The Cucumber Sage

Ta-Wan

Once a monk approached Wu-ming and asked in all earnestness, "In the whole universe, what is it that is most wonderful?" Without hesitation Wu-ming stuck a cucumber before the monks face and exclaimed, "There is nothing more wonderful than this!" At that the monk crashed through the dualism of subject and object, "The whole universe is pickled cucumber; a pickled cucumber is the whole universe!" Wu-ming simply chuckled and said, "Stop talking nonsense. A cucumber is a cucumber; the whole universe is the whole universe. What could be more obvious?" The monk, penetrating the perfect phenomenal manifestation of Absolute Truth, clapped his hands and laughed, saying, "Throughout infinite space, everything is deliciously sour!"

This post originally appeared on Ta-Wan's blog, Tao Wow.

Dishonesty I

Scott Bradley

Dishonesty is, I believe, if not an essential attribute of the human condition, then at least one that so typically dominates our relationship with ourselves and others, as to be nearly so. In other words, dishonesty is the daily stuff of life.

Calling it self-deceit helps direct us to the heart of this dishonesty; we are forever lying to ourselves. The seemingly default belief that we are more than a momentary self-conscious experience arising out of and returning to that in which identity disappears, is the core dishonesty. Proceeding from this, it is not difficult to see how dishonesty permeates our self-relationship and our relationship to others.

So, let us affirm dishonesty; it has become an essential means of our coping with our tenuous existence as self-conscious beings. Our reflex judgment might be to condemn this dishonesty as 'wrong', but this presupposes a Universe that makes some kind of ultimately intelligible sense, and that the emergence of the self-conscious experience is purposive and thus intelligible. It echoes a similar argument of creationism that human yearnings must necessarily have their fulfillment — otherwise, it would be like the evolution of a fish without water; it would make no sense. Exactly; it makes no sense. (We need not declare all things accidental in order to affirm that they appear to be so.)

This is, I think, also a basic premise of Buddhism; we are deceiving ourselves, live in illusion, and if we can just break out of this illusion through enlightenment, we will discover how it all does make some kind of sense, even if this sense is a non-sense. We are saved. Reality is coherent. For Buddhism, then, dishonesty is decidedly not affirmable; it is the greatest impediment to the realization of the Truth that Reality is coherent and so therefore is our place within it. This, I would suggest, is but another manifestation of dishonesty. But that’s okay given our inherent dishonesty.

The greatest dishonesty is the denial of our inherent dishonesty. However, admitting to our dishonesty does not necessarily render us honest; but it does move us along the continuum toward honesty.

An affirmation of our own dishonesty parallels Zhuangzi’s suggestion that since every being self-affirms, the ‘rights’ and ‘wrongs’ of one being in cancelling out the rights and wrongs of every other being yields an affirmation of all beings. Thus, in acknowledging the inherent self-deception implied by my attachment to my right and wrong while continuing to self-affirm, I also acknowledge the same in others, and together we emerge as mutually affirmed — in our mutual dishonesty.

Affirming our own dishonesty is the beginning of a movement toward greater honesty (and thus authenticity), but it would be dishonest to say this makes us honest. Existence is always a work in progress.

You can check out Scott's other miscellaneous writings here.

A Conversion Experience IX

Scott Bradley

In this way, wholeheartedly embody the endlessness and roam where there is no sign, fully realize whatever is received from Heaven, but without thinking anything has been gained thereby. It is just being empty, nothing more.
(7:13; Ziporyn)

"Without thinking anything has been gained thereby" is a phrase with immense implications. It is reminiscent of those words purportedly spoken by Buddha which go something like this: "When I attained absolute, unsurpassed enlightenment I gained absolutely nothing; this is why it is absolute, unsurpassed enlightenment." Zhuangzi's "add nothing to the process of life" is, in my opinion, more radical still, if it is indeed the abandonment of hypotheticals and redemptive avenues of escape that is implied by "gaining nothing". Buddha "gained" enlightenment, became something other than the mundane, was "saved" from the curse of existence, was freed from the fearful wheel of rebirth, got to understand how things really are, got to somehow pre-exist life and transcend death while denying he had anything to say on the subject — he got to have his cake and eat it too. Buddha got religion, or at least became the seed of one. None of this on offer in Zhuangzi's way; what you experience is what you get. This is not about getting saved, but about "fully realizing" one's humanity with all its existential unfixedness.

"Just be empty." If there is no identity fixed and sure, no soul to start with, how could anything be "gained"? Add nothing to nothing and what do you get?

If it is religion we want, and by default we do, then Zhuangzi's philosophy can certainly become just that. It did. Daoism is a religion. It provides answers. It offers salvation. It is populated by entities, fixed and real. It reassures us about death, that it will be overcome. It provides all those things that religion does, all those things that deny our actual existential circumstance, because we find them too fearful to squarely face and affirm. Yet, it is precisely this that Zhuangzi sought to leave behind; it is precisely those things that religion denies that Zhuangzi saw as the means to an authentic transcendence that "fully realizes" the very tenuousness of this life experience.

There is a sense in which this path of not-knowing is a constant struggle against the impulse to religion within us. If this is so, then we are likely to discover in our perpetual self-critique that this way has become religion for us. Of course it has. This is what we do. Yet realizing this is precisely the means by which we "chariot upon" it, not in denying it, but in embracing it, and in so doing, experience "our homeland of not-even anything, the vast wilds of open nowhere".

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Equalizing Things IV: Spontaneous Self-Rightness

Scott Bradley

Ziqi’s explanation of what it means that he has lost his ‘me’ seems to only raise more questions than it answers. Though lots of these questions remain, I’m going to try and summarize what I think his analogy of the three pipings intends to teach us.

The pipings of man, earth and Heaven, though individually identifiable, are really just one Happening. The piping of Heaven, however, is only discernible in and as the other two. “What identity could there be for the rouser”, he asks rhetorically, when everything just seems to happen by and of itself? The piping of Heaven is everything that happens and the Mystery of their emergence; it is not the causal source of that emergence . It is a kind of emptiness which can inform our own piping not as an external ‘other’, but as the very event of our own happening. The way to Dao is through our own individual expression of Dao. We honor the Mystery in fully embracing and affirming its expression.

Daoism agrees with Buddhism that all things are essentially empty in that they arise from and return to “emptiness”, but it differs from Buddhism in that this leads it to affirm and embrace all things rather than to negate them. They are empty; yet they are. They are “self-so”, which Guo Xiang also tells us, is the same as being “Heaven-so”. In this sense, Daoism preserves the unavoidable paradox of things both being and not-being more faithfully than does Buddhism. I have several times quoted Liu Xianxin (1896-1932) in this regard: “This chapter begins by showing the spontaneous self-rightness of all things. . . . The main principle of Buddhism is Emptiness: nothing is wanted, all is to be abandoned. The main principle of Daoism is vastness: everything is wanted; all is to be included.” (Ziporyn) We need not take this as a condemnation of Buddhism, but rather as a clarification of that watershed, the two possible fundamentally different directions we can take in response to our being-yet-not-being, through which we might better, as Ziqi says, “select out” our own way.

In declaring “the self-rightness of all things”, Ziqi is simultaneously declaring the equality of all things. Everything is perfect because everything is perfectly what it is. In the event that we call reality, each thing is absolutely affirmable, and this renders all things equal. And it is in the realization of this equality that Ziqi has lost his ‘me’. “I have lost ‘me’” is not the negation of his self, but its fullest expression. ‘Me’, not ‘I’, is the means by which we separate ourselves from the world; it is the psychological act of self-identification which excludes all else and is the basis upon which we judge others as unacceptable. Ziqi has no-self in that his self is no longer self-contained, but is instead united with all things in the realization that all things are “Heaven-so”. He has come to understand the unity that underlies but does not negate diversity. All things are the same in that they are all different. ‘I’ without ‘me’ is an affirmation of self as utterly “self-right” in its uniqueness and the equality of all things in theirs. We might also call this openness.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Jesus Ain't No Buddha

Trey Smith

Ryan Rotella, a junior at Florida Atlantic University (FAU) said that his professor, Dr. Deandre Poole, of his Intercultural Communications class, asked students in the class to write the word “Jesus” on a piece of paper, fold the paper, and step on it. By the time FOX News and Commentary got to the story, “asked” had become “directed,” “step” had become “stomp,” and the “Stomp on Jesus” firestorm was manufactured. FAU reacted by apologizing to those who were offended, immediately placing Poole on administrative leave, and banning him from FAU’s campuses.

Poole was using an exercise from an instructor’s guide to a popular textbook, Intercultural Communication: A Contextual Approach, written by Jim Neuliep, a professor of communication and media studies at St. Norbert College, in Wisconsin. The instructor’s guide describes the exercise:

This exercise is a bit sensitive, but really drives home the point that even though symbols are arbitrary, they take on very strong and emotional meanings. Have the students write the name JESUS in big letters on a piece of paper. Ask the students to stand up and put the paper on the floor in front of them with the name facing up. Ask the students to think about it for a moment. After a brief period of silence, instruct them to step on the paper. Most will hesitate. Ask why they can’t step on the paper. Discuss the importance of symbols in culture.

Poole, under orders from FAU not to discuss the case, did say that he never told anyone to “stomp on Jesus,” but asked his students to step on the piece of paper. Poole said that one student approached him after class and said, “How dare you disrespect someone’s religion?” while hitting his balled fist into his other hand. Poole claims the student said the “he wanted to hit me,” but didn’t. Poole reported the incident to campus security and filed a report.

Poole, a former Sunday-school teacher, identifies himself as “very religious” and says that Jesus “is my lord and savior.” Poole has received hate mail and death threats, including one threatening Poole, an African-American, with hanging. Poole is on a one-year teaching contract with FAU, and although FAU may not fire him, the non-renewal of his contract will send the same message.

Not one to miss out on an opportunity to pander, Governor Rick Scott called the assignment “intolerant to Christians.”

Christians have learned well from their Islamic brothers. Any slight to their faith, real or imagined, is to be met with the full wrath of the faithful. As Poole’s situation demonstrates, no slight is too insignificant, or too illogical. Like Islam, the only way Christianity can get the respect they think they deserve is through threats and intimidation. Like Islam, it appears that Christianity has given up any hope of achieving respect through persuasive argument.
~ Academic Freedom Sacrificed To Religious Intimidation by David Drumm ~

For me, this news item highlights a key difference between a deity-based religion versus a philosophic religion or a philosophy. The former treats symbols as sacred, while the latter does not. For the former, even a symbol of the symbol -- like a word written on a piece of paper -- is holy, while the latter recognizes symbols for what they are -- symbols.

To underscore this difference, think of the Zen Buddhist koan, "If you meet the Buddha, kill him." Can you imagine a Christian saying this about the savior (If you meet Jesus, kill him) or a Muslim saying this about the prophet (If you meet Mohammed, kill him)? Want to talk about blasphemy! You would be denounced by the faithful until the cows come home.

Think about the first line of the Tao Te Ching.

The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.

Can you imagine a devout Christian standing up to declare, "The God we worship is not the eternal God"? Such a person would be tossed out of the flock so fast it would make your head spin!

People of a religious ilk -- particularly those of the Abrahamic religions -- have never come to grips with the notion that they treat the finger pointing at the moon as the moon itself. The finger -- the symbol of the deity -- has become just as important, if not more so, than that which they ostensibly worship!

This whole situation would be downright comical...if not for the societal implications it engenders.

On Being Momentary I

Scott Bradley

Sometimes you just need to wade in, even though you know that you will immediately be in over your head. This will certainly be the case here. But then, when am I ever not in over my head? Is there anyone who is not? Might not the greatest error be in thinking that it could be otherwise?

I am always bouncing off of Buddhism here; this need not be confrontational; in contrast we learn. (And in having learned through contrast we learn not to cling to either side of the matter.) Would I be mistaken if I suggested that Buddhism denigrates the transient and momentary? Things are empty of "self-being"; they are contingent, caused, derived, empty. When taken ontologically, Zhuangzi might ask, So what? But for Buddhism this is a problem; we have to see through the made-up world and discover the . . . the what? I don't know. The "real"? My point is that there is a bias toward Being; but this is the opposite of what is said, so let's call it Non-Being. But this is really just more of the same, so let's call it Beyond Being and Non-Being. How about the Void? Yet how is this trajectory still not just more of the same? How is this not a bias away from the world in which we live? How is this not an escapist salvation from this experience of being momentary?

Philosophical Daoism basically agrees with the Buddhist assessment of things as essentially void. Nothing lasts. Nothing is forever. Things arise; things perish. Only Daoism does not turn this into a pursuit of a True and Constant beyond the Transient. Unmoved Movers (even Empty ones) leave Daoism unmoved. Rather, Daoism embraces the transitory and momentary; things are this way, because this is the way of things. And the way things are is the way they are 'supposed' to be. All is well. To the extent that we can speak of a hypothetical Source, "It" is this Transforming, not a reality making it happen.

Before I drown, let me say that I know that Buddhism can easily refute my complaint. All that I would maintain is that the word trajectory best sums up my point, not the nuances of speculative ontology and cosmology.

But perhaps more importantly, I also realize that a strong case could be made for a pursuit of the "Real" in Daoism. (The problem when speaking of "Daoism", however, is in trying to figure out where it begins and where in ends, which is to say, what it is.) The Daodejing certainly opens itself to the possibility of speculation with respect to Non-Being. Neo-Daoism made much of this. Religious Daoism seems to have embraced Being — how else does one become immortal? Zhuangzi speaks of a Creator of Things; but then Zhuangzi made light of words and did not intend that they should be taken literally. (Such freedom!) In any case, my personal use of Daoism is more than willing to make it what I would have it be, and I call this Philosophical or Proto-Daoism.

You can check out Scott's other miscellaneous writings here.

The Delusion of Delusion

Scott Bradley

Mu Soeng (Trust in Mind) refers to David Weber (One Taste), a "transpersonal psychologist", in making a case for a distinction between "translation" and "transformation". The former might fall under the rubric of "self-cultivation", while the later refers to getting thoroughly zapped, also known as 'enlightenment'. He suggests that the former is "delusional" while the latter is the real thing. Or maybe he says it can be delusional — I'm not sure and I don't want to put him in the wrong; I just want to address the issue.

If there is indeed an utterly transformational experience in which "self" is so transcended as to no longer be motivationally involved in one's activities, then yes indeed that would be the real thing and anything else would be the same old thing. But is being self-involved necessarily delusional? The delusion, of course, is the belief that one is and has a "self-being" (real) self. In this sense, the answer is yes; it is by definition delusional to act on the basis of self. But what about the self-involved self-cultivators who know they are delusional; are they in some sense less delusional?

The old adage that you are not altogether nuts if you know you are nuts, no matter how nuts you are, applies here. This might be compared to awakening to the dreaming, where awakening from the dreaming corresponds to 'enlightenment'. My point here is this: There is a legitimate place for gradual self-cultivation even though this remains in the sphere of self-involvement and thus takes place in the world of dreaming, and even though the possibility of not-dreaming is entertained.

But is there a sense in which all these distinctions are delusional? I just happen to have Buddha here and he says: Yes. So, there you have it. It is certainly a delusional activity to chase after a hypothetical transformational experience which you have obviously not yourself experienced and thus have no basis for believing is even real or possible. “But the Buddha says . . . Mary says, and her body, though dead for a thousand years, has yet to decompose . . . Guru X says, and he can materialize gold from nothing . . . Guru Y says, and she exudes an incredible holy aura of peace . . .” Believe what you will, but I think Zhuangzi would say this is most definitely depending on (believing in) what is unsure, and thus both delusional and self-fettering.

But Zhuangzi also says that it's okay to be delusional, for the very reason that he doesn't seem to think we can ever be anything but. And this is why his vision of freedom is one of playing and wandering within the dream. The mitigation of our delusional sense of being resides in understanding that we are delusional and having fun being delusional.

Buddha says he wants the last word: “In any case, it is delusional to believe there is any distinction between delusion and non-delusion.” There you have it.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Everyday Nirvana II

Scott Bradley

David Loy (in Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi) makes reference to Nagarjuna's observation that the everyday world is nirvana. Samsara is nirvana. Maya is nirvana. Delusion is nirvana. Buddha is a shit-wiping stick.

If we take a non-dual world view seriously . . . well then, all this differentiation between states of awareness and what not ultimately has to be revealed for the bullshit that it is. I choose to be vulgar here because vulgarity too is nirvana.

It is not that there are not possible awakening experiences, but that to think of them as somehow separate and other than taking your morning dump is to deny the non-dual nature of which they ostensibly consist.

Believing in 'enlightenment' we think there is something that needs to be achieved. Reality is in the future, not now. We are pulled out of our present. We believe we have to become someone else, experience something else, understand something else.

Yeah, yeah, we need to be enlightened here and now; it has to happen now. No. Nothing needs to happen. My fucked-up present reality is it. Fucked-up is nirvana. Rejoice and be glad.

"No-conditions-to-meet" is just this. Do you get it? (I'm trying, but can't say that I have.) It's true of you now. It's not true of some hypothetical buddha-nature or original-nature; it's true of the fucked-up you in your present fucked-upped-ness. Enough already with the abstractions.

Not fucked-up? Then you are either a sage or un-self-aware. If the former, I beg to be your disciple.

Thank you Darwin. I am a (not-so) hairless ape; a product of evolution without any known purpose; without any 'spiritual birthright'; without an ‘original nature’; without some back-door, sleight of hand preservation of my identity; without redemption or any need for redemption. And that is perfectly compatible with Loy's interpretation of a passage in the Zhuangzi to the effect that "everything is a manifestation of the Dao." Dao is this Happening and every happening, however momentary or ‘unspiritual’, is Dao; nothing else is on offer.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Everyday Nirvana I

Scott Bradley

David Loy's essay ("Zhuangzi and Nagarjuna on the Truth of No Truth") in Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi attempts a comparison of these two philosophies which, though in many ways helpful, also goes too far, in my opinion, in explaining Zhuangzi in the light of Buddhist philosophy. If it is possible to over-analyze, then Nagarjuna, who was undoubtedly a brilliant expositor of Buddhist thought, nevertheless might be said to have done so. In any event, Daoism in general, and Zhuangzi in particular, cannot compete with the overwhelming volume and profundity of Buddhist philosophy; to anachronistically attempt to explain what is in many respects purposely vague and tentative by that which is not is to do an injustice to the former. It is possible to drown in a sea of words and ideas.

There is no doubt a great deal of brilliance in Nagarjuna and other Buddhist and Brahmanist expositors; shall we as Buddhists or Brahmanists proudfully point to these as some kind of proof of . . . of what exactly? Can we not be both greatly impressed and yet somehow unimpressed?

The real question, it seems to me, is whether or not Zhuangzi can deliver on his own. Deliver what? He certainly cannot provide us with an awe-inspiring systematic explanation of "the way things really are", or as in the case of Nagarjuna, "aren't". Nor does he provide us with a methodology. In fact, there is so much 'lacking' in his presentation that some scholars have suggested that it was intended to be read with the accompaniment of a 'user's manual'. I don't think so; rather, I think we would do better to ask ourselves why we would wish to have one.

What then does Zhuangzi deliver? For me, he provides an opportunity to explore possibilities which he kindly only suggests. It's like getting a new book in the mail (oh boy!) only to find it blank. Zhuangzi offers us a spring-board from which to launch ourselves into our own inquiries. There's nothing ready-made here.

Admittedly, Nagarjuna would be the first to tell us that his total deconstruction of our every intellectual construct is just to point us to what can only be a personally realized experience, but cannot all this incredibly complicated fish-trap building end up being more of a distraction than a help? Zen's "Buddha is a shit-wiping stick" might be much more helpful for us of more limited intellectual prowess.

Still, to each his own.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

The One and Oneness

Scott Bradley

The author of the Trust in MindDaodejing uses it straightaway as a designation for a One that is beyond objectification; it cannot be known, yet it is suggested in all things. Zhuangzi uses it similarly, but in deference to the emptiness of the metaphysical Dao he also transforms it into a term descriptive of an experience, the experience of oneness. "Dao throughs as one." The experience of oneness is Dao.

The experience of oneness requires no One. Oneness is not experience of the One. The One does not grant the experience of oneness. A person does not experience oneness because there is One. A person experiences oneness because it is possible for the human brain to do so. There are no answers on offer.

Why then does one seek the experience of oneness? Because it feels good. If we seek it because it is our "birthright" we have rendered reality purposive, not empty. If we seek it because we 'should', we have rendered reality moral, not empty. If we say we cannot experience it if we have rendered reality purposive and moral, we have rendered reality conditional, not empty.

Oneness is not a metaphysical statement; it is an experience.

You can check out Scott's other miscellaneous writings here.

This Statement Is False

Scott Bradley

Mu Soeng (Trust in Mind), in addressing the first element of Gautama's Eight-Fold Path, "right view", tells us how the right view can be the wrong view: "The radicalism of Chan . . . said that all views are erroneous simply by virtue of being views in the first place." This "right view" refers to the four ennobling truths (?!), namely that insufficiency (suffering) is universal, why it arises, what is its cure, and how one gets the cure.

Thus, the right view becomes the wrong view when it is thought to be anything other than a provisional paradigm for understanding the human experience. In this sense, the right view is never truly right, even though it need not be wrong. However, it can be wrong if thought to be right—but also only provisionally so. He continues: "In practical terms, we can work with views . . . as working propositions but when we grasp any of them as 'truth' these views become instantaneously erroneous. Therefore, a deconstruction of all views, bar none, is required before one steps into working with them provisionally."

This, of course, is precisely the understanding of Zhuangzi. And though Buddhism may very well understand the same, it seems to have taken an encounter with Daoism for it to remember. The result was Chan (Zen).

I have several times here expressed my disapproval of the idea of "right view", informed as I am by my righter view that there is no right view, but that obviously amounts to the same thing. Still, since there are very few (if any) realized buddhas among us, one generally encounters this admonition to "right view" stated as 'truth', so my wrong view about this wrong view is not altogether wrong, though I am.

You can check out Scott's other miscellaneous writings here.

Upaya: Universal Provisionality

Scott Bradley

"[W]hen we speak of Chan in China, we need to keep in mind that we are speaking of a thousand experiments on a thousand mountain peaks." (Mu Soeng; Trust in Mind)

Might we not similarly say that when we speak of any spiritual endeavor, we are speaking of a personal experiment? As I like to say, there are as many paths as there are pairs of feet to walk them. Even when we follow a certain traditional path, it might be better described as finding our own path up a traditional mountain.

Soeng's statement is not intended to suggest that, after much experimentation, the true way was discovered. Not at all. It is always and only this experimentation — if the individual journey is to be authentic.

He also makes the point that Gautama’s philosophical revolution was motivated in part by a rejection of the ontological substantiality, the 'ultimate' of Brahman, in the Brahmanism of his day. In other words, "he was a phenomenologist"; his interest was in the human experience, not in establishing 'facts' about ultimate Reality. Thus, by extension, does he similarly critique every other idea of the so-called Ultimate — Dao as Source, God, I Am, Universal Mind, and the rest.

This conditioned propensity to establish Being so as to secure our being easily infiltrates even those philosophies which began in the acknowledgement of no such thing; and thus did a Buddhism now religiously reifying Buddha, when it encountered the "not-knowing" of neo-Daoism, reform itself in Chan (Zen). (Neo-Daoism being a reform of religious Daoism, which had similarly lost itself in belief.) Or something like that.

What is left is upaya, "skillful means", always-provisional (and thus self-emptying) ways of understanding our being-in-the-world. As with everything else, my understanding of upaya has been rather shallow; I have thought of it as only applying to method — a fish-trap forgotten when the fish are caught. But Soeng demonstrates how upaya applies to our every understanding of and relationship with the world — the fish, too, are upaya.

And thus are the teachings of the Buddha "therapeutic rather than absolutist" and "a series of fictions" (Conze) designed to facilitate a certain favorable outcome. And thus does Zen suggest that if we meet the Buddha we had best kill him, for in meeting him we have met a lie.

You can check out Scott's other miscellaneous writings here.

Buddho-Daoism

Scott Bradley

In his Trust in Mind: The Rebellion of Chinese Zen, a commentary on the Chan poem Trust in Mind (Xinxinming; Seng-ts'an ?, 6th cent.), Mu Soeng begins by emphasizing its roots in Daoism, going so far as to call it "Buddho-Taoist". This connection is what has made this poem especially attractive to me since I find myself much more at home in the simplicity of proto-Daoist philosophy than in the admittedly rich, but overwhelmingly complex and relatively religiously bound philosophy of Buddhism.

Thus, when his introduction begins by ascribing to Zhuangzi the seeds of the Chan revolution, I am hopeful of learning still more how the Trust in Mind can lead me to a better understanding of Zhuangzi: "Chan was born out of what might be described as a nuanced sensibility of the absurdity of the human condition. This was the gift of Zhuangzi to Indian Buddhism in China."

He goes on to quote Grigg (The Tao of Zen): "Zen is Taoism disguised as Buddhism. When twelve hundred years of Buddhist accretions are removed from Zen, it is revealed to be a direct evolution of the spirit and philosophy of Taoism. Indeed, the literature known as the Laozi and Zhuangzi begins a continuous tradition that can be followed through the Chan of China to the Zen of present-day Japan. The formative writings of early Taoism are essentially the teachings of Zen."

Mu Soeng takes a more balanced view, however. He suggests that the Trust in Mind, though it does demonstrate fewer "Buddhist accretions", is still a synthesis of Indian Buddhism, Chinese Chan as it already existed, and Daoism. To each he dedicates a chapter demonstrating in what way this is so.

Thus, will I get my Chan exposition of Zhuangzi, even if in moderation; and I suspect I will be sharing some of that here.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Undoing An Ox: Bloodied Dao

Scott Bradley

The story of Cook Ding in the third chapter of the Zhuangzi is among the best known and most appreciated. Unlike many stories in that book, this one tells us precisely what it is intended to teach: How to nourish life.

Wu (The Butterfly as Companion) remarks on the peculiar irony involved in teaching how to nourish life through the butchering of a recently slaughtered ox. In this regard he refers to a Buddhist story of a butcher who, upon dropping his cleaver, becomes a buddha. Cook Ding, in contrast, picks up his cleaver and unites himself, his cleaver and the ox with Dao. Though we must be careful of anachronistic thinking (for centuries still awaited the introduction of Buddhism into China) this contrast is, nonetheless, instructive. Daoism wades right into life, blood and guts, death as a prerequisite to life. Buddhism, on the other hand, attempts to sanitize life; it knows a better, more moral, way than the way of nature. Nature, for Buddhism, is "fallen", and therefore requires redemption. For Daoism, nature is perfect just as it is.

We need not snarl and resume gnawing on bones, however. There is in humanity a unique sensibility, a caring for things, which is ever much an expression of what nature has wrought as nature "red in tooth and claw". This, too, is worthy of nurture. The question is whether we can do so without denying nature and imposing values where they have no place.

Perhaps the balance is found in thankfulness. Some time ago I shared a poem by Gibran in which he called for the sanctification of our slaughter of beings for our nourishment through thankfulness. Much as did the Native Americans, we acknowledge and honor our prey in thanking them for their gift. At the same time, we do not stop there, thinking we are at the top of a pyramid and exempted from the cycle of life- and death-giving. With every slaughter we acknowledge our own eventual slaughter. Zhuangzi does not mince words on this point, declaring nature as that which also slaughters us. It is true that we seldom feed the tigers, or even that we parcel out deceased parental bits for friends and community, but we do feed the worms and bacteria. We do that even while we live.

We can do more, of course. We can become vegetarians or vegans, should circumstances allow and we feel so inclined. Yet even then we cannot extricate ourselves from the unavoidable reality that our lives require the extinction of other lives — in the garden, on the road, in the shower.

All this is another way of saying that life is messy. It does not resolve to moral platitudes. Everything we do is a working-through of life's complexities. Cook Ding's dao of butchery is intended to show us how to do so with grace and ease.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Bad Lao Tzu! I

Scott Bradley

One of the more enigmatic passages in the Inner Chapters is that in which an apparent sage comes to the wake for Lao Dan and, observing an inordinate amount of weeping and wailing, abruptly leaves. A Laozian chases after him and asks why he did not stay and show greater respect. It is the sage's answer which leaves interpreters in a quandary. There are two ways to take it: either he denounces the disciples for their failure to exemplify their teacher's teaching through an excessive concern for his passing, or he denounces Lao Dan himself for having failed to teach them properly.

I favor the latter interpretation for two reasons. Firstly, it seems to me that this is how the text most naturally renders. Secondly, it's not what we might want it to mean.

Wu's very literal translation of the most relevant verse goes thus (bold type represents the meaning of the characters themselves): "Seeing that there is that which that party gathered like this, he must have had it exist in him that-which he did not wish worded and was worded, that for which he did not wish wept and was wept." (Zhuangzi, 3)

Lao Tzu's failure to inculcate his teaching in his disciples was primarily because he had a teaching in the first place. His disciples seized upon the message and thereby failed to make it their own, for the message was to go beyond messages. Lao Tzu failed to teach without words. Easy enough to say, but what does it mean? Here are two negative examples that might help to illustrate: What if Socrates, instead of asking the ‘knowers’ what is truth, told them what it is? What if the Zen master, instead of answering the question of what is Buddha with "an ass-wiping shit-stick", gave a long winded metaphysical exposition of Buddhist cosmology? In both cases these teachers knew that midwifery was the only way to truly teach: It has to be born of the student him- or herself.

This failure led to an even more damning indictment; Lao Tzu created a cult of personality. He embodied the message; he was holy, he was special. All this weeping and wailing over the loss of a 'master' must have appalled this sage. What was Lao Tzu that his passing could leave anything more than a decomposing sack of flesh? But let us not fail to notice that he thereby joins a regal pantheon of similarly co-opted sages — Buddha, Zhuangzi and Jesus among them, not to mention the array of canonized saints whose pictures surround their present day sainted-wannabes. Perhaps their task was an impossible one; perhaps that easiest default to religious grasping was more than any of them could overcome.

And this brings us to the second reason I prefer the rendering of this story as a criticism of Lao Dan — we would prefer it to be otherwise. We want our holy ones, our sages, our perfected examples, who, though we cannot attain to their supposed sagacity, at least provide an idealized goal to believe in, and who, by virtue of our attachment to them, might carry us along on their coat-tails. Might not Zhuangzi have intended to shatter just this?

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Zhuangzi in Relief II

Scott Bradley

Here are further ways in which Zhuangzi's philosophy differs from Buddhism as articulated by Wu (The Butterfly as Companion):

3) Both understand ignorance as a cause of suffering. "The Buddhist awakening to knowledge dissolves our ignorance. Chuang Tzu's awakening to uncertainty (are we dreaming or awakened?) amounts to our knowledge of ignorance, affirmation of uncertainty." Buddhists believe they can come to know Truth and are thereby relieved of their ignorance. Zhuangzi teaches that no such Truth is within our grasp and that this essential not-knowing is where our liberation lies; we become free in our tenuousness by abandoning the futile search for solidity and by becoming that very tenuousness.

"Buddhists awaken out of dreaming; Chuang Tzu wakes up to dreaming." I have often attempted to make this point. Though Zhuangzi and Buddhism agree that we live in a world-made-up, Zhuangzi does not propose the possibility of ceasing to dream. Rather, we wake up to the fact that we are dreaming and recreate the world we dream. Perhaps this is why words like "wandering", "frolicking", "playfulness", and "laughing" so readily come to mind when considering the spirit of Zhuangzi.

4) Both understand clinging (attachment) to be a cause of suffering. "The Buddhist unclings himself to go beyond existence, even that of himself. Chuang Tzu unclutters and empties his self to tune in and partake in the pipings of all (men, things, heaven), to treasure and follow things . . ." Buddhism seeks detachment to escape things, Zhuangzi in order to more thoroughly embrace them. Attachment is manifest in preferences. Zhuangzi declares the equality of all things and consequentially the acceptability of all things. Unstuck from "benefit and harm", the belief that things (events) can rob us, one is free to mount and happily ride upon them all.

5) Buddhism seeks to dissolve identity altogether. Zhuangzi seeks only to unfix it; now a horse, now a cow; the point is to enjoy what one presently is while gladly accepting and enjoying changing into something else. The emptied self is a self nonetheless — while it is a self.

Wu sums up with a quote from Liu Xianxin (1896-1932) to which I have also made frequent reference: "The Buddhists stressed the emptiness of all, discarding all; Taoists stressed the greatness of all, wanting all." Here, we see these two philosophies at their most extreme divergence. Liu saw no possibility of reconciling the two. And yet, amazingly, they have so much in common — if only we can understand them outside the context of objective rightness and wrongness. But such a perspective is not so easily adopted by those who believe that Truth is to be had. Traditional Christianity, for example, is unable to accept other points of view solely on the basis of their effectiveness; and Buddhism, I believe, is ultimately also unable to do so.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Zhuangzi in Relief I

Scott Bradley

Kuang-Ming Wu (The Butterfly as Companion) contrasts Zhuangzi's philosophy with Buddhism in answer to some who have sought to equate them. Even when we do not go that far, there is a tendency, I think, to lump them together, yet they are widely divergent in many important respects. I will share Wu's points in this and the following post, but first want to clarify his and my purpose in making the contrast. Admittedly, it is difficult not to be partisan here since I (and Wu, I think) have chosen the way of Zhuangzi to launch our own paths to transcendent experience. Still, a contrast need not imply dismissal; Buddhism is clearly a viable spiritual option. What this contrast intends is to put Zhuangzi's thought into relief that we might better understand its uniqueness.

And, I believe, his philosophy was and is unique, not just with respect to other traditions, but also within the boundaries of Daoism itself. He was not, of course, a Daoist at all in the sense that the term was only retroactively applied to the tradition to which he came to be associated. In the end, to my admittedly limited scholarship, Zhuangzi' philosophy was essentially lost to Daoism early on. That he was later deified by Daoists only serves to demonstrate this point.

It also needs to be re-iterated in this context that this distinction making between two philosophies is not about a "wrong view" versus a "right view"; at best we could only speak of the most effective view, and I, at least, have no means of making that judgment. But this point, that is not about truth but about subjective experience without recourse to knowing 'how things really are', is also a point of divergence between Zhuangzi and Buddhism, which does, in fact, hold "right view" as one of its central pillars.

Here then are some of the ways in which Zhuangzi's (and Daoist) philosophy differs from Buddhism:

1) In Buddhism, "things are moving in many circles, co-causing and co-arising to annoy us, making us suffer." Things, together with existence itself, are the cause of our suffering. For Zhuangzi, things are "alive, co-arising, co-dying, and are equally important." In Buddhism, things are seen as part of the problem; for Zhuangzi, things are unfolding Dao and are affirmed as such. Ch'i Wu Lun, the title to the second chapter of the Zhuangzi, might be translated, Wu says, "as a description of how equally important things are." In a broad, though debated, sense Buddhism can be described as world-denying while Daoism is world-affirming.

2) Consequentially, Buddhism seeks to escape the world. Zhuangzi seeks to more thoroughly integrate with the world. "For Chuang Tzu, we are part of such live interdependence among things. We must let go of ourselves so as to overhear, accommodate, and truly participate in the delight of such life flip-floppings. We are awakened to an onerous participation in the vicissitudes of things-transforming." Buddhism seeks to escape the ever-changing; Zhuangzi seeks to unite with the ever-changing.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

On Realizing Unity

Scott Bradley

To my thinking, the most profound of the Buddha's purported utterances was this (I paraphrase): "I attained absolutely nothing when I attained absolute enlightenment; that is why it is absolute enlightenment."

Nearly every mystical tradition essentially tells us the same. "Realization" is a coming to realize in conscious experience what is already true of us. Nothing is gained. Nor does it matter or is it necessary, were it possible, to know what that "true of us" is. If those who 'know' do not speak, it is because there is nothing to say. Those who speak because they 'know' might know, but they do those who do not know a great disservice. What is known is grasped, what can be known is grasped for. But striving to be is a denial of what is.

Unity cannot be achieved because it already is. If it were not, there would be no such thing, actual or possible. Is there Unity? How could it be otherwise? To say this does not imply something redemptive, spiritual or purposeful. If the One were Zhuangzi's "Great Clod", then that would be our Unity. The realization of Unity is not a ticket to heaven or a guarantee of meaning; it is a subjective experience of release into nothing defined.

Yet it is believed that one can "realize" Unity; something transformative happens and the reality of that Unity informs one's conscious life in its entirety. For this, we can strive. But is striving an effective means? This is where Zen steps up and shouts, "No!" To do so would be for one to search for his head because he could not see it, or to look for a head to put on top of one's head. Nevertheless, a great deal of striving accompanies Zen.

I have my means, though I won't presume to call it "effective". I have not "realized" Unity. My effort to do so is to simply accept in the moment that it is so, whether realized or not. Yes, I will say it again: There are no conditions to meet; it is already true in me and in you. What need to strive? What need to speak of failure? What need to self-condemn? What need to realize anything? There is absolutely no gap between anything and everything.

Again, Unity with what? There is no 'what', nor any need for 'what'. But let us call it, like Zhuangzi, "The Great Openness", "The Great Thoroughfare", "The Great Transparency" — all of which speak of experience without content and not of some 'thing'. The way of Zhuangzi is not to realize the Truth, but to realize no need for Truth. "It is just being empty, nothing more." (Zhuangzi, 7:13; Ziporyn)

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

Sinlessness

Scott Bradley

It is believed that Seng-Ts'an, the Third Zen Patriarch and ostensible author of the Xin-Xin Ming, had leprosy, and this, he believed, was a consequence of some sin within him. Thus, when he met Huike, the Second Patriarch, he asked to be cleansed of his sins. Echoing the words of Bodhidharma which led to his own satori ("Show me your mind and I will pacify it."), Huike said, "Bring me your sins and I will cleanse them." "I have tried, but cannot find them," replied Seng-Ts'an. "Then I have cleansed you of them," concluded Huike.

He did not of course cleanse him of his sin, but brought to Seng-Ts'an's awareness that his sense of his own sinfulness was illusory, and that realization brought about his satori.

I have read commentary to the effect that, because a sense of sinfulness, a guilty conscience, is a product of self, which is itself illusory, sin is therefore likewise illusory. Sin does not exist. "If we have no self, it cannot commit sin." Although this may be in agreement with Buddhist belief, I think it might go too far. There is a vast difference between harmful deeds done (sin) and how we attach to them (sinfulness). I would suggest that we do have a self, and that it matters not that it is illusory — what is not?

Similarly, we are capable of doing harm to ourselves, the world and others, though in the context of Dao, no harm can be done. The real question is whether this 'matters' in the context of Reality, and the Daoist answer is, not at all. But because it does not matter in the context of an amoral Universe, does not mean that it does not matter in the necessarily moral sphere of human activity. We Walk Two Roads. It is illusory to deny anything in an illusory world.

To realize the meaninglessness of 'sin' in the context of Dao is to be released from the oppressiveness of a sense of 'sinfulness' and that freedom effects a change in how one behaves in the morally imbued human sphere.

Seng-Ts'an most likely could not find his sin because he didn't really have much of anything to find; what he had was leprosy. And this, he believed, was a visitation upon him of bad karma consequent to some sins committed in previous lives. And this most certainly is a most pernicious illusion. Like many of the doctrines of Buddhism, I have given up trying to understand what precisely karma is, since its definition continually morphs according to the needs of the moment (D. T. Suzuki seems embarrassed by it and suggests it was smuggled into Buddhism through its Hindu origins.), but this definition truly needs a holly-stake driven through its heart if for no other reason than that it presupposes a ‘soul’ resident in a moral universe.

As a final note, it is interesting to note that legend has Seng-Ts’an cured of his leprosy at his moment of enlightenment. Here is a wonderful opportunity to explore the nature of religiosity in contrast to spirituality.

You can check out Scott's other miscellaneous writings here.

Faith Is Mind

Scott Bradley

Though finished with the series on the Xin-Xin Ming, I continue to read it and commentary on it and find such a significant divergence of view in the understanding of this one word Xin (Hsin), translated "faith" or "trust", that I wish to pursue it further here.

The title above was a subtitle to one post in that series, but I'm not sure that I actually pointed out how it differs from the more accepted "Faith in mind". I prefer "Faith is mind". This is very possibly not what the author had in mind, but as I have previously said, I come to this document for inspiration, not doctrine.

Here is part of a commentary that speaks of what is probably the orthodox understanding of this Xin:

This is not faith in the ordinary sense, it is a belief that comes from firsthand experience, a faith which arises out of supreme knowledge and wisdom of enlightenment. This "believing" is an affirmation that all existence or reality is essentially the Buddha mind, which is our true nature. Hsin is the conviction that at the bottom of all phenomena lies the One Mind, the Buddha mind, which is one with our real nature, the Buddha-nature.

The first thing we are told is that this "faith" does not precede the experience, but is its consequence. Though I wonder about the need to provide any interpretive content to the experience at all, I understand how that "faith in mind" might arise from that experience. But this also means it has nothing to do with me, for I have not had the experience. And, more importantly, I have no basis for exercising that faith-with-content before or in pursuit of that experience.

What I can do is put my faith in the human experience as an expression, not of something else ("Universal Mind"), but of itself. This "faith in mind" is, in fact, the actual exercise of mind. Thus, "faith is mind", which is to say, "the exercise of mind is faith". It is an affirmation of the human experience. On what basis? Because it is so. It is an affirmation of life because life is affirmation.

I fear I am coming across as pedantic, but the distinction is, I believe, an important one. It is the difference between believing in something and simply being something. This is precisely what is expressed in the commentary above; only it imposes interpretive content and speaks from a distant shore which has no relevance to this shore upon which I presently am.

The imposition of articles of faith is what Zhuangzi calls "adding to life". Yet life, he insists, is sufficient to itself. We need not disturb our peace "striving to make all things one"; we need not believe anything at all; all we need do is let the human experience unfold as it is. This, I believe, is the heart of the Zhuangzian vision. We need not pursue anything; we need only live the exploratory adventure of the human experience and let arise what will.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.