in recent years, and the sad decay of the Dharma. The young generation of monks are a pack of misfits—irresponsible and ungovernable rascals. When they first come to me, I cannot help loving them for their quiet, unassuming manner. My head bows before their sincere devotion and firm resolve. I think: “They are genuine monks determined to break through to enlightenment. Their thoughts are fixed firmly on the great matter of birth and death.”

But before even a month is up, they turn from the exemplary norms and customs of the past as they would from dirt. The time-honored temple regulations mean no more to them than lumps of dry mud. They band together in groups and run roughshod through the temple, roaming the garden and corridors shouting out to one another in loud voices, loitering in passageways singing and humming. They pay no attention to what their superiors tell them. Senior priests and temple masters are powerless to restrain them.

They cut the bucket rope at the well. They lift the temple bell from its moorings and turn it upside down. They push over the big temple drum. Whenever they get the chance, they sneak out the front gate. They slink furtively back in at night through openings they have burrowed in the temple wall. They gather in front of the main hall, capering about and singing shameless tunes they pick up in town. They swarm over the hill in back of the temple like ants, disturbing others with their wild clapping and horsing around. They prop sharp sickles up in dark corridors where the unsuspecting will walk into them, stack big water jars in passageways where people will be sure to knock them over. They crack the floor-planks over the privy so that when men squat on them they will tumble into the pit-filth. They plague the kitchen monks by dousing the firewood with water so it can’t be used to light the ovens in the morning. They make the rounds of the local teahouses and wineshops, gleefully abandoning themselves to base amusements.

While there could be a thousand people inside the temple devoting themselves to their training with untiring zeal, because they do not venture outside the gates for the entire retreat, no one knows of their illustrious achievements. The rowdy miscreants haunting the town streets engrossed in these unsavory pastimes may be no more than two or three in number, but since it all takes place in broad daylight for everyone to see, their black sins become known to all.

Ahh! because of the mindless and irresponsible actions of a handful of monks, tens of thousands of their fellows must share their notoriety. Jades are cast into the furnace along with ordinary stones. Gold and steel are melted into one common lump. Buddhist monks have come to be despised by good laymen and -women. Now they are as welcome as a shit-covered pig or a mangy dog with running sores. People in the streets condemn them. Even the masterless samurai talk of their flagrant misdeeds.

It is deplorable, the harm they do. In one moment, the dignity and authority of the Buddha’s Way is lost, the radiance of the Dharma teaching snuffed out. A troup of Yaksha demons eight thousand strong will swoop down and sweep all trace of them from the face of the earth. The Deva hosts will expunge their names from the sacred Dharma rosters.

I used to assume that I could devote my life to giving the gift of the Dharma to all people unconditionally and make the teaching bequeathed by the buddhas of the past flourish once more. How could I, or anyone, have foreseen the lamentable course that events have taken? To think that gangs of these wretched bonzes would wreak damage of this magnitude on the ancient, time-honored practices of their own Dharma ancestors!

You never saw such a wild assortment of sights and scenes! You would think you were on a battlefield, or gazing at herds of deer bounding madly over a moor. It would quiver the liver of Fei Lien. It would set Wu Lai’s teeth chattering in panic fear.⁴ Arrogance in all its forms. Every conceivable shade of madness and folly. Not only do these fellows think nothing of the achievements their predecessors have bequeathed to them, they arrogantly deprive later students of their rightful legacy as well. They are not satisfied until they trample the Dharma banners underfoot and bring the sacred precincts of the temple into total discord.

These are the real Dharma reprobates—the ones to call “hopelessly unteachable.” They are heretics masquerading in Buddhist robes. Avatars of the Evil One himself. Incarnations of the archfiend Papiyas stalking the earth.⁵ They will take their sins with them even when they die; for they are destined to fall into the dreadful realms of hell, where unspeakable agonies await them. Once that happens, there is no way for them to repent or atone for the terrible wrongs they have committed, even should they want to.

Their teachers or their parents gave them traveling money and sent them out to pursue their study of Zen. If these elders saw the contemptible lives their students or children now lead, do you suppose for a moment they would be pleased?

Recently, seven or eight of my trusted disciples, men with whom I have lived and practiced, combined their efforts in order to get the temple ready for this lecture meeting. They hauled earth, cleared away rubble and stones. They drew water, got the vegetable gardens up to pitch. They endured cold and hunger, experienced full shares of pain and suffering. They started at dawn, their robes wet with dew; the stars were out when they returned. They worked on the monks’ quarters, the well, the cooking ovens, the privy and bath house. Ten thousand hardships. Untold difficulties. Why, you broke into a sweat just watching them. Your eyes would swim just hearing about their deeds. And when you think that monks at any other training hall in the land do the same thing . . . A lecture meeting is certainly nothing to be undertaken lightly.

But then, when all these preparations have been made, these misfits, who have not even dirtied their hands, descend upon us, stirring up all kinds of trouble and totally disrupting the meeting. What on earth goes on in the minds of such men? Dragon kings and Devas who stand guard over the Dharma wail out in lamentation. The local earth gods burn with anger and resentment. Monks of this kind have always been around. They have appeared throughout the ages. Yet not a single one of them has been known to live out his natural span unscathed. Even if they don’t run foul of their fellow men, there is no way they can escape the retribution of heaven. They are drawing near the three-forked junction.⁶ They should be shaking in their sandals.

I have always loathed monks of their type. They are tiger fodder, no doubt about it. I hope one tears them into tiny shreds. The pernicious thieves—even if you killed off seven or eight of them every day, you would still remain totally blameless. Why are we so infested with them? Because the ancestral gardens have been neglected. They have run to seed. The verdant Dharma foliage has withered and only a wasteland remains.

We have in this Zen school of ours an essential Barrier that must be passed through. A forest of thorn and bramble that must be penetrated. But these people don’t even know that such things exist. They haven’t encountered them in their dreams.

Nowadays, you find worthy senior priests, fully qualified Zen teachers, who are reluctant to take on the responsibility of training a large group of students because it means they will have to deal with these trouble-makers. They would rather retreat to some quiet spot where they can “hide their tracks and conceal their light,” and make themselves into winter fans and straw dogs. So even if there is a priest who has achieved a mastery of Zen through authentic practice, he will refuse to accept students no matter how fervently they beg him. Turning his back on their pleas, he is content to live a spare, comfortless existence off by himself, heedless of the privation cold or hunger may bring. After a lifetime of such carefree idleness, he finally wastes away inside a small hermitage in some remote corner of the land.

How keenly it struck home to me! It is priests like these who are to blame! They are the ones responsible for undermining the Dharma banners. It is they who are destroying the true style and practices of the school. I had always detested a priest who would refuse to respond to a student’s need, but for a long time I had just gone along without giving any more thought to the matter. Then recently, a group of virtuous priests from various parts got together to do something about the problem. With no small amount of embarrassment, I must report that they came to me! They took me to task for neglecting my teaching responsibilities!

The keen and eager monks hungering for a teacher were greatly encouraged and emboldened by this turn of events. They made their descent upon me. Now they come at me from all quarters, like hordes of wasps rising from a broken nest, like mobs of ants swarming from an anthill to the attack. Some are like white-cheeked infants seeking their mother’s breast. Some are like black-hearted ministers set on squeezing the populace dry. I can’t come up with an excuse to turn them away. I don’t have the strength to keep pushing them off. I find myself pinched into a tight corner, all avenues of escape cut off.

However hard I scrutinize my life, I am unable to come up with any reputation that would need protecting. I haven’t achieved anything noteworthy for others to esteem. I am ignorant of poetry. I don’t understand Zen. I’m as lumpish and indolent a man as you could find. I drift idly along, doing only what pleases me. I sleep and snore to my heart’s content. No sooner do I wake up than I’m nodding off again, like a rice-pounder, deep in daydreams. You won’t discover much resemblance between me and a real Zen teacher. Not one trait for younger monks to emulate. No one is more keenly aware of this than I am. I view these defects of mine with constant loathing, but I don’t know what to do about them. I’m afraid I’m a lost cause.

It’s easy work for the villainous monks of today to get the best of a bumbling, good-for-nothing blind old bonze like me. They could disrupt the meeting, throw it into confusion, even cause it to break up early. If that happens, I’ll just wait until they have gone, have someone clean up, then I’ll close up shop and resume my slumber where I left off. It won’t plunge me into despair.

Of course, on the other hand, if thanks to the efforts of my veteran disciples we are able to get through the meeting without incident, that is just fine—but it won’t send me into transports of joy. I have no great desire to think up comments for Zen texts. I am not all that keen on sitting and lecturing from the high seat. I’m just hoping the worthy masters around the country, some of them former comrades, will overlook my shiftless ways and not despise me too much. If one or two of them drop around, I’ll take them into the hills behind the temple. We can gather some sticks and fallen leaves, make a fire, and simmer up some tea. It would be nice to enjoy ourselves like that, unburdened with work or responsibilities, talking leisurely over old times. It would be nice to spend a month or two savoring the pleasures of a pure and carefree existence like that.

At the same time, I must admit that there are one or two things I want monks engaged in penetrating the Zen depths to know about.

When the resolve to seek the Way first began to burn in me, I was drawn by the spirits of the hills and streams among the high peaks of Iiyama. Deep in the forests of Narasawa, I came upon a decrepit old teacher living in a mountain hermitage. He was known as Shōju Rōjin, the old master of the Shōju Hermitage.⁷ His priestly name was Etan. His Dharma grandfather was Gudō Kokushi; his Dharma father was Shidō Munan. Shōju was a blind old bonze, filled with deadly venom. And he was true and authentic to the core.

He was always telling students:

This Zen school of ours began to decline at the end of the Southern Sung. By the time of the Ming dynasty, the transmission had fallen to earth, all petered out. Now what remains of its real poison is found in Japan alone. Even here there’s not much left. It’s like scanning a midday sky for stars. As for you, you smelly, blind shavepates, you ragtag little lackwits, you wouldn’t be able to stumble on it even in your dreams.

Another time, he said:

You’re imposters, the whole lot of you. You look like Zen monks, but you don’t understand Zen. You remind me of the clerics in the teaching schools, but you haven’t mastered the teachings. Some of you resemble precepts monks, but the precepts are beyond you. There’s even a resemblance to the Confucians, but you certainly haven’t grasped Confucianism either. What are you really like? I’ll tell you. Large sacks of rice, fitted out in black robes.

Once he told us this story:

There is a Barrier of crucial importance. Before it sit a row of stern officials, each of whom is there to test the ability of those who come to negotiate the Barrier. Unless you pass their muster, you don’t get through.

Along comes a man who announces that he is a wheelwright. He sits down, fashions a wheel, shows it to the officials, and they let him pass. Another person walks up. An artist. He pulls out a brush, paints a picture for them, and is ushered through the gates. A singing girl is allowed to pass after she sings a refrain from one of the current songs. She is followed by a priest of one of the Pure Land sects. He intones loud invocations of the nembutsu—“Namu-amida-butsu, Namu-amida-butsu.” The gates swing open and he proceeds on his way.

At this point, another man appears. He is clothed in a black robe and declares he is a Zen monk. One of the guardians of the Barrier remarks that “Zen is the crowning pinnacle of the buddhas’ Way.” He then asks, “What is Zen?”

All the monk can do is to stand there, in a blank daze, looking like a pile of brushwood. The officials take one look at the nervous sweat pouring from under his arms and write him off as a rank imposter, a highly suspicious and totally undesirable character. He winds up as a poor devil of an outcast, condemned to a wretched existence outside the Barrier. What a pitiful turn of events.

Shōju also told us:

At some future date you men will probably have temples of your own. Suppose that you receive an invitation from one of your parishioners, asking you to visit him at his home. You arrive with your head monk and some of your students and are ushered into a large room. You find layers of thick, soft cushions to sit upon; dishes filled with rare delicacies are arranged before you. You sit there in high spirits, partaking of the food without a single qualm, because you believe that as a senior priest such hospitality is something you are rightfully entitled to. You finish eating and are enjoying yourself immensely amid the loud talk and boisterous laughter. Suddenly, one of the people present addresses you. He brings up a difficult point of Zen—the kind that would bring deep furrows to the brow of any Zen monk. He casually suggests that you explain it. At that moment, what kind of response are you going to make? Your heart will probably start to thump wildly in your chest. Your body will break out in a muck sweat. Your distress will cast a black pall over the entire room.

So inasmuch as you are members of the Zen school, you should concentrate earnestly on your training. If you don’t, you will be unwittingly sowing the seeds of your own shame and disgrace. There’s no telling when you will be placed in such a harrowing predicament. It’s too terrifying to even contemplate.

He also said:

In recent times, monks are given the Mu koan to work on.⁸ With diligence and concentration, one man among them—or half a man—may be passed by his master.⁹ But in achieving this first small breakthrough, the student forgets about his teacher. He gets the idea that he has enlightened himself and goes around crowing about it to anyone who will listen—sure signs that he is still confined within samsara. Then he proceeds to hatch ideas of his own on various matters pertaining to Zen. With cultivation, these grow and prosper. But the gardens of the patriarchs are still beyond his farthest horizons.

If you want to reach the ground where true peace and comfort is found, the more you realize, the harder you will strive. The further you reach, the further you will press forward. When you finally do see the ultimate truth of the patriarchal teachers, there will be no mistake about it—it will be as if it is right there in the palm of your hand. Why is this? You don’t trim your nails at the foot of a lamp.¹⁰

There is a rich family in eastern Shinano province. They amassed their great wealth over several generations, until their influence rivaled that of the provincial daimyo himself. Their residence is so spacious, the family so large, a bell is needed at mealtime to call everyone together. Occasionally they receive visits from the great and powerful, but on the whole they live a quiet, comfortable, and unobtrusive life. No one even seemed to know what the family business was. Then, in recent years, a large number of young servants were added to the staff. They erected a row of water mills that can be heard grinding away day and night. A procession of rice carts can always be seen trundling in through the gates. They are ten times more prosperous than they were before. It is rumored that they brew almost two hundred thousand liters of sake daily.

An old man living nearby observed these developments. He said: “Mark my words, the prosperity of that house won’t last much longer. What you see now are signs of the end approaching. When things deteriorate internally, the external aspect always tends to swell out like that. They may turn to selling rice for a time, or medicinal herbs, and try to save the situation. But you’ll see before long that they’ll be forced to put the family house up for sale.”

When Shōju heard the old man’s prediction, he heaved a heavy sigh. “Is that what he said? Our Zen school has been in constant decline from the time of the Sung. It has continued on up until the fall of the Ming. Yet the training halls were always full and seemingly prosperous. It’s just as the old man said.”

When he finished speaking, his eyes were filled with tears.

I have recorded a few brief examples of old Shōju’s instructions as I remember them, in the hope that they will give you an idea of the anger, the scoldings and verbal abuse, the shouts of encouragement, that he used in his daily teaching, as well as a sense of the deep concern and sad regrets he often voiced about the present state of the Zen school.