“Dharma transmission” usually takes place in a private ceremony between the teacher and the student in acknowledgment of the student’s maturity and to entrust dharma. Dogen was transmitted dharma from his teacher Rujing upon their first meeting. But Dogen gave dharma transmission to his students after practicing with them for a number of years.
All buddha tathagatas who individually transmit inconceivable dharma, actualizing unsurpassable, complete enlightenment, have a wondrous art, supreme and unconditioned.
Transmission of buddha dharma in the west and east [India and China] is no other than transmission of sitting buddha. This is the pivotal point. Where buddha dharma is not transmitted, zazen is not transmitted. What has been passed on person to person is the essential teaching of zazen alone. Those who have not intimately received this teaching are not buddha ancestors.
A face-to-face-transmitting buddha transmits to a face-to-face-transmitting buddha. It is transmitted from vine to vine, without being cut off. It is transmitted from eye to eye, with the eye open. It is transmitted from face to face, with the face revealed.
I first offered incense and bowed formally to Rujing in the abbot’s room—Wondrous Light Terrace—on the first day, the fifth month, of the first year of the Baoqing Era of Great Song [1225]. He also saw me for the first time. Upon this occasion he transmitted dharma to me, finger to finger, face to face, and said, “The dharma gate of face-to-face transmission from buddha to buddha, ancestor to ancestor, is actualized now.”
Your ability to see buddhas and hear dharma right now is the result of the compassionate continuous practice of each buddha ancestor. Without the one-to-one transmission of buddha ancestors, how could the dharma have reached us today? You should gratefully repay the beneficence of having received one phrase, one dharma. How much more beneficent is the unsurpassed great dharma, the treasury of the true dharma eye? How could you not repay it with gratitude? You should vow to surrender to this day your lifetimes, which could be as immeasurable as the sands of the Ganges.
The Great Master Shakyamuni authentically transmitted this splendid method of attaining the way, and all buddha tathagatas of the past, future, and present attain the way by practicing zazen. For this reason it has been transmitted as the front gate. Furthermore, all ancestors in India and China attained the way by practicing zazen. Thus I now teach this front gate to human beings and devas.
Shakyamuni Buddha once caused Ananda to ask, “Whose disciples were all buddhas of the past?”
Shakyamuni Buddha answered, “All buddhas of the past are disciples of me, Shakyamuni Buddha.”
The presence of all buddhas is like this. To see all buddhas, to succeed in all buddhas, to fulfill the way, is the buddha way of all buddhas. In this buddha way, the document of heritage is always given at the time of transmitting dharma. Those without dharma heritage are people outside the way who believe in spontaneous enlightenment. If the buddha way had not clearly established dharma heritage, how could it have come down to the present?
The meaning of the document of heritage is this: you understand the sun, the moon, and the stars and inherit dharma; you attain skin, flesh, bones, and marrow and inherit dharma; you inherit a robe or staff, a pine branch or whisk, an udumbara blossom or a brocade robe; you receive straw sandals or an arched bamboo staff.
At the time of dharma heritage, the document is handwritten with the blood of the finger or the tongue. Or it is handwritten with oil or milk. Every one of these is a document of heritage.
Those who entrust and those who receive this heritage are both the buddhas’ heirs. Indeed, whenever buddha ancestors are actualized, dharma heritage is actualized. At the time of actualization, innumerable buddha ancestors arrive without expectation and receive dharma without seeking. Those who inherit dharma are all buddha ancestors.
From Shakyamuni Buddha [and Mahakashyapa, the First Ancestor of the Zen lineage] through Huineng there are thirty-four ancestors. The succession of buddhas and ancestors is all handed down in the same way that Mahakashyapa met the Tathagata and the Tathagata attained Mahakashyapa.
In the same way that Shakyamuni Buddha studied with Kashyapa Buddha, masters and disciples exist to this day. In this way the treasury of the true dharma eye has been handed down from person to person. The essential life of buddha dharma is just this authentic transmission. Because buddha dharma is authentically transmitted in this way, it is the direct succession of entrusting.
This being so, the function, the essence, of the buddha way is present with nothing lacking. This has been transmitted from India to China for eighteen thousand miles. It has been transmitted from Buddha’s lifetime to the present day for more than two thousand years.
When Linji was about to pass away, he entrusted Sansheng,120 who would later become Zen Master Huiran, and said, “After I pass away, do not let my treasury of the true dharma eye be extinguished.”
Sansheng said, “How can I let your treasury of the true dharma eye be extinguished?”
Linji said, “If someone asks you about it, how would you respond?”
Sansheng shouted.
Linji said, “Who would have guessed that my treasury of the true dharma eye has reached as far as this blind donkey and perished?”