Alone eternal

Sitting on the shore
The endless ocean roars
Alone eternal

Like stepping on earth and falling into space

Like stepping on earth and falling into space
It cannot be grasped
Words cannot define it
Thoughts cannot capture it
A songbird without a tongue
A bell without a striker
A frog without a mouth
The old man tries to clap with just one hand
Listen

Dogen's Fukanzazengi: Section Three

For sanzen (zazen), a quiet room is suitable. Eat and drink moderately. Cast aside all involvements and cease all affairs. Do not think good or bad. Do not administer pros and cons. Cease all the movements of the conscious mind, the gauging of all thoughts and views. Have no designs on becoming a Buddha. Sanzen has nothing whatever to do with sitting or lying down.

At the site of your regular sitting, spread out thick matting and place a cushion above it. Sit either in the full-lotus or half-lotus position. In the full-lotus position, you first place your right foot on your left thigh and your left foot on your right thigh. In the half-lotus, you simply press your left foot against your right thigh. You should have your robes and belt loosely bound and arranged in order. Then place your right hand on your left leg and your left palm (facing upwards) on your right palm, thumb-tips touching. Thus sit upright in correct bodily posture, neither inclining to the left nor to the right, neither leaning forward nor backward. Be sure your ears are on a plane with your shoulders and your nose in line with your navel. Place your tongue against the front roof of your mouth, with teeth and lips both shut. Your eyes should always remain open, and you should breathe gently through your nose.

Cast aside all involvements and cease all affairs.
This just means that when we are preparing to do zazen, we should deliberately set aside our concerns and thinking about the past and future. A Theravadan monk I sit with sometimes says that we carry around two heavy bags - one called 'past' and one called 'future'. When we prepare to meditate we put these down.

Do not think good or bad. Do not administer pros and cons. Cease all the movements of the conscious mind, the gauging of all thoughts and views.
What this means is that we should not judge our experience. This is easier said than done of course, especially when language like 'do not...' is used, as this might easily lead one to react to one's judgement as 'bad' and idealise non-judging as 'good'.

Learning to be patient, compassionate and non-judgmental is fundamental to any kind of 'mindfulness'-type meditation, including Shikantaza. The mind is always 'doing', always trying to acheive something, get something or get away from something else. In zazen we are finding a way to enter a different mode, a mode of 'being' where we are just open to our experiences as they are. If something we don't like happens we just notice it, if a judgement occurs, we just notice that - rather than adding fuel to the fire by judging our judgement. This way, the mind gradually settles down by itself.

Sometimes the metaphor of muddy water is used to describe the mind in meditation. We can't get the mud to go to the bottom by forcing it down, that would just stir up more mud. Instead we stop trying to make it subject to our will. We leave it alone and in the light of awareness it settles down by itself.

Have no designs on becoming a Buddha.
There is a tendency in modern commentary on Soto Zen, that Zen practice is about not having goals. People even seem to set up abandoning goals as a sort of goal or become quite judgemental about the idea of any sort of intention or to deny the existence of their own motivations. And they cite Dogen in support of this idea. I suspect that this is a misunderstanding.

We would not take up and remain on the Zen path if it was not our intention to abandon delusion, craving and aversion. Is that not having 'designs on becoming a Buddha'? Did not Dogen himself take up the Zen path to become free from the realm of birth, death and suffering? Did he not voyage to Korea and China and visit the wisest masters he could find in order to clear his doubt and confusion? I don't think that he is suggesting here that we shouldn't seek the way with equal vigour.

It is interesting to note here that his instruction to not seek enlightenment is not a general statement, but is in reference specifically to zazen instruction. It is indeed true that for Shikantaza or any kind of mindfulness-type meditation, simply being present with one's experience rather than striving to have a different kind of experience is essential. On the other hand we still need to have the intention to sit with our experiences, to remain in the present moment and to return our attention to the present moment when it wanders.

Sanzen has nothing whatever to do with sitting or lying down.
Another preoccupation of some Soto commentators is posture. Some even go so far as to suggest that posture is the whole of Zen, that correct posture is itself enlightenment. Again I think this is a misunderstanding.

Good posture is important. And Dogen follows with the details of what good posture is from the perspective of traditional Zen. But posture is not the only thing. I could sit daydreaming in a perfect lotus posture for hours, but that would not be 'good zazen'.

It is true that Zazen is not a 'mind-only' practice. We practice with the body; we practice with the mind; we practice with the universe. It is the body-mind-universe that practices. Practicing with the body does mean having a posture that helps us to be awake. But even more importantly it means not separating the mind from the body in whatever we are doing - whether we are driving, cooking, lying down or doing zazen. It means keeping the attention on the body and our activity rather than cutting it off and getting lost in abstractions. The Buddha taught meditation in four postures: sitting, standing, walking and lying down.

There is little that the body can do to keep the mind from separating itself off into a world of delusion. The body is always the body. It is the mind that becomes deluded. And it is the mind that has the opportunity to return to body-mind samadhi.

Personally speaking, I usually sit in the lotus position, however I've also sat in half-lotus, seiza and on a chair. Any differences in these postures with regards to zazen must be very subtle as I don't really notice a difference. The only posture I really have trouble with is lying down as I tend to fall asleep.

There is another meaning which may apply to Sanzen has nothing whatever to do with sitting or lying down. The mind of Zen moves freely without getting attached anywhere. It doesn't get stuck on postures or zazen and not-zazen; it doesn't exclude anything. In the Platform Sutra, the Sixth Patriarch, Master Eno says:

One Practice Samadhi means at all times, whether walking, standing, sitting, or lying down, always practicing with a straightforward mind. The Vimalakirti Sutra says, 'A straightforward mind is the place of enlightenment,' and 'a straightforward mind is the pure land.' ...Deluded people who cling to the external attributes of a dharma get hold of One Practice Samadhi and just say that sitting motionless, eliminating delusions, and not thinking thoughts are One Practice Samadhi. But if that were true, a dharma like that would be the same as lifelessness and would constitute an obstruction of the Way instead. The Way has to flow freely. Why block it up? The Way flows freely when the mind doesn't dwell on any dharma. Once it dwells on something, it becomes bound. If sitting motionless were right, Vimalakirti wouldn't have criticized Shariputra for meditating in the forest.

Good friends, I know there are people who tell others to devote themselves to sitting and contemplating their minds or purity and not to move or to think. Deluded people are unaware, so they turn things upside down with their attachments. There are hundreds of such people who teach the Way like this. But they are, you should know, greatly mistaken.

This is the expansive mind of Zen that doesn't cling to anything, not to sitting, lying down, zen nor worldly things. Rather it is a mind that is excludes nothing and is intimate with everything; the space that includes all phenomena and the phenomena themselves. Of course, we usually need to practice in order to realise it - which probably means sitting meditation.

Dogen's Fukanzazengi: Section Two

Need I mention the Buddha, who was possessed of inborn knowledge? The influence of his six years of upright sitting is noticeable still. Or Bodhidharma's transmission of the mind-seal?--the fame of his nine years of wall-sitting is celebrated to this day. Since this was the case with the saints of old, how can we today dispense with negotiation of the Way?

You should therefore cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate your self. Body and mind of themselves will drop away, and your original face will be manifest. If you want to attain suchness, you should practice suchness without delay.

What Dogen is saying here is that even Shakyamuni Buddha and Bodhidharma with their incredible talent for the dharma and attainment needed to practice intensely in sitting meditation for years. Therefore the notion that such practice is unnecessary is absurd.

Dogen was a Buddhist reformer who wanted to restore true Buddhist practice in place of what he saw as the degenerated forms of Buddhism that had become prevalent in Japan. The time Dogen was writing was a period of transition for Buddhism. The traditional schools of Tendai (Mahayana) and Shingon (Vajrayana) were becoming overshadowed by new, populist, lay-dominated sects that placed no emphasis on meditation. These sects argued (as they still do) that they were in the degenerate final age according to Buddhist mythology and that realisation through individual effort ('self-power') had become impossible - only so called 'other-power' could bring sentient beings to salvation, so they put faith in chanting the Nembutsu - the name of the Bodhisattva of compassion, Amida Buddha - NAMU AMIDA BUTSU (in Pure Land Buddhism) or a line from the Lotus Sutra, NAM-MYOHO-RENGE-KYO 'the teaching of the lotus flower of the wonderful law' (in Nichiren Buddhism). I suspect Dogen's comments were made with this in mind.

This matter is explored in more detail in the Bendowa:

Questioner: Such reasons as correct transmission by the unexcelled method of the Tathagatas and following in the footsteps of the patriarchs are beyond common sense. To ordinary people, reading the sutra and saying the Nembutsu are the natural means to enlightenment. You just sit cross-legged and do nothing. How is this a means to enlightenment?

Dogen: You look on the meditation of the Buddhas and the supreme law as just sitting and doing nothing. You disparage Mahayana Buddhism. Your delusion is deep; you are like someone in the middle of the ocean crying out for water....What good are such actions as reading the sutras and saying the Nembutsu. How futile to think that Buddhist merits accrue from merely moving the tongue and raising the voice. If you think this covers Buddhism, you are far from the truth. Your only purpose in reading the sutras should be to learn thoroughly that the Buddha taught the rules of gradual and sudden training and that by practicing his teachings you can obtain enlightenment. You should not read the sutras merely to pretend to wisdom through vain intellections. To strive for the goal of Buddhism by reading many sutras is like pointing the hill to the north and heading south. It is like putting a square peg in a round hole. While you look at words and phrases, the path of your training remains dark. This is as worthless as a doctor who forgets his prescription. Constant repetition of the Nembutsu is also worthless-like a frog in a spring field croaking night and day.

Dogen is also criticising merely intellectual understandings of Buddhism and fixation with sutras and other inherited literature. For Dogen, the true meaning of Buddhism - realisation itself - is not something that we can truly grasp with the intellectual mind but is something to be realised directly, primarily through meditation. This is what he means when he says:

learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate your self

From this expression it is clear that for Dogen, sitting meditation (zazen) is not just a matter of sitting immobile in a particular posture with the mind doing as it will as some have claimed. Zazen - even when called 'just sitting' - is not some kind of purely physical practice or stationary yoga. It is not as Dogen says "just sitting and doing nothing". It is learning the backward step and turning the mind inwardly. The backward step is an interesting expression which suggests to me the abandonment of the mind of 'doing' or 'achievement' or 'changing the ways things are', and being concerned rather with reality, just as it is. Turning your light inwardly in an expression that may derive from a teaching that Shakyamuni Buddha gave on his deathbed. In the Zen tradition this teaching is passed down in the Pali language in the form of the Atta Dipa:

Atta Dipa
Viharatha
Atta Sharana
Ananna Sharana
Dhamma Dipa
Dhamma Sharana
Ananna Sharana

Know!
You are the light itself
Rely on yourself
Do not rely on others
The Dharma is the light
Rely on the Dharma
Do not rely on anything
Other than the Dharma

I suspect that Dogen did not have direct access to the Nikayas of the Pali Canon (which are likely to be the most accurate renderings of the teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha). He probably relied on paraphrased versions which were passed on orally, in Mahayana Sutras or in gathas such as the Atta Dipa. A more full and accurate version of these words are found in the Maha-Parinibbana Sutra - they are a response to Ananda, his most senior disciple, who asks him how they should continue their practice after the Buddha's death.

"Now I am frail, Ananda, old, aged, far gone in years. This is my eightieth year, and my life is spent. Even as an old cart, Ananda, is held together with much difficulty, so the body of the Tathagata is kept going only with supports. It is, Ananda, only when the Tathagata, disregarding external objects, with the cessation of certain feelings, attains to and abides in the signless concentration of mind, that his body is more comfortable.

"Therefore, Ananda, be islands unto yourselves, refuges unto yourselves, seeking no external refuge; with the Dhamma as your island, the Dhamma as your refuge, seeking no other refuge.

"And how, Ananda, is a bhikkhu an island unto himself, a refuge unto himself, seeking no external refuge; with the Dhamma as his island, the Dhamma as his refuge, seeking no other refuge?

"When he dwells contemplating the body in the body, earnestly, clearly comprehending, and mindfully, after having overcome desire and sorrow in regard to the world; when he dwells contemplating feelings in feelings, the mind in the mind, and mental objects in mental objects, earnestly, clearly comprehending, and mindfully, after having overcome desire and sorrow in regard to the world, then, truly, he is an island unto himself, a refuge unto himself, seeking no external refuge; having the Dhamma as his island, the Dhamma as his refuge, seeking no other refuge.

"Those bhikkhus of mine, Ananda, who now or after I am gone, abide as an island unto themselves, as a refuge unto themselves, seeking no other refuge; having the Dhamma as their island and refuge, seeking no other refuge: it is they who will become the highest, if they have the desire to learn."

Maha-Parinibbana Sutta

The essential meaning is the same, although the absence of any reference to 'light' in the earlier Sutta implies that we shouldn't look too hard for any special significance of it in the Atta Dipa.

What does Dogen mean by turning your light inwardly and illuminate your self? It means to be aware and present in the here and now, recognising that the mental phenomena of one's own personal mind are empty, impermanent, and not-self. Only in the clarity of non-grasping awareness can we see what we are not and thus gain insight into true nature. In other words, he is describing a kind of meditation that is called vipassana or mindfulness in other traditions, perhaps more accurately 'objectless awareness' or 'themeless meditation', which in Soto Zen is called 'silent illumination' or 'just sitting'.

As in most schools of Buddhism, some, 'Zennists' like to set their practice apart from (and above) other schools, however understood correctly, all authentic schools of Zen are a transmission of a core of understanding and meditation practices from Shakyamuni Buddha through the Zen Patriarchs to today (although there have been some simplifications and some developments too). Shakyamuni Buddha practiced Vipassana or Mindfulness meditation as described in detail in the Pali Canon. Just before his enlightenment he was practicing the most advanced of these practices, referred to as 'themeless meditation'. I believe that this corresponds to Shikantaza and like all mindfulness meditation involves maintaining awareness of the present moment when it gets involved in thinking and dreaming. It does not allow the mind to do what it will without discipline.

The Fukanzazengi continues:

Body and mind of themselves will drop away, and your original face will be manifest.

This is a phrase that comes up again and again in Dogen and refers to his own awakening experience under the instruction of Master Nyōjo. For example, it is found in this famous passage from the Genjokoan:

To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.

I think that body and mind dropping away refers to the total disappearance of the sense of oneself as a discrete being at both a physical and psychic level or the collapse of subject-object duality. In other words, it is deep Zen samadhi. This is seeing directly with one's own eyes the false nature of the constructed sense of self and that one's true identity is reality itself, this moment itself, the universe itself or expressed in another way, no identity. This is one's original face becoming manifest. Original face becoming manifest is a common expression for realisation, or seeing one's true nature in the Zen tradition, which has it's roots in the following koan:

Huìnéng asked Hui Ming, "Without thinking of good or evil, show me your original face before your mother and father were born."

The text continues:

If you want to attain suchness, you should practice suchness without delay.

Dogen is saying that if you wish to attain freedom from delusion, aversion and craving, rather than relying on intellectual knowledge or faith in the power of chanted phrases, we must practice the activity of being free from delusion, aversion and craving. The direct identification between the 'suchness' that is attained and the 'suchness' that is practiced can be seen as a reference to Dogen's doctrine of practice-enlightenment - that is, the non-separation of practice and attainment.

Dogen's Fukanzazengi: Section One

Dogen's Fukanzazengi is fundamental to Soto Zen, due to the emphasis this school places on practice (zazen) being not a means to attaining realisation, but as being realisation itself.

There are a number of translations of this fascicle of the Shobogenzo available - many of them are collected together on this page which I shall use as a reference for comparing the various translations. I shall be using the first of these, marked as 'English Translation 1', as my principle text - it's the most commonly commented translation I've come across. Unfortunately I've so far been unable to find the origin of the various translations.

There is a danger with taking a single statement or passage of Dogen out of context and using it to support a viewpoint because his writings often jump from one viewpoint to another - expressing a truth that goes beyond the limited scope of any single viewpoint. Most importantly, the relative and ultimate viewpoints are expressed together without contradiction, even if they appear to do so - they are both true in their own terms.

Section One

The Way is basically perfect and all-pervading. How could it be contingent upon practice and realization? The Dharma-vehicle is free and untrammelled. What need is there for concentrated effort? Indeed, the whole body is far beyond the world's dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? It is never apart from one, right where one is. What is the use of going off here and there to practice?

And yet, if there is the slightest discrepancy, the Way is as distant as heaven from earth. If the least like or dislike arises, the Mind is lost in confusion. Suppose one gains pride of understanding and inflates one's own enlightenment, glimpsing the wisdom that runs through all things, attaining the Way and clarifying the Mind, raising an aspiration to escalade the very sky. One is making the initial, partial excursions about the frontiers but is still somewhat deficient in the vital Way of total emancipation.

Dogen leaps straight to the fundamental point. The doctrines of Buddhism as they had been taught to Dogen stated that nothing is hidden, that all beings are already Buddha and that we are in the midst of enlightenment. And this lead some to conclude that it was unnecessary to practice. Yet all the Ancestors including Shakyamuni Buddha practiced with great dedication. How do we make sense of this paradox? This is the 'Great Doubt' that drove Dogen to cross the dangerous Sea of Japan to China.

We can make sense of this apparent contradiction by using a principle sometimes known as the Doctrine of Two Truths - Conventional Truth and Ultimate Truth. From the perspective of Ultimate Truth, everything is already lacking inherent nature, nothing is separate, despite appearances nothing comes into being, nothing continues and nothing stops being, all is the Unconditioned, the Unborn. This is the perspective of Sunyata as expressed in the Heart Sutra. This is how things already are, whether we realise it or not. Nothing can obstruct or eliminate this reality as even an apparent ending or obscuration is 'it' too. So from this perspective, all things are Buddha irrespective of what we do. This perspective is sometimes called 'Primordial Buddha', 'Buddha Embryo', 'Buddha Nature' or 'Original Mind'. It also corresponds to the principle of 'Sudden Enlightenment' emphasised by Master Eno (Hui Neng) - all surviving Zen schools descended from him. This is the perspective that Dogen opens with.

The Way is basically perfect and all-pervading. How could it be contingent upon practice and realization? The Dharma-vehicle is free and untrammelled. What need is there for concentrated effort? Indeed, the whole body is far beyond the world's dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? It is never apart from one, right where one is. What is the use of going off here and there to practice?

This also corresponds to the second statement of the Genjo Koan:

As myriad things are without an abiding self, there is no delusion, no realization, no buddha, no sentient being, no birth and death.

And yet, human beings simply do not see this reality clearly all the time. There is delusion, aversion and greed, which, even though (from the ultimate perspective) cannot obstruct 'Buddha', from the perspective of the mind afflicted by them they appear to do so. Being told that we are already in Nirvana is all very well, but to someone in the midst of hell this is little comfort - a merely intellectual or docrinal acceptance of this 'fact' is not enough to end suffering. We need to realise Buddha ourselves. We need to feel it. We need to experience suchness directly, to breathe it in and breathe it out, knowing in every cell that we are Buddha. This is why we practice. This relative or conventional perspective is the viewpoint of Dogen's second statement:

And yet, if there is the slightest discrepancy, the Way is as distant as heaven from earth. If the least like or dislike arises, the Mind is lost in confusion.

This also corresponds to the principle of acquired or attained enlightenment, the progressive path emphasised in the Pali Canon and in the so-called Gradual School of Zen. It also corresponds to Dogen's opening statement in the Genjo Koan:

As all things are buddha-dharma, there are delusion, realization, practice, birth and death, buddhas and sentient beings.

Dogen then goes on to give an example of a mind that tastes awakening - realising primordial enlightenment and then, through clinging to this as an attainment, falls back into delusion, seeing awakening as something remote and limited, the world becoming fractured and dualistic once more.

Suppose one gains pride of understanding and inflates one's own enlightenment, glimpsing the wisdom that runs through all things, attaining the Way and clarifying the Mind, raising an aspiration to escalade the very sky. One is making the initial, partial excursions about the frontiers but is still somewhat deficient in the vital Way of total emancipation.

Such a one has a partial attainment in Dogen's view, but is not yet fully awakened.

Note that Dogen does not deny attainment or the concept of enlightenment as some commentators occasionally suggest. To take this view would be to get stuck to an idea of ultimate reality, a rather nihilistic idea at that.