Machine Head
The Koan's Transformative Power
By
Nicholas Sayers
Buddhism
May 7th, 2009
Professor Nancy Martin
Zen consciousness strives for the goal of breaking through the duality of the apparent world and responding to the fullness of emptiness. To do this, the Zen mind must break all subjective and rational thought, which leads to an awareness of nothingness. For centuries the method employed by Zen (more specifically Rinzai) was that of the koan, an absurdity that wears down the mechanical mind so one can experience satori. (Satori is the constant undoing of layers of illusion that reality presents the mind, which attaches to it.) Through the use of koans and the goal of satori, one can radically transform into a being connected intimately to the infinite emptiness behind all form. This connection to emptiness and all beings creates a consciousness without fear or duality, which leads the way to an unadulterated spiritual freedom.
A common method of Rinzai Zen is the use of koans. A koan is a puzzle with no apparent trick. This definition only scratches the surface. In practice, it is a way to exhaust rational thought or shock the mind out of the rational level. A Zen master will ask a student to explain the sound of one hand clapping. The mind has no rational answer for this and there never will be. However, through the deep act of trying to rationalize it, one will exhaust the rational. This opens the mind to a revelation. This revelation is satori. Satori is a flicker of enlightenment, where one sees beyond the rational and material. After the mind loses its rational thought process, a door is opened so that a Zen student can find the true answer which he seeks. One may attain satori only for an instant. Just because a person reaches satori once, this does not mean that he or she is enlightened.
Satori is an ongoing quest—one that will not end until death. It can be described as a light bulb flickering: when it is off the rational mind blinds the person, when it is on the light hits one and satori is attained for that instance, until the light is turned off again. In Zen Flesh, Zen Bone the story “Three Days More” depicts a student who returns to his master upset that he cannot answer what the sound of one hand clapping is like.[1] The master sends him back to keep meditating on the matter, but the student still cannot attain enlightenment. Finally, the master tells him that if he doesn’t have an answer after three more days, he should commit suicide. The student becomes enlightened on the second day. The impending doom of suicide shocked the student’s mind into letting go of the rational and finding the truth, leading to satori.
The roots of the pithy absurdity that is the koan trace back to the patriarchs of Ch'an Buddhism in China. Koan, or kung-an in Chinese originates from "the realm of jurisprudence in medieval China."[2] It means bench of a magistrate translated, which came to signify a record of a magistrate's decision on a case. The secular etymology was taken by Ch'an masters when they were commenting on "old cases," or "passages from the patriarchal records," because their ability to comment asserted a level of "rank and spiritual authority of the master."[3] A master's commentary was usually given in semiprivate or private environment, which is a precursor to the intense relationship seen between master and disciple in Japan. By asserting spiritual authority, the master now can be likened to a secular judge, because the master can gage and pass judgment on a disciple's quest for enlightenment. In these cases, being guilty is a state of ignorance and innocence "is equated to with awakening."[4]
Kung-an evolved to refer to written dialogues and judgments on students, which started to resemble a legal "standard" within Ch'an schools. The past judgments by masters became a way for new masters to weigh a disciple's progress with precedence. The idea of a master's commentary being used as a quasi-legal document in spiritual progress becomes problematic for Zen. In the Zen story What Are You Doing! What Are You Saying!, there is Mu-nan, an old master nearing death, who has a book which has commentaries and notes from the past seven generations of masters. This book is dear to Mu-nan and he wants to pass it on to his successor Shoju, who refuses the book many times. Finally Shoju takes the book:
The two happened to be talking before a brazier. The instant
Shoju felt the book in his hands he thrust it into the flaming
coals. He had no lust for possessions. Mu-nan, who never had
been angry before, yelled: "What are you doing!" Shoju shouted
back: "What are you saying!"[5]
If koans were being viewed as footprints "which monks could 'track,' tracing them back to their original" enlightened mind, then there is a threat of attachment to a sort of path to enlightenment, which is dangerous.[6]
During the Sung dynasty, Ta-hui changed kung-an study from a gradual search for the writer's enlightened mind through reading and contemplation in a rational manner to a "cultivation of trance states as a means of cutting of discursive thought."[7] Here the kung-an becomes shortened to a "contemplating phrase," which was used by practitioner to transcend intellectual thought and reach "sudden enlightenment."[8] The concept of sudden enlightenment carried over to Japanese Zen--most prominently in Rinzai--which is called satori. The progression of the kung-an in Ch'an Buddhism has influenced many key aspects of Zen practice. Although koans started off in a very different context they became short contemplating phrases. The koan, on the other hand, cannot be reduced to its social and literary contexts. The transformative aspects of it must be analyzed. As D.T. Suzuki puts it, "Ko literally means 'public' and an is 'a document.' But 'a public document' has nothing to do with Zen."[9]
Before examining what spiritual and psychological implications the koan holds for the Zen mind, the mechanical and categorizing nature of thought must be explored. From an early age the brain is trained to repeat processes so that life is more efficient. The brain is turned into a machine with categories of logic, which make it easy to communicate ideas to each other. This is essential for humans to live, but there is a collapse into this machine-like thinking that creates a conciseness, which loses its roots in boundless infinity. Zen consciousness sees consciousness as that obstacle.[10] When the mind is presented with true reality, it cannot experience it in abstraction, logic, or propositional language. That is why terms like the fullness of emptiness and infinity are used. The terms point in the direction of understanding that which is not understandable.[11] The mind only gets in the way of satori, because it tries to encapsulate it in human logic. The realization that one's consciousness is the consciousness of all things in an ocean of non-duality, cannot be realized by the brain because the brain perpetuates an agenda of attachment to the world through conceptualizations. The mind tells humans that nothingness cannot exist because they only see matter. That same mind tells one to reject something, which falls outside of a trained comfort zone.
Thought is a limited reaction to things around us, Zen does not want one to react; it wants someone to respond. "Response involves the whole being of man in his freedom and in his capacity to 'see' and 'move on'" while "reaction is nothing more than the mechanical, perhaps astutely and dishonestly improvised, answer of one's superficial self."[12] This is how a roshi, or master, gauges his students work on a presented koan. Is the student reacting to the absurd koan? Or is the student responding? A good indication of a reaction is trying to express the "answer" of a koan in words or logical thought.
Zen masters consistently keep their students in check by destroying preconceptions to better help them to release their mechanical thinking. There is one story where a student, Ma-tsu, was in deep meditation and his master asks him what he is doing and Ma-tsu replies "I wish to become a Buddha."[13]
Thereupon the master picked up a tile and stated rubbing it on a stone.
Ma-tsu asked "what are you doing, Master?" "I am polishing this tile
to make it a mirror," [the master] replied. "How can you make a mirror
by rubbing a tile?" exclaimed Ma-tsu. "How can one become a Buddha
by sitting in mediation?" countered the master.[14]
The master is trying to illustrate that satori cannot be contained in a systematic process. One who meditates to become a Buddha is missing the point. The setting of the goal is an attachment to a preconception of what a Buddha entails. In reality, everything is already inside the human psyche. Ritual can become the slave of the mind; this is what the koan tries to stop.
There is no answer to the question "what is the sound of one hand clapping?"[15] The intellectual mind cannot answer it. The brain will try with all its might to react to the koan by trying to solve the puzzle through rational thought.[16] This is perfectly normal. The koan wants the mind to ask questions and work hard because after a while, it is shocked or wore out, which shuts it down for an instant. This instant is satori. In the exhaustion of the brain "psychology must be transcended," which roots the individual back to the original nature of all being: nothingness.[17] In the moment one can respond with his or her entire being. By transcending the brain, one is delving into a purely spiritual experience where one is connected to the boundlessness of reality. Since the logical confines of words in this essay can do little to explain the experience of truly being present in reality, poetry must be sought. Basho writes:
The horse grazing on the bank
Seems to me black in colour.
I think it otherwise,
For its reflection in the paddy
Says chestnut-brown.[18]
At first, Basho's brain tells him there is a black horse in front of him. But he turns to reality for truth and sees the reflection of the horse in a paddy and notices the truth of things. This is like satori. To reach this, Basho must transcend what his brain is telling him by being in reality or out of the subjective. That is what the paddy presents to him: the experience of reality and truly seeing the horse. At first glance, the world is filled with things and matter, but when first glances are transcended, reality is seen for what it truly is. It is a pure experience where the entire self is surpassed and one can shed a layer of ignorance.
Satori does not promise the attainment of enlightenment; it is only a condition where a layer of ignorance is shed. Absurd koans help this happen by shocking the mind into satori. Once a koan is "mastered," it only opens more responsibility and intensity to shed more layers of ignorance. This experience does not mean that one can see past all matter into some dark void of existence on a different plane. It is:
...not a negation and annihilation of concrete existent beings.
It implies the complete acceptance of them as they are, but
with a totally transformed consciousness which does not see
them as objects, but which so to speak, 'gazes out' from the
midst of them. The final awakening of the Zen consciousness
is not simple the loss of self, but the finding of self in and through all.[19]
This transformation of the self hinges on the ability interconnecting features of nothingness.
To the Zen mind reality is nothingness, which is boundless infinity. This points to something "prior to either affirmation or negation."[20] By realizing nothingness, there is a deeper implication for the Zen mind, which is endless compassion for all existent things. If there is no particular self and all are a part of a universal connection to one another, then the enlightened being must transform. The spiritual transformation stemming from satori creates a new non-person inside all other things. Zen masters speak of the "unborn," which is the original nature before the phenomenal self is born.[21] This unborn or original essence is the root of all spiritual creativity and energy, because it is connected to nothingness, where potentiality is boundless. The satori experience connects one with this original nature, successfully rebinding them to the infinite realm. To be rebinded to nothingness opens the mind up to a deep realization that all others are a part of you. This leads to deep empathy. Thich Nhat Hahn speaks of realizing this compassion through mindfulness:
We are life, and life is limitless. Perhaps one can say that we are
only alive when we live the life of the world, and so live the
sufferings and joys of others. The suffering of others is our own
suffering, and the happiness of others is our own happiness...The
impermanent character of the universe, the successes and failures
can no longer manipulate us.[22]
The radical transformation the Zen mind is that of absolute freedom.
Spiritual freedom, or liberation, is the goal of all Buddhists. Zen can see this liberation in every moment through satori experiences, where one truly sees reality and sheds ignorance. Rinzai Zen also holds a constant state of freedom, contingent on the constant process of attaining satori.[23] Spiritual freedom to Zen is not like the freedom of the West where one is free from certain taxes on his or her will. To Zen "a person is free only when he is not a person. He is free when he denies himself and is absorbed in the whole."[24] This freedom is reliant on the realization of oneness with all things. The spiritual implications of this freedom extend a degree of responsibility for the enlightened mind, not so much a spiritual privilege. Zen freedom requires that "action then carries a sense of spontaneity, much like the spontaneous creative act of living nature."[25] This spontaneity most likely refers back to an mind operating without a why or agenda; a state of pure action and response. This most likely roots back to Taoist influence on Zen and the concept of wei wu wei.[26]
Wei wu wei literally means action with no action.[27] It is the way of life for people whom embody Tao--what Zen would call ontological Buddha-nature--without needing to embody anything. By letting Tao work in a person, wei wu wei happens without effort or any set goals. Every moment requires an action, which can either be seethed in personal desire or be of spontaneity and singleness of attention. The champion of wei wu wei sees the truth of the situation, while objectively discerning what creative action should be done. Therefore wei wu wei is to negate the refusal to attend to the need of the other or the situation. To do this, the Zen mind first needs to accept the truth of the situation by looking at it with spiritual attention, which is in no way attached to the social or the self.[28] After this, he or she will become alert to the situation and the consequences of acting. Without being alert to the situation, one may act rashly or with some sort of desire, which undermines the singleness. After the need is discerned, one will act according to the situation. One must act, because he or she knows that moments never come twice. With no goals in mind and the self pulsating with freedom, the good of the situation will be met through wei wu wei.
The organic nature of Buddhism makes it difficult to explore a single aspect of Zen. That is how one starts with the koan and ends in the deep realization that all beings are connected. The historical development of the koan, from Ch'an to Rinzai, has confused and inspired scholars for a number of decades. With modern scholarship, one can trace the koan's root to its presentation today, but this only gets one so far. To really study koan, it must be seen in its transformative powers. It can exhaust and shock the rational mind, to let one see into reality as infinite. Satori leads to life where one can feel the happiness and suffering of all others, because one's own existence is reliant on all things. When one person suffers, all beings suffer. That is the boundless realization that koans can produce, which frees one from all presuppositions.
Bibliography
Foulk, T. Griffith. "The Form and Function of Koan Literature." In The Koan, by Dale S. Wright and Steven Heine, 15-45. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Fowler, Jeaneane, and Merv Fowler. Chinese Religions. Portland: Sussex Academic Press, 2008.
Hanh, Thich Nhat. The Miracle of Mindfulness. Translated by Mobi Ho. Boston: Beacon Press Books, 1976.
Kasulis, T.P. Zen Action, Zen Person. University of Hawaii Press, 1989.
Matsuo, Bashō. The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Translated by Nobuyuki Yuasa. New York: Penguin Books, 1966.
Merton, Thomas. Mystics and Zen Masters. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1967.
—. Zen and the Birds of Appetite. New York: New Directions, 1968.
Mohr, Michel. "Emerging from Nonduality." In The Koan, by Steven Heine and Dale S. Wright, 245-279. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Nagatomo, Shigenori. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2006. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/japanese-zen/#ZenFre (accessed May 1, 2009).
Senzaki, Nyogen, and Paul Reps, . Zen Flesh Zen Bone. North Clarendon: Tuttle Publishing, 1985.
Smith, Huston. The World's Religions. New York: Harper Collins, 1991.
Suzuki, D.T., Erich Fromm, and Richard De Martino. Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1963.
Wright, Dale S. "Koan History." In The Koan, by Dale S. Wright and Steven Heine, 200-212. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
[1] Senzaki, Nyogen, and Paul Reps, . Zen Flesh Zen Bone. North Clarendon: Tuttle Publishing, 1985. Pg. 45
[2] Foulk, T. Griffith. "The Form and Function of Koan Literature." In The Koan, by Dale S. Wright and Steven Heine, 15-45. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Pg. 18
[3] Ibid. Pg. 17
[4] Ibid. Pg. 19
[5] Zen Flesh Zen Bone. Pg. 80-81
[6] Wright, Dale S. "Koan History." In The Koan, by Dale S. Wright and Steven Heine, 200-212. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Pg. 205
[7] "The Form and Function of Koan Literature." Pg. 23
[8] Ibid. Pg. 23
[9] Suzuki, D.T., Erich Fromm, and Richard De Martino. Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1963. Pg. 43
[10]Merton, Thomas. Zen and the Birds of Appetite. New York: New Directions, 1968. Pg. 38
[11] Kasulis, T.P. Zen Action, Zen Person. University of Hawaii Press, 1989. Pg. 133
[12] Merton, Thomas. Mystics and Zen Masters. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1967. Pg. 250
[13] Fowler, Jeaneane, and Merv Fowler. Chinese Religions. Portland: Sussex Academic Press, 2008. Pg. 205
[14] Ibid.
[15] Zen Flesh Zen Bones. Pg. 45
[16] Suzuki. Pg. 48
[17] Ibid. Pg. 49
[18] Matsuo, Bashō. The Narrow Road to the Deep North. Translated by Nobuyuki Yuasa. New York: Penguin Books, 1966. Pg. 11
[19] Mystics and Zen Masters. Pg. 253
[20] Zen Action, Zen Person. Pg. 41
[21] Suzuki Pg. 19.
[22] Hanh, Thich Nhat. The Miracle of Mindfulness. Translated by Mobi Ho. Boston: Beacon Press Books, 1976. Pg. 49
[23] Mohr, Michel. "Emerging from Nonduality." In The Koan, by Steven Heine and Dale S. Wright, 245-279. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Pg. 266
[24] Suzuki. Pg. 9
[25] Nagatomo, Shigenori. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2006. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/japanese-zen/#ZenFre (accessed May 1, 2009).
[26] Zen Action Zen Person. Pg. 36
[27] Ibid.
[28] Smith, Huston. The World's Religions. New York: Harper Collins, 1991. Pg. 208.
