ZEN PARADOXES Kazuaki Tanahashi Japanese Translator and Calligrapher Introduction1 How do you bind yourself without rope? This absurd question makes no sense at all, but there is a certain truth to it. In fact, don’t we all bind ourselves at times with worry, concern, or desire? Although this question is self-contradictory, if you ponder it deeply, you may discover a profound lesson. That is a paradox. That is the rhetoric of Zen, or Chan in Chinese. (The first definition of “paradox” in The American Heritage Dictionary: A seemingly contradictory statement that may nonetheless be true). In this essay, I discuss paradoxes as essential elements that make Zen unique among all schools of Buddhism. I will describe their historical development and present the text of the thirteenth-century Japanese monk Dōgen, the Shōbōgenzō or Treasury of the True Dharma Eye, as a large collection of paradoxes, showing some selections in the Appendix. Enigma pervades Zen literature. If you read such words as “a broken wooden dipper” or “a barrel with no bottom,” they are just odd phrases. But they may mean more: to become completely useless in the common sense, to give up all intellectual reasoning, and to be fully engaged in the practice of meditation. “The extremely small is vast“ is a saying attributed to Sengcan (d. 606), the Third Ancestor of Chan Buddhism. This statement seems to parallel the concept of “moon in a dewdrop.” The moon symbolizes vast wisdom, while the dewdrop is a person, relatively tiny and short-lived, yet it can hold the entire moon in the sky. Zen Master Dōgen described it in this way:

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water.

This notion makes us humble yet encourages us to realize our infinite possibility of learning and experiencing. The intuitive, poetic language of the ancient meditators helped to form the language and style of teaching of Chan in China and beyond. How do you eat a painting of a rice cake? That is another unreal and impossible question. You need to know the background of the image: In ninth-century China, Xuanyuan searched for awakening. He burned his copies of scriptures and said, “A painting of a rice cake doesn’t satisfy hunger.” Later, Dōgen developed the idea that only a painting of a rice cake satisfies hunger, indicating that scriptures are essential for Buddhist studies and awakening. He even said, “All painted buddhas are actual buddhas.” Sengai, an eighteenth-to-nineteenth-century Japanese monk painter, drew a circle and wrote at its side, “Eat this.”

Chan or Zen Buddhism can be characterized as a hybrid of early Buddhism, Mahāyāna Buddhism, and Daoism. Early Buddhist teaching emphasizes the notion of anātman or no-self, advocating liberation from self-clinging. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed the theory that all things, sentient and insentient, are not completely independent and permanent entities. It is characterized as shūnyatā or zero-ness: the lack of concrete divisions or boundaries. To experience this notion is called prajñā pāramitā or the realization of prajñā (true wisdom beyond wisdom). A part of the Heart Sūttra is typically translated as: “Form is emptiness. Emptiness is form…In emptiness there is neither form, nor feeling, nor perception, nor impulse, nor consciousness; no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind.” Rōshi Joan Halifax and I translated it as: “Form is boundlessness. Boundlessness is form… Boundlessness is not limited by form, nor by feelings, perceptions, inclinations, and discernment. It is free of the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind.” The Heart Sūttra was compiled in China, as I explained in my book The Heart Sutra: A Comprehensive Guide to the Classic of Mahayana Buddhism, but most of its elements come from earlier Indian texts, especially Prajñā Pāramitā literature. Ancient Indian texts tended to be logical. In contrast, early Chan texts reveal a preference for being illogical and paradoxical. You may see a clear sample in Engraving Trust in the Heart (Xinxin Ming) attributed to Sengcan. This towering text is full of paradoxes: “The supreme way is not difficult,” “The circle of the way is boundless space,” and “The wise do not make things happen.” Here you may detect the influence of Daoist texts. For example, the Daode-Jing (Tao Te Ching), attributed to Laozi of the Spring and Autumn Period (771 B.C.E.–481 B.C.E.), is full of paradoxes: “High virtue is not virtue, low virtue does not lose virtue,” “Greatly straight looks crooked, greatly skillful looks coarse,” “One who knows doesn’t speak, one who speaks doesn’t know.” You may also see the influence of the Flower Splendor Scripture (Avatamsaka Sūtra), first translated from Sanskrit into Chinese by the Indian monk Buddhabhadra between 419 and 420. It embodies an enormous-scale cosmology, as well as paradoxical notions such as “One is no other than many,” and “Myriad years in a single moment.

The Sixth Ancestor, Huineng (638–713), who taught the undividedness of practice and realization, had an unparalleled influence on Chan Buddhism. The Southern School of Chan, initiated by Huineng, which emphasized sudden enlightenment, became dominant in China. The Sixth Ancestor’s Platform Sūtra that recorded his teaching reflects his straightforward style of teaching, not using many unusual images or paradoxes. But his main student, Nanyue (677–744), became famous for showing an effort to polish a tile to make a mirror, as a way of illustrating that practicing meditation with the intention of becoming a buddha would not make a buddha. His fellow student Qingyuan (d. 740) talked about the price of rice in Luling when he was explaining dharma. Zhaozhou (778–897) of the Nanyue lineage, who at age sixty-five became a monk, spoke about donkeys and horses crossing a bridge, a big radish, and the cypress tree in the garden.16 Eccentric images and odd behaviors became emblematic of the monks in the late eighth to early tenth centuries who would later be regarded as founders of the Five Schools of Chan (Fayan, Guiyang, Caodong, Yunmen, and Linji). For example, Fayan (885–958) held up an incense spoon or pointed to a bamboo screen, Guishan (771–853) knocked down a water jar, Yangshan (803–887) pushed a pillow toward a monk. Dongshan (807–869) said, “There is no soil on the great earth,” and Caoshan (849–901) mentioned a well seeing a donkey.18 Also, Yunmen (864–949) spoke about rice in the bowl,19 and Linji (d. 867) shouted and struck students with a stick as a way of guiding them. These renowned monks led rigorous practice in Buddhist monastic training centers. Their disciples recorded some of their words and sayings. The crazy wisdom in their teachings captured the imagination of later dharma practitioners. Eventually, these curious and even bizarre stories were devotedly studied and investigated as kōans, which often got more attention than passages from scriptures: “Transmission outside of the teaching” was often a central motto of practitioners. Studying these paradoxes and solving the “great doubt“ is called “a grave matter of study "in a lifetime.” That process makes the paradoxes genuine and authentic. In fact, working on paradoxes is basic to all forms of Zen practice.

One of the earliest kōan collections was Commentaries on One Hundred Cases by Xuedou (980–1052), which developed into The Blue Cliff Record, published in 1128. The Book of Serenity was completed in 1224, and The Gateless Gate was published in 1229. Many additional collections of kōans were created.

Dōgen (1200–1253), regarded as the founder of the Sōtō (Caodong) School, calls such enigmatic dialogues, poetry, and behavior in kōans an “intimate language.” The word “intimate” in Zen means direct, without any intermediary such as words and intellect. It can be characterized as transcendental language. His collection of ninety-five essays, Treasury of the True Dharma Eye (Shōbōgenzō), contains a great number of kōans extending from ancient times until his teacher Rujing’s time. Often, he added an equally enigmatic commentary.

Hakuin Ekaku of eighteenth-century Japan, systematized the kōan study system and is regarded as the restorer of the Rinzai (Linji) School of Zen. He wrote a certificate alongside a painting of a walking stick with a dragon, a symbol of an outstanding Zen practitioner: “Nihei Tanaka has passed the barrier against dualism called ‘the sound of one hand.’ This is to certify it – a heavy prize indeed for a courageous person!”

Dōgen famously said: 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.

You may notice that Dōgen used the same word “self” in opposite ways. The first “self” is a self that is higher than the self – a universal self that is one with all things. The second self is an ego, a small conventional self that clings to the notion of self-identity and possessions. The basic premise of Buddhist practice, as mentioned earlier, is the realization of anātman or shūnyatā. That leads to being selfless and experiencing the flexible interconnection of all things, which is the basis of compassion and dedication in service of others. How can we be truly selfless? Dōgen recommends meditation that is “wandering at ease” in a state of being “unconstructed in stillness,” which is no other than “ultimate and unconditioned.” While he insists that studying with an authentic teacher is essential, he also writes: “Get enlightened by yourself without a self.” That is no other than “Think of not thinking,” “Leap out of sound and form,” “See colors with your ears,” and “Just let go.” The morning star represents Shākyamuni Buddha’s enlightenment under the bodhi tree. The star may have been the catalyst of his awakening. On the other hand, your insight or “your eyeball makes the morning star.” And, “Become a buddha innumerable times – one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand, millions of times.” Freedom From Division When you meditate and settle your body and mind, the difference between large and small, long and short, right and wrong, life and death becomes obscure and insignificant. We can intuit and trust that we can experience this realm in meditation and make it a base for our understanding and action. This is what Hakuin calls “passing the barrier of non-duality.” There is a great deal of value in going beyond dualistic or divided views. If you see an enemy as not different from a friend, you fight less. If you regard non-human beings as not separate from humans, you become conscious of animal rights. If you see insentient beings are equal to sentient beings, you want to protect the environment. If you take the practice of meditation not as a goal for attaining enlightenment but as “practice within realization,” the goal is already achieved at the beginning of the process. Isn’t this surprising? Dōgen says, On the great road of buddha ancestors there is always unsurpassable practice, continuous and sustained. It forms the circle of the way and is never cut off. Between aspiration, practice, enlightenment, and nirvāna, there is not a moment’s gap; continuous practice is the circle of the way. As you see, a “circle of the way” is an intriguing concept. As soon as you start the practice of meditation, your practice of each moment embodies aspiration for enlightenment, practice, enlightenment, and nirvana, which in Dōgen’s case is an experience of non-duality. Further, Dōgen says, “By the continuous practice of all buddhas and ancestors, your practice is actualized, and your great road opens up. By your continuous practice, the continuous practice of all buddhas is actualized and the great road of all buddhas opens up. Your continuous practice creates the circle of the way.” A circle can be a micro-circle, where each moment is complete in itself. Also, it can be a macro one where the practice-enlightenment of all awakened ones from different times actualizes your practice. Not only that, but your own practice actualizes the practice-enlightenment of all awakened ones in all times. This is a dimension of meditation, a dimension free of all physical and mathematical reality. This is a measure of undivided mind. In meditation, “The world is ten feet wide,” “A tuft of hair inhales the vast ocean,” “A mustard seed contains Mount Sumeru.” In undivided mind, there is no boundary between sentient and insentient beings: “The eastern mountain walks on water,” “Emptiness claps toward the left and toward the right,” “Insentient beings speak dharma,” “Ask a question to a bare pillar.” In a deeply contemplative mind, the east mountain or any mountain may not be separate from the cloud or the river stream. It may not be different from the viewer. When the viewer walks, the mountain may walk at the same time. In poetry and in Zen, the products of imagination and of reality seem to enjoy equal citizenship: “A donkey’s fins and a horse’s beak,” “When an iron tree blossoms, the world becomes fragrant,” “Put your body into a fist,” “Loving words turn heaven,” “The whole world flies through the sky.” Don’t these statements free you from ways of seeing things through the filter of opposition?

Upside down language contains eccentric rhetoric: “A bowl rolls over a pearl,” “The forest runs around the hunting dog.” Tutology reduces the language for elucidation to self-evidence:
“A well sees the well,” “Mountains are mountains,” “Rocks inherit from rocks,” “A fish goes like a fish,” “A bird flies like a bird.” There may be a point on the other side of a widely accepted notion. All-inclusive mind fears no contradiction:
“Bodhidharma did not come to China,” “A parent and a child are born at the same time,” “There is no muscle in the eye,” “A thousand-foot cliff on the vast flat land.” For those who regard buddhas and ancestors as the ultimate teachers and enlightenment as sacred, there may be a way to go even further: “Leap beyond buddhas and ancestors,” “Lose enlightenment and let go of practice,” “Do not realize the utmost way,” “Vast emptiness, nothing sacred.”

When people try hard to become enlightened, the words “Practice itself is enlightenment” is a paradox. While people are focused on improving their lives, “Every day is a good day” can be a paradox. Where only sacred activity is assumed to manifest sublime awakening, “Have some tea” is a paradox. I have focused here on the experience of non-duality or realizing the wisdom beyond wisdom of seeing all things as one. However, our common wisdom in recognizing and honoring the differences and boundaries of all things is as important as wisdom beyond wisdom. Without common sense, we cannot conduct our daily activities and be ethical. Shitou (700–790) of the Qingyuan lineage said in his poem, “Being One and Many“ or “Merging of One and Many“ (Cantong Qij), “Brightness and darkness contrast with each other, like the front and back foot in walking.” He seems to suggest that brightness, or the realm of diversity, and darkness, or the realm of oneness, take turns in our activities. This is a dynamic interaction of duality and non-duality, or pluralism and singularism, in our daily lives.

In this regard, I suggest in my book on The Heart Sūtra: Our life may be seen as a dance with pluralism represented by one foot and singularism by the other. If there is the slightest misstep, boundaries are violated and there is a chance that, through some action, our integrity will be lost. Each step is a challenge. However, can we not also see our dance in life and meditation as something other than the constant switching between opposites? When the dancing becomes natural and fluid, singularism and pluralism are no longer in opposition. They become one and inseparable, which allows us to keep dancing with integrity and grace. Nanquan (748–834) of the Nanyue lineage says, “Everyday mind is enlightenment.” Perhaps he was encouraging his students to pay attention to worldly pluralistic wisdom. “Not born” or “Beyond life” is a common phrase in Mahāyāna Buddhism. These are paradoxes beyond paradoxes.