10
The Awakening of a New Consciousness in Zen
When Suzuki returned to Ascona, Switzerland in 1954 to attend his second Eranos Conference (see the introduction to “The Role of Nature in Zen Buddhism”), the theme of the meeting was “Man and Transformation” (Mensch und Wandlung). For the event, Suzuki presented a paper that utilized the Ten Oxherding Pictures as the entry point for a discussion of “The Awakening of a New Consciousness in Zen.” An edited version of the paper, along with images of the Ten Oxherding Pictures, was published in the conference journal, Eranos Jahrbuch, the following year. The essay is an excellent example of how Suzuki reframed earlier presentations concerning Zen, using language that he felt would be familiar to his audience. At the Eranos meetings in the 1950s, regular attendees included such scholars of religion as Mircea Eliade, Henry Corbin, and Gershom Scholem. These three, who sought through their study of religious, particularly mystical, phenomena to create a distinctively modern “religion after religion” that emphasized religious experience but was secular, individual, and anti-institutional, were a receptive, stimulating audience for the in many ways like-minded Suzuki. (See Wasserstrom, Religion after Religion, especially, p. 167.) In this essay he writes in a comparative mode, amply using material from Christianity, as well as European and American philosophical language, to explain the nature of awakening in Zen. In this essay Suzuki makes ample use of material from the Linji lu (Records of Rinzai), since he had been working steadily on that material, publishing an important study, Rinzai no kihon shisō (The Fundamental Thought of Rinzai), in 1949. Suzuki also adds an exegesis of the Ten Oxherding Pictures, a common topic for lectures in the Rinzai tradition, especially in Japan. Suzuki wrote about this series of images in Essays in Zen Buddhism (First Series), Manual of Zen Buddhism, in a separately published pamphlet, The Ten Oxherding Pictures, that was published by Sekai Seiten Kyōkai in 1948, and for Gentry no. 9 (1953–1954): 91–92.
The essay here is based on “Awakening of a New Consciousness in Zen,” Eranos Jahrbuch 1954, Mensch und Wandlung, 23 (1955): 275–304. The essay was reprinted in Man and Transformation: Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks, ed. Joseph Campbell (New York: Pantheon, 1964), 179–202.
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I
My position in regard to “the awakening of a new consciousness,” summarily stated, is as follows:
The phrasing, “the awakening of a new consciousness,” as it appears in the title of this paper, is not a happy one, because what is awakened in the Zen experience is not a “new” consciousness, but an “old” one which has been dormant ever since our loss of “innocence,” to use the Biblical term. The awakening is really the re-discovery or the excavation of a long-lost treasure.1
There is in every one of us, though varied in depth and strength, an eternal longing for “something” which transcends a world of inequalities. This is a somewhat vague statement containing expressions not altogether happy. “To transcend” suggests “going beyond,” “being away from,” that is, a separation, a dualism. I have, however, no desire to hint that the “something” stands away from the world in which we find ourselves. And then “inequalities” may sound too political. When I chose the term I had in mind the Buddhist word asama which contrasts with sama, “equal” or “same.” We may replace it by such words as “differentiation” or “individualization” or “conditionality.” I just want to point out the fact that as soon as we recognize this world to be subject to constant changes we somehow begin to feel dissatisfied with it and desire for something which is permanent, free, above sorrow, and of eternal value.
This longing is essentially religious and each religion has its own way of designating it according to its tradition. Christians may call it longing for the Kingdom of Heaven or renouncing the world for the sake of divine love or praying to be saved from eternal damnation. Buddhists may call it seeking for emancipation or freedom. Indians may understand it as wishing to discover the real self.
Whatever expressions they may use, they all show a certain feeling of discontent with the situation in which they find themselves. They may not yet know exactly how to formulate this feeling and conceptually represent it either to themselves or to others.
I specified this obscure feeling as a longing for something. In this, it may be said, I have already a preconceived idea by assuming the existence of a something for which there is a longing on our part. Instead of saying this, it might have been better to identify the feeling of dissatisfaction with such modern feelings as fear or anxiety or a sense of insecurity. But the naming is not so important. As long as the mind is upset and cannot enjoy any state of equilibrium or perfect equanimity, this is a sense of insecurity or discontent. We feel as if we were in the air and trying to find a place for landing.
But we do not know exactly where this place for landing is. The objective is an altogether unknown quantity. It can nowhere be located and the fact adds a great deal to our sense of insecurity. We must somewhere and somehow find the landing.
Two ways are open: outward and inward. The outward one may be called intellectual and objective, but the inward one cannot be called subjective or affective or conative. The “inward” is misleading, though it is difficult to designate it in any other way. For all designations are on the plane of intellection. But as we must name it somehow, let us be content for a while to call it “inward” in contrast to “outward.”
Let me give you this caution here: as long as the inward way is to be understood in opposition to the outward way—though to do otherwise is impossible because of the human inability to go beyond language as the means of communication—the inward way after all turns to be an outward way. The really inward way is when no contrast exists between the inward and the outward. This is a logical contradiction. But the full meaning of it will I hope become clearer when I finish this paper.
The essential characteristic of the outward way consists in its never-ending procession, either forward or backward, but mostly in a circular movement, and always retaining the opposition of two terms, subject and object. There is thus no finality in the outward way, hence the sense of insecurity, though security does not necessarily mean “standing still,” “not moving anywhere,” or “attached to something.”
The inward way is the reverse of the outward way. Instead of going out endlessly and dissipating and exhausting itself, the mind turns inwardly to see what is there behind all this endless procession of things. It does not stop the movement in order to examine what is there. If it does, the movement ceases to be a movement; it turns into something else. This is what the intellect does while the inward way refuses to do so. As soon as there is any kind of bifurcation, the outward way asserts itself and the inward way no longer exists. The inward way consists in taking things as they are, in catching them in their is-ness or suchness. I would not say, “in their oneness” or “in their wholeness.” These are the terms belonging to the outward way. Even to say “is-ness” or “suchness” or “thusness” or in Japanese “sono-mama” or in Chinese “qi-mou,” is not, strictly speaking, the inward way. “To be” is an abstract term. It is much better to lift a finger and say nothing about it. The inward way in its orthodoxy generally avoids appealing to language though it never shuns it.
The inward way occasionally uses the term “one” or “all,” but in this case “one” means “one that is never one,” and “all” means “all that is never all.” The “one” will be “a one ever becoming one” and never a closed-up “one.” The “all” will be “an all ever becoming all” and never a closed-up “all.” This means that in the inward way the one is an absolute one, that one is all and all is one, and further that when “the ten thousand things” are reduced to an absolute oneness which is an absolute nothingness, we have the inward way perfecting itself.
Buddhism, especially Zen Buddhism as it developed in China, is rich in expressions belonging to the inward way. In fact, it is Zen that has effected, for the first time, a deep excavation into the mine of the inward way. To illustrate my point read the following—I give just one instance:
Suigan at the end of the summer session made this declaration: “I have been talking, east and west, all this summer for my Brotherhood. See if my eyebrows are still growing.”2
One of his disciples said, “How finely they are growing!”
Another said, “One who commits a theft feels uneasy in his heart.”
A third one without saying anything simply uttered “Guan!” 3
It goes without saying that all these utterances of the disciples as well as of the master give us a glimpse into the scene revealed only to the inward way. They are all expressions directly bursting out of an abyss of absolute nothingness.
Now we come to the psycho-metaphysical aspect of the inward way. Buddhists call this “abyss of absolute nothingness” kokoro in Japanese. Kokoro is xin in Chinese and in Sanskrit citta, or sarvasattva-citta to use the term in Aśvaghosa’s Awakening of Faith. Kokoro is originally a psychological term, meaning “heart,” “soul,” “spirit,” “mind,” “thought”; it later came to denote the kernel or essence of a thing, becoming synonymous metaphysically with “substance” and ethically “sincerity,” “verity,” “faithfulness,” etc. It is thus difficult to give one English equivalent for kokoro.
Out of this kokoro all things are produced and all things ultimately go back to it. But this must not be understood in relation to time. The kokoro and all things are one and yet not one; they are two and yet not two. A monk asked Zhaozhou (Jōshū in Japanese), “I am told that the ten thousand things all return to the One, but where does the One return to?”
Zhaozhou answered, “When I was in Qingzhou, I had a robe made which weighed seven jin.” This mondo4 demonstrates eloquently the difference between the outward way and the inward way. If this sort of question was asked of the philosopher he will go on writing one book after another. But the Zen master who thoroughly knows the inward way does not stop to think and instantly gives his answer which is final, with no going-on-and-on.
The kokoro is not to be confused with the Ālaya-vijñāna of the Yogācāra, one of the Mahayana schools. The kokoro reveals itself only when the Ālaya is broken through. The Ālaya may be considered as corresponding to “the Unconscious” or to “the Collective Unconscious,” but the Ālaya is more than mere Unconscious as distinguished from the Conscious, for it comprises both. The kokoro, however, is not the Ālaya, in which, I would say, there is still something savoring of intellection. The kokoro is thoroughly purged of all sorts of intellection, it is an abyss of absolute nothingness.
And yet there is something moving in the midst of the kokoro. From the point of view of the outward way, this will be incomprehensible, because how could “absolute nothingness” be made to “move” at all? That such a thing should actually take place is a mystery. Some may call it “the mystery of being.” As if from the unfathomable depths of an abyss, the kokoro is stirred. The kokoro wants to know itself. As long as it remains in itself all is quiet: the mountain remains a mountain towering up to the sky; the river flows as a river singing its way down to the ocean. But as soon as a tiny speck of cloud appears in the blue, it in no time spreads out enveloping the whole universe, even vomiting thunders and lightnings. The kokoro is in all this, but human intellectuality loses sight of it and would go on bewildered and annoyed and full of fearful thoughts. The kokoro is lost in the maze of perplexities.
In Western terminology, the kokoro may be regarded as corresponding to God or Godhead. God also wants to know himself; he did not or could not remain himself eternally absorbed in meditation. Somehow he came out of his is-ness and uttered a mantram, “Let there be light!” and lo, the whole world leaped out into existence. From where? Nowhere! Out of nothing! Out of the Godhead! And the world is God and God is the world, and God exclaims, “It is good!”
According to Aśvaghosa, “In the midst of the kokoro a nen is spontaneously awakened.” A nen (nian in Chinese, citta-kṣaṇa in Sanskrit) is a moment of consciousness coming to itself; it is, one might say, a consciousness rising from the unconscious, though with a certain reservation. The Sanskrit, eka-citta-kṣaṇa, literally means “one-mind (or thought) moment.” It is “a thought-instant” or “a consciousness-unit” which constitutes consciousness like a second or a minute which is a unit-measure for time. “Spontaneously” (kotsunen in Japanese) describes the way a citta-kṣaṇa rises in the kokoro. God uttered his fiat just as spontaneously. When the kokoro is said to have raised a thought to know itself, there was no conscious intentionality in it; it just happened so—that is, spontaneously.
But what we must remember in this connection is that when we say “no intentionality” we are apt to understand it in the outward way along the intellectual line and may find it difficult to reconcile it with the idea of human consciousness. It takes a long series of discussions to make this point clear, and as it does not directly concern us here, let it pass with this remark that with God as with the kokoro freedom and necessity are one.
When Buddhists make reference to God, God must not be taken in the Biblical sense. When I talk about God’s giving an order to light, which is recorded in Genesis, I allude to it with the desire that our Christian readers may come to a better understanding of the Buddhist idea of the inward way. What follows, therefore, is to be understood in this spirit.
The Biblical God is recorded as having given his Name to Moses at Mount Sinai as “I am that I am.” I do not of course know much about Christian or Jewish theology, but this “name,” whatever its original Hebrew meaning of the word may be, seems to me of such significance that we must not put it aside as not essential to the interpretation of God-idea in the development of Christian thought. The Biblical God is always intensely personal and concretely intimate, and how did he ever come to declare himself under such a highly metaphysical designation as he did to Moses? “A highly metaphysical designation,” however, is from the outward way of looking at things, while from the inward way “I am that I am” is just as “spontaneous” as the fish swimming about in the mountain stream or the fowl of the air flying across the sky. God’s is-ness is my is-ness and also the cat’s is-ness sleeping on her mistress’s lap. This is reflected in Christ’s declaration that “I am before Abraham was.” In this is-ness which is not to be assumed under the category of metaphysical abstractions, I feel like recognizing the fundamental oneness of all the religious experiences.
The spontaneity of is-ness, to go back to the first part of this paper, is what is revealed in the “eternal longing” for something which has vanished from the domain of the outward way of intellectualization. The kokoro’s wishing to know itself, or God’s demanding to see “light,” is humanly expressed, no other than our longing to transcend this world of particulars. While in the world, we find ourselves too engrossed in the business of “knowing” which started when we left the garden of “innocence.” We all now want “to know,” “to think,” “to choose,” “to decide,” “to be responsible,” etc., with everything that follows from exercising what we call “freedom.”
“Freedom” is really the term to be found in the inward way only and not in the outward way. But somehow a confusion has come into our mind and we find ourselves madly running after things which can never be attained in the domain of the outward way. The feeling of insecurity then grows out of this mad pursuit, because we are no more able to be in “the spontaneity of is-ness.”
We can now see that “the awakening of a new consciousness” is not quite a happy expression. The longing is for something we have lost and not for an unknown quantity of which we have not the remotest possible idea. In fact, there is no unknown quantity in the world into which we have come to pass our time. The longing of any sort implies our previous knowledge of it, though we may be altogether ignorant of its presence in our consciousness. The longing of the kind to which I have been referring is a shadow of the original kokoro cast in the track of the inward way. The real object can never be taken hold of until we come back to the abode which we inadvertently quitted. “The awakening of a new consciousness” is therefore the finding ourselves back in our original abode where we lived even before our birth. This experience of home-coming and therefore of the feeling of perfect security is evinced everywhere in religious literature.
The feeling of perfect security means the security of freedom and the securing of freedom is no other than “the awakening of a new consciousness.” Ordinarily, we talk of freedom too readily, mostly in the political sense, and also in the moral sense. But as long as we remain in the outward way of seeing things, we can never understand what freedom is. All forms of freedom we generally talk of are far from being freedom in its deepest sense. Most people are sadly mistaken in this respect.
That the awakening of a new consciousness is in fact being restored to one’s original abode goes in Christianity with the idea of God’s fatherhood. The father’s “mansion” can be no other than my own home where I was born and brought up till I became willful and left it on my own account. But, really, however willful I may be I can never leave my original abode behind and wander away from it. I am always where I was born and I can never be anywhere else. It is only my imagination or illusion that I was led to believe that I was not in it. To become conscious of this fact is to awaken a new consciousness so called. There is nothing “new” in this, it is only the recovery of what I thought I had lost; in the meantime I have been in possession of it; I have been in it, I have been carrying it all the time; no, I am it and it is I.
The Shin Buddhists are quite emphatic in asserting this idea of restoration or rather of identification. They go further and say that Amida is always pursuing us and that even when we wanted to run away from him he would never let us go, for we are held firmly in his arms. The harder we struggle to get away from him the tighter he holds us, just as the mother does to her baby who tries to assert its self-will.5
In Zen the idea of restoration or re-cognition may be gleaned from Enō’s reference to “the original (or primal) face” which he wanted his disciples to see. This “face” is what we have even prior to our birth. In other words, this is the face of “innocence” which we have before our eating of the fruit from the tree of knowledge. “The tree of knowledge” is the outward way of intellection. When it begins to operate, “innocence” which is the inward way hides itself and becomes invisible. Most people take the “innocence” in a moral sense, but I would interpret it symbolically. “Innocence” corresponds to Aśvaghosa’s “Original (or primal) Enlightenment” in which we were or are. It has never been lost even when “knowledge” is in full operation, because without it our existence has no significance whatever and “knowledge” itself of any kind would be altogether impossible. In this sense, “the inward way” is at once inward and outward. When it is separated and considered in opposition to “the outward way” it ceases to be itself.
Incidentally, Zen is often criticized as not having any direct contact with the world of particulars, but the critics forget the fact that Zen has never gone out of this world and therefore that the question of contact has no sense here.
Aśvaghosa’s great work on the Mahayana is entitled The Awakening of Faith, but Zen generally does not use the term. The reason is that faith implies a division and Zen is emphatic in denying it in any sense. But if it (faith) is used in its absolute sense—which is in accordance with the inward way of seeing things—faith may be regarded as another name for satori and is no other than the awakening of “a new consciousness” though, as I have repeatedly said, there is really nothing “new” in Zen. Whatever this may be, “the awakening of a new consciousness” is the awakening of faith in Aśvaghosa’s sense, that is, in its absolute sense. Then, faith corresponds to becoming aware of “Original Enlightenment” in which we are all the time. Faith is coming back to ourselves, to our own is-ness, and has nothing to do with the so-called objective existence of God. Christians and other theists seem to be unnecessarily busy in trying to prove God as objectively existing before they believe in him. But from the Zen point of view the objectivity of God is an idle question. I would say that those who are so engrossed in the question of this sort have really no God whatever, that is, subjectively as well as objectively. As soon as they have faith, they have God. Faith is God and God is faith. To wait for an objective proof is the proof—the most decisive one—that they have no God yet. Faith comes first and then God. It is not God who gives us faith, but faith that gives us God. Have faith and it will create God. Faith is God coming to his own knowledge.6
When the Zen man has a satori, the whole universe comes along with it; or we may reverse this and say that with satori the whole universe sinks into nothingness. In one sense, satori is leaping out of an abyss of absolute nothingness, and in another sense it is going down into the abyss itself. Satori is, therefore, at once a total annihilation and a new creation.
A monk asked a Zen master, “Does ‘this’ go away with the universe when the latter is totally consumed by fire at the end of the kalpa?” The master answered, “Yes.” When the same question was proposed to another master, he said, “No.” From the inward way, “Yes” and “No” are one; destruction and construction are one.
The awakening of a new consciousness is the awakening of faith, and the awakening of faith is the creating of a new universe with infinite possibilities.7 It is a new universe, yes, but in reality an old, old universe, where beings, sentient and non-sentient, have been dreaming their dreams, each in his way, ever since “Let there be light” came to work out its destiny. Here the Biblical time has no meaning.
II
One or two examples from the history of Zen in China and Japan may help one to understand how the awakening of a new consciousness takes place in Zen. To tell the truth, Zen literature does not give us any detailed account of a personal experience gone through by the masters who came to have a satori. We have to supply much to complete the account from our own experience. First, let me tell you how Rinzai Gigen (Linji Yixuan, died 867) came to his satori.
Rinzai Gigen, usually better known as Rinzai, is the founder of the Zen school called after his name. He flourished in the later middle part of the Tang dynasty. In his younger days he was interested in the study of the Vinaya (Buddhist Precepts) and of the Sutras and Shastras (doctrinal and discursive texts of Buddhism). This, however, did not give him a spiritual satisfaction and he went to Ōbaku Kiun, one of the greatest Zen masters of the day, to discipline himself in Zen. Let me remark here that those who come to Zen generally do not come to it directly; they spend some time in the study of the moral and the philosophical teachings. The Vinaya give a detailed course of moral discipline. No doubt Rinzai must have gone through all those disciplinary measures. That he failed to find here food sufficient for his inner needs shows, as in the case of Buddha himself, that morality does not penetrate into the core of a religiously-minded person who is after all a spiritual being. As we all know the spiritual life can never be realized by just observing all the rules prescribed for one’s daily behavior. Morality is concerned with our social and political and, therefore, superficial aspect of our existence. However righteous a man may be in his moral conduct, he can never be a religious man for that reason. We cannot reach religion through morality, for religion has a life of its own and must be reached by another approach; in my terminology, religion belongs in the inward way; morality and intellection are closely related. A man may not steal a bamboo-shoot from his neighbor’s yard, but that will not make him a religious being. On the other hand, a man may be pious enough to go to church on every “religious” occasion and assiduously perform all that is required of him as a church member; and yet he may be far from being a religious personality. He may be called moral inasmuch as he is conscientious enough, but he is not a religious man. Spirituality which constitutes the religious life has nothing to do with all these superficialities belonging to one’s outward way.
I cannot tell whether Rinzai started with the Vinaya first and then came to philosophy. We cannot generally make such a sharp division between morality and knowledge and trace stages in a man’s spiritual progress. That philosophy is not at all conducive to one’s spiritual welfare may be seen from Kierkegaard’s parable of a palatial mansion built by the philosopher.8 He constructs all kinds of fine architectural specimens but he refuses to live in them and instead would spend his life in a hovel next to the palace. A spiritual man, on the other hand, never builds a house of his own. He finds himself in any sort of dwelling he would come across and turns it into a magnificent residence. This is the difference between the philosopher and the religious spirit. Rinzai like other men of his type must have started to construct a fine house by ardently applying himself to the study of philosophy. When he found that the house of his construction was not after all meant for himself he gave up being further engaged in this unprofitable enterprise.
The intellect is not meant to lead a man to a life of spirituality. It may point to the path, but the pointing is not an actual walking on it. Of course, the finger is needed to show where the moon is, but it is not the moon itself and how frequently we are led to commit this kind of error!
What is needed in Zen is the inward way, the builder himself who builds the house, and not the house. However splendid the palace may be, it does not belong to him, it is not he himself. The reason why the philosopher does not live in a residence of his construction is because what he constructs after all does not belong to him, is not his; he may look at it and is not allowed to live in it. He and the house are two separate objects. It is the philosopher’s destiny that he cannot enjoy the fruit of his labor. He always contrives for objectification. He splits himself into two. Zen does the reverse.
Zen is concerned with a person, a living person, who acts and does not spend his life in mere thinking. With him thinking and acting are one. He builds a house and the house is he. With him the house is not an object erected beside him. He is the builder and the building when he is engaged in building. The builder is never away from the building, he is building himself. Zen wants us to take hold of this builder in the building—the building not as an object but as the subject himself, as the one who is engaged in the act of building.
The philosopher is the planner; he draws up his plan on paper and wants to see somebody else to work on it. He can never build a house himself, much less live in it. He does not know how to use the hammer or the saw. He is doomed to be an on-looker, an outsider. Zen on the other hand takes up at once all the necessary implements for the building. Every stroke of the hammer is himself, so is every movement or act that goes into the building. The whole structure is not as an object to look at but is the person standing here. The structure is not his work, but he himself.
Later, when Rinzai became a full-fledged Zen master, he gave a sermon to the following effect:
“Over a mass of reddish flesh there sits a true man who has no title; he is all the time coming in and out from your sense-organs. If you have not yet testified to the fact, Look! Look!” A monk came forward and asked, “Who is this true man of no title?” Rinzai came right down from his straw chair and taking hold of the monk exclaimed: “Speak! Speak!” The monk remained irresolute, not knowing what to say, whereupon the master, letting him go, remarked, “What worthless stuff is this true man of no title!” Rinzai then went straight back to his room.
Rinzai’s search for “the person” naturally could not be accomplished by going through the philosophical lores of Buddhism however edifying in the other respect they may be. Whatever “person” he may come across here was a painted one, an objectified one always busy in a reconstruction work and not in creation. Rinzai had to come to a Zen master.
He stayed under Ōbaku for three years, but did not know what to ask him. This eloquently proves that his mind was, at the time, in a state of utter confusion. Morality failed him, intellection failed him, and his resources were now exhausted. What could he do? How would he proceed now? Those three years must have been for him the days of excruciatingly painful spiritual torture. Zen is not just a kind of psychological exercise, nor is it a discipline in meditation considered an art of mental tranquillization. Zen is very much more than that.
Fortunately, there was a man in the monastery, who had much experience, and seeing Rinzai silently struggling over a problem which had never yet been articulately formulated, he felt great sympathy with his younger fellow disciple. One day, he approached Rinzai and wanted to know if Rinzai ever asked the master any question in regard to his inner struggle. When Rinzai gave a negative answer, the kind-hearted monk who was known as Chin the Elder told Rinzai to ask the master: “What is the ultimate principle of the Buddhist teaching?”9
The question suggested is quite a common one, there is nothing unusual about it, innocent enough, one might say. But the point is not the intellectual content of the question, but the questioning itself. What Rinzai wanted was not anything of intellectual nature; he was already full of it; he had no desire to go back to his old “outward way.” Chin the Elder knew exactly the position in which Rinzai was, for Chin has passed the same state of mental impasse. The experience is not limited to those ancient masters of Zen, but anybody, modern as well as ancient, knows very well that there is a certain critical moment in his life when he is about to start in his arduous career of spiritual turmoil. When he faces this moment and goes on struggling for some years, he finds himself in a peculiar state of mentality which borders on an utter feeling of despondency, sinking lower and lower, and yet knowing no way to stop it or to recover himself from it. The feeling has various degrees of intensity according to different temperaments. From the point of view of satori experience this is a good sign showing that the mind is prepared to turn away from its old way, that is, from its outward way of seeing things. What is needed here is to have a certain pivotal point around which the mind may begin to work out its own salvation; Chin the Elder gave it to Rinzai.
With something new to turn his attention upon, Rinzai came to Ōbaku and asked, “What is the fundamental principle of the Buddhist teaching?” Ōbaku lost no time in giving Rinzai several hard blows of a stick even before the latter finished his question. Whatever sense there was in Ōbaku’s striking Rinzai so hard and apparently so mercilessly and so unreasonably, we can be sure of one thing, which is that there was nothing on either side, Rinzai or Ōbaku, which might be designated as intellectual. The question as I said before had nothing to do with “principle” or with “the Buddhist teaching.” If there were anything in it approaching what we call “sense,” Ōbaku would never have resorted to the stick. All that was imperative in this moment of mental crisis was to awaken Rinzai from his spiritual torpidity or stagnation. Something corresponding to an electric shock was what Rinzai needed. This came in the form of the stick-beating from the master’s hand. Rinzai, however, failed to respond to it. He reported the incident to Chin the Elder. Chin did not say anything to help Rinzai to get out of the quandary. He simply made Rinzai go again to Ōbaku with the same question. He obediently followed the advice, but the same treatment from the master was the reward.
The report was made as before and the same advice came again from the elderly adviser. Rinzai saw the master for a third time with the same question. The master was relentless. Rinzai did not know what to do with himself. He expressed his desire to Chin the Elder to go somewhere else where he perhaps may have an opportunity to open up a new passway.
Chin the Elder was quite an expert Zen psychologist as he thoroughly understood where Rinzai stood. He saw Ōbaku and suggested that when Rinzai should come for advice Ōbaku might tell him where to go. Rinzai called on Ōbaku expressing his deep regret that he was unable to comprehend anything in regard to all that went between the master and himself. Ōbaku told him to go to Daigu, a friend of his who might help Rinzai in his perplexity.
Daigu’s first question was about Ōbaku’s treatment of Rinzai when the latter asked, “What is the fundamental principle of the Buddhist teaching?” Rinzai told Daigu all about the experience he went through under Ōbaku. Daigu simply remarked, “What a grandmotherly person Ōbaku is!”
This comment, casual and nonchalant in all appearance, suddenly awakened Rinzai from the depths of an inexpressible despondency and made him exclaim, “After all there is not much in Ōbaku’s teaching!”
When Daigu heard this, he at once seized Rinzai by the chest and demanded, “What is the matter with you? A moment ago you tearfully complained about your inability to understand Ōbaku and what makes you now utter such a bold challenge? Speak! Speak!”
Thus pressed, Rinzai did not say a word, but poked Daigu’s sides softly three times.
Daigu pushed Rinzai away, saying, “Ōbaku is your teacher. I have nothing to do with you. Go back to him!”
When Rinzai returned to Ōbaku, Ōbaku said, “What keeps you so busy going and coming all the time?”
Rinzai then narrated to Ōbaku all that happened. When he finished it, Ōbaku said, “That stupid fellow of Daigu! When I see him I will give him a hearty blow of my stick!”
“What is the use of waiting for him?” Rinzai burst out, “You have one yourself right this moment!” So saying, Rinzai gave Ōbaku a slap on his face.
Ōbaku’s certificate testifying Rinzai’s satori experience came out in the following utterance quite appropriate to a Zen master of his type: “What arrogance! What impudence!”
Let us ask: What was really the change that had taken place in Rinzai? As they say, he was a most miserable sort of cur when he was under Ōbaku, not being able to ask even a question, and when told to ask, bearing meekly all the harsh treatment from the master. But as soon as he threw away all the burden under which he had been moaning and groaning, he turned into a golden-haired lion whose one roar would frighten away every feeble-minded animal around him. What is the meaning of this sudden transformation?
Christ would need three days to restore the temple once destroyed. The crucified Christ also waited for some time to get resurrected. Rinzai apparently needed no time to achieve his satori performance. In a twinkling of an eye all the miracles that were there were performed. Buddha’s teachings which were given out for forty-nine long years after his Enlightenment were completely swept away by one blow of his breath. There was not much not only in Ōbaku’s teaching but in all other Buddhist fathers’ and saints’ teachings. And Zen does not seem to be proud of the accomplishment. What is after all the meaning of all this?
Neither psychology nor logic nor metaphysics can explain it as long as they are on the outward way of intellectualization. Because Zen is on the other side where nothing of the outward way can reach. This of course does not mean that there is another way beside the outward way, which is to be called the inward way. To objectify the inward way as such is to treat it in the outward way, the inward way will never be understood in this way. Follow the way Rinzai went on, weigh the treatment Ōbaku gave him, notice Daigu’s comment on Ōbaku, and contrast Rinzai’s later behavior including his sermons and mondo.10
Psychologically, we may say that here is a sample of a new consciousness awakened in the Zen man’s mind, or a new consciousness awakened in the Unconscious. But from the point of view of an advocate of what might be provisionally designated as the “inward way” school, I should like to state that “the Unconscious” belongs in the outward way of thinking or viewing things and is inadequate to give us the key to the whole field of Rinzai’s spiritual experiences.
While I do not feel like making any reference to metaphysics so called I fear I have to bring something of it here in order to make Rinzai more “intelligible” to those who are not familiar with Zen. Instead of identifying satori with “a new consciousness” awakened from “the Unconscious,” cannot we say that here human consciousness itself is becoming conscious of itself?
We talk ordinarily so much of self-consciousness as if we knew all about it, but in reality we have never come to a full knowledge of what self-consciousness is. Consciousness has always been conscious of something other than itself. As to “the Self” it has never even attempted to know, because the Self cannot be conscious of itself insofar as it remains dichotomous. The Self is known only when it remains itself and yet goes out of itself. This contradiction can never be understood on the level of the outward way. It is absolutely necessary to rise above this level if the meaning of self-consciousness is to be realized to its full depths.
The awakening of a new consciousness so called, as far as the inward way of seeing into the nature of things is concerned, is no other than consciousness becoming acquainted with itself. Not that a new consciousness rises out of the Unconscious but consciousness itself turns inwardly into itself. This is the home-coming. This is the seeing of one’s own “primal face” which one has even before one’s birth. This is God’s pronouncing his name to Moses. This is the birth of Christ in each one of our souls. This is Christ rising from death. “The Unconscious” which has been lying quietly in consciousness itself now raises its head and announces its presence through consciousness.
We humans have the very bad habit of giving a name to a certain object with a certain number of attributes and think this name exhausts the object thus designated, whereas the object itself has no idea of remaining within the limit prescribed by the name. The object lives, grows, expands, and often changes into something else than the one imprisoned within the name. We who have given the name to it imagine that the object thus named for ever remains the same, because for the practical purposes of life or for the sake of what we call logic it is convenient to retain the name all the time regardless of whatever changes that have taken place and might take place in it. We become a slave to a system of nomenclature we ourselves have invented.
This applies perfectly to our consciousness. We have given the name “consciousness” to a certain group of psychological phenomena and another name “unconscious” to another group. We keep them strictly separated one from the other. A confusion will upset our thought-structure. This means that what is named “conscious” cannot be “unconscious” and vice versa. But in point of fact human psychology is a living fact and refuses to observe an arbitrary system of grouping. The conscious wants to be unconscious and the unconscious conscious. But human thinking cannot allow such a contradiction: the unconscious must remain unconscious and the conscious conscious; no such things as the unconscious conscious or the conscious unconscious must take place, because they cannot take place in the nature of things, logicians would say. If they are to happen, a time-agent must come in and make consciousness rise out of the unconscious.
But Zen’s way of viewing or evaluating things differs from the outward way of intellection. Zen would not object to the possibility of an “unconscious conscious” or a “conscious unconscious.” Therefore, not the awakening of a new consciousness but consciousness coming to its own unconscious.
Language is used to give a name to everything, and when an object gets a name, we begin to think that the name is the thing and adjust ourselves to a new situation which is our own creation. So much confusion arises from it. If there is one thing Zen does for modern people, it will be to awaken them from this self-imposed thralldom. A Zen master would take up a staff, and, producing it before the audience declare, “I do not call it a staff. What would you call it?” Another master would say, “Here is a staff. It has transformed itself into a dragon, and the dragon has swallowed up the whole universe. Where do you get all these mountains, lakes, and the great earth?” When I got for the first time acquainted with Zen I thought this was a logical quibble, but I now realize that there is something here far more serious, far more real, and far more significant, which can be reached only by following the inward way.
I now finish Rinzai. I thought I would give you another example of “the awakening of a new consciousness” so called. But as I have no time I would refer you to my books already published, though there are many things I wish to rewrite in them.
Before concluding the second part of this paper, there is one important thing which is needed in the study of modern Zen. By this I mean the koan system, which has opened a new way to Zen but which as we know is also doing a great deal of harm to it unless we are careful about its handling. As is the case of language, all human creations tend to produce good and bad indiscriminately. The innovation of the koan system or koan methodology which was needed for the propagation and preservation of a special spiritual discipline called Zen has created a new psychological study which I am sure will interest students of the psychology of religion as well as those of psychology in general. I have touched on the subject in my books, but there are still many points I wish to clarify. The study naturally requires the cooperation of specialists not only of the West but of the East. This has so far never been attempted by anybody anywhere in the methodical way. Here is a field of religious study of the greatest import. I am not speaking just from the point of view of scientific interest, but mainly from the point of view of a world culture which is taking shape more or less tangibly in spite of the fact that we are at present facing a great confusion of thought political and otherwise. The world is becoming one as it should and the distinction of East and West is disappearing though slowly. Prejudices of all sorts are to give way to an age of illumination.
III
One last thing remains, which is to explain what is known as “The Ten Ox- (or Cow-) herding Pictures.” The Chinese term for “ox” or “cow” is niu and ushi in Japanese. Ushi designates the bovine family generally, it can be either a cow, or an ox, or a bull. It is sexless. The ushi is a sacred animal in India. It is compared here to the mind or heart or the Self. It is somewhat hard to get a precise office of the animal which is made to illustrate the progress of one’s spiritual life. In the first parts of the Pictures, it is something worthy of seeking as a treasure. But in the pictures IV, V, and VI [figures 6, 7, and 8], the animal is represented as unruly and requiring a great deal of training. In point of fact, what requires the training is not the animal but the man himself. He is not yet worthy of the treasure and the latter constantly shows its readiness to go away from him. As long as the man is conscious of his “Self” in connection with the prize, there is the dualistic separation of the possessor and the possessed. This consciousness which may be compared to the Christian idea of pride hinders the man’s perfect identification with the thing he has been in search of for so many years. These pictures, therefore, may better be regarded as stages of training for the man and not for the animal. The author’s symbolization shows a confusion here.
The pictures are said to have been done by a Zen master of the Song dynasty known as Kakuan Shien. He is also the author of the poems and the introductory words attached to the pictures. Kakuan was not, however, the first one who tried to illustrate by means of pictures stages of Zen training. There was one who made use of the ushi’s gradually growing white to visualize progress of spiritual life in Zen. There are some indications that there were a number of Zen masters who made use of the ushi to demonstrate their ideas of Zen. But most of them are now lost. The one here reproduced is the one most popular and accessible in Japan and perhaps the only one that has survived vicissitudes of history while coming over from China. The painter is Shūbun, a Japanese Zen priest of the fifteenth century. The original pictures are preserved in Shōkokuji, one of the principal Zen temples in Kyoto.
The foreword to the Picture I [figure 3] concurs with my view of the original home which we have never left but which, owing to our intellectual delusions, we are led to imagine its disappearance out of our sight. The searching for the lost is a great initial error we all commit which makes us think we are finally awakened to a new consciousness.
The idea of the “Paradise Lost” and the “Paradise Regained” seems to be well-nigh universal all over the world. The psychologist may explain it by alluding to our prenatal abode in the mother’s womb, but Buddhists would go further back and talk about the womb of Tathagatahood (tathagatagarbha) as is done by Aśvaghosa. The tathagatagarbha is no other than the kokoro, and the kokoro is not something to regain. We are always in it, we are it. In fact, as the Shin followers would say, Amida who is the kokoro personified is ever pursuing us, and however much we try to run away from him, we can never succeed, because all the running we perform can never be outside the kokoro itself.
This idea is hinted at in the poem attached to the Picture II [figure 4]. Everywhere and anywhere we may ramble, we see the traces of the kokoro, or, in this case, of the ushi, not only by the streams, among the trees, on the sweet-scented grasses, but among the hills, in the wild fields. His horns or rather nose is said to reach the heavens and there is nothing that can hide him. It is we who shut our own eyes and pitifully bemoan that we cannot see anything.
The Picture III [figure 5] is the awakening of “a new consciousness”; it is the finding of the precious animal which is no other than the man himself. There is no new finding. The sun is warm as before, the breeze is soothing, the willows are green, the flowers are red: the whole universe is the man. “Heaven above, heavens below, I alone am the honored one.” No painter can ever reproduce him.
The Pictures IV, V, and VI [figures 6, 7, and 8], are misleading. It is really not the animal but the man himself that needs training and whipping. He has now what he has been looking for, or, it may be better to say, he finds himself that he has never gone out of his original abode. But he is not used to the new situation and the karmic taint of the infinite past tenaciously clings to him. That is to say, his habit of intellectualization or conceptualization which has been going on ever since his loss of “innocence” is extremely difficult to get rid of. The identification is something altogether new in his life. The adjustment will naturally take time. The Picture VI [figure 8] shows that the struggle is finally over.
The Picture VII [figure 9] completes the process of self-discipline, it marks the culmination of a struggle that has been going on even after the awakening of a new consciousness. The man is coming, we may say, to experience a second awakening, for “the man,” the consciousness of the Self, is still left, and this must go with the rest. We all—including the man (or boy) and the animal, plants and fields, mountains and rivers—have come from the abyss of absolute nothingness, and we are once more to return to it. The idea is symbolized by a circle (VIII) [figure 10] here. But really the circle is not circumscribed, has no limits, no boundary lines, and therefore, it is centerless which means that the center is everywhere. The second awakening takes place here.
With this we enter into the realm of ontology. The mystery is that the inward way is, in spite of its eternally being empty (śūnya), in possession of infinite values. It never exhausts itself.
The foreword and the poem attached to the Picture IX [figure 11] may give us a somewhat distorted idea of the Origin or Source. The man is here said to be “watching the growth of things while he abides in the immovable serenity of non-assertion.” We may take this as a sort of dualistic statement: here is the man unattached by the maya-like transformations of things whereas outside his hut the streams are flowing—whither nobody knows—and the mountains are changing from the green in spring to the multicolored in autumn. This may remind us of Sankhya philosophy in which the Purusha quietly sits unmoved and unconcerned with the Prakriti going through an infinite series of antics. Zen would, however, never espouse this way of interpretation. For the man will never be found “sitting in his hut.” Not only does he take cognizance of things going on outside, but he is the things, he is the outside and the inside. Nor is he deaf and blind. He sees perfectly well even into the interior of an atom and explodes with it wherever it may fall regardless of its effects. But at the same time he sheds tears over human ignorance, over the human follies and infirmities; he hastens to repair all the damages he produced, he contrives every possible method to prevent the recurrence. He is forever kept busy doing this, undoing that. This is what “daubed with mud and ashes” (Picture X) [figure 12] means.
We now come to the final stage of the drama. “His thatched cottage gate” is not just shut, the gate and cottage are all gone, and nobody can locate where he is. Yet he is ubiquitous; he is seen in the market place, he is seen on the farms, he is seen with the children, with men and women, he is seen with the birds and animals, among the rocks and mountains. Anything he touches grows into full bloom, even the dead are awakened.
To conclude: I wish to direct your attention to the “bare-chested and bare-footed” figure in Picture X [figure 12], and to contrast this to the Christ in the Last Judgment scene as painted by Michelangelo at the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican Museum. How energetically, how vigorously, how majestically, he gives out his judgments all around! It is almost impossible to approach him, much less touch him; for if you come near him, you would surely be torn to pieces and thrown into eternal fire. The Bodhisattva in Picture X [figure 12] is such a genial fellow, his smile is captivating, his “belly”11 swallows the whole universe. The bag he carries on his back is a cornucopia and will never be exhausted however freely he bestows his bliss upon anybody who comes to him. He looks somewhat untidy, but this is to show how free he is, not “following the steps of the ancient sages.”
“The Ten Cowherding Pictures” may be interpreted in connection with the koan methodology. It is likely that the author of the pictures lived after or about the time the koan began to be used as the quicker method of attaining satori in the Song dynasty when Goso, Engo, and Daie were flourishing. The koan method probably developed under these great teachers of Zen. The pictures are explainable as illustrating stages of the psychological process the Zen student goes through when he endeavors to solve the koan. A full psychological explanation is omitted here.
The Ten Oxherding Pictures
by Kakuan
I
Searching for the Ox. The beast has never gone astray, and what is the use of searching for him? The reason why the oxherd is not on intimate terms with him is because the oxherd himself has violated his own inmost nature. The beast is lost, for the oxherd has himself been led out of the way through his deluding senses. His home is receding farther away from him, and byways and crossways are ever confused. Desire for gain and fear of loss burn like fire; ideas of right and wrong shoot up like a phalanx.
FIGURE 3. Searching for the Ox.
Alone in the wilderness, lost in the jungle, the boy is searching, searching!
The swelling waters, the far-away mountains, and the unending path;
Exhausted and in despair, he knows not where to go,
He only hears the evening cicadas singing in the maple-woods.
II
Seeing the Traces. By the aid of the sutras and by inquiring into the doctrines, he has come to understand something, he has found the traces. He now knows that vessels, however varied, are all of gold, and that the objective world is a reflection of the Self. Yet, he is unable to distinguish what is good from what is not, his mind is still confused as to truth and falsehood. As he has not yet entered the gate, he is provisionally said to have noticed the traces.
FIGURE 4. Seeing the Traces.
By the stream and under the trees, scattered are the traces of the lost;
The sweet-scented grasses are growing thick—did he find the way?
However remote over the hills and far away the beast may wander,
His nose reaches the heavens and none can conceal it.
III
Seeing the Ox. The boy finds the way by the sound he hears; he sees thereby into the origin of things, and all his senses are in harmonious order. In all his activities, it is manifestly present. It is like the salt in water and the glue in color. [It is there though not distinguishable as an individual entity.] When the eye is properly directed, he will find that it is no other than himself.
FIGURE 5. Seeing the Ox.
On a yonder branch perches a nightingale cheerfully singing;
The sun is warm, and a soothing breeze blows, on the bank the willows are green;
The ox is there all by himself, nowhere is he to hide himself;
The splendid head decorated with stately horns—what painter can reproduce him?
IV
Catching the Ox. Long lost in the wilderness, the boy has at last found the ox and his hands are on him. But, owing to the overwhelming pressure of the outside world, the ox is hard to keep under control. He constantly longs for the old sweet-scented field. The wild nature is still unruly, and altogether refuses to be broken. If the oxherd wishes to see the ox completely in harmony with himself, he has surely to use the whip freely.
FIGURE 6. Catching the Ox.
With the energy of his whole being, the boy has at last taken hold of the ox:
But how wild his will, how ungovernable his power!
At times he struts up a plateau,
When lo! he is lost again in a misty unpenetrable mountain pass.
V
Herding the Ox. When a thought moves, another follows, and then another—an endless train of thoughts is thus awakened. Through enlightenment all this turns into truth; but falsehood asserts itself when confusion prevails. Things oppress us not because of an objective world, but because of a self-deceiving mind. Do not let the nose-string loose, hold it tight, and allow no vacillation.
FIGURE 7. Herding the Ox.
The boy is not to separate himself with his whip and tether,
Lest the animal should wander away into a world of defilements;
When the ox is properly tended to, he will grow pure and docile;
Without a chain, nothing binding, he will by himself follow the oxherd.
VI
Coming Home on the Ox’s Back. The struggle is over; the man is no more concerned with gain and loss. He hums a rustic tune of the woodman, he sings simple songs of the village-boy. Saddling himself on the ox’s back, his eyes are fixed on things not of the earth, earthy. Even if he is called, he will not turn his head; however enticed he will no more be kept back.
FIGURE 8. Coming Home on the Ox’s Back.
Riding on the animal, he leisurely wends his way home:
Enveloped in the evening mist, how tunefully the flute vanishes away!
Singing a ditty, beating time, his heart is filled with a joy indescribable!
That he is now one of those who know, need it be told?
VII
The Ox Forgotten, Leaving the Man Alone. The dharmas are one and the ox is symbolic. When you know that what you need is not the snare or set-net but the hare or fish, it is like gold separated from the dross, it is like the moon rising out of the clouds. The one ray of light serene and penetrating shines even before days of creation.
FIGURE 9. The Ox Forgotten, Leaving the Man Alone.
Riding on the animal, he is at last back in his home,
Where lo! the ox is no more; the man alone sits serenely.
Though the red sun is high up in the sky, he is still quietly dreaming,
Under a straw-thatched roof are his whip and rope idly lying.
VIII
The Ox and the Man Both Gone out of Sight.12 All confusion is set aside, and serenity alone prevails; even the idea of holiness does not obtain. He does not linger about where the Buddha is, and as to where there is no Buddha he speedily passes by. When there exists no form of dualism, even a thousand-eyed one fails to detect a loop-hole. A holiness before which birds offer flowers is but a farce.
FIGURE 10. The Ox and the Man Both Gone out of Sight.
All is empty—the whip, the rope, the man, and the ox:
Who can ever survey the vastness of heaven?
Over the furnace burning ablaze, not a flake of snow can fall:
When this state of things obtains, manifest is the spirit of the ancient master.
IX
Returning to the Origin, Back to the Source. From the very beginning, pure and immaculate, the man has never been affected by defilement. He watches the growth of things, while himself abiding in the immovable serenity of non-assertion. He does not identify himself with the maya-like transformations [that are going on about him], nor has he any use of himself [which is artificiality]. The waters are blue, the mountains are green; sitting alone, he observes things undergoing changes.
FIGURE 11. Returning to the Origin, Back to the Source.
To return to the Origin, to be back at the Source—already a false step this!
Far better it is to stay at home, blind and deaf, and without much ado;
Sitting in the hut, he takes no cognizance of things outside,
Behold the streams flowing—whither nobody knows; and the flowers vividly red—for whom are they?
X
FIGURE 12. Entering the City with Bliss-Bestowing Hands.
Entering the City with Bliss-Bestowing Hands. His thatched cottage gate is closed, and even the wisest know him not. No glimpses of his inner life are to be caught; for he goes on his own way without following the steps of the ancient sages. Carrying a gourd13 he goes out into the market, leaning against a staff14 he comes home. He is found in company with wine-bibbers and butchers, he and they are all converted into Buddhas.
Bare-chested and bare-footed, he comes out into the market-place;
Daubed with mud and ashes, how broadly he smiles!
There is no need for the miraculous power of the gods,
For he touches, and lo! the dead trees are in full bloom.