2.11.17

Principle of Zen According to Eisai

Question: What is the characteristic of this school?
Answer: The Zen school has the Diamond Sutra and the Vimalakirti Sutra as its main references. Its principle is that the mind is nothing other than the Buddha. A mind freed from clinging to anything constitutes its religious act. Its purpose is [to cause people to realize] that everything that has its own characteristics is empty of self-nature. Since the Buddha handed down the robe and bowl to Kasyapa, transmission from master to disciple has not changed. Details are known from the records.
(A Treatise on Letting Zen Flourish, in Zen Texts, BDK ed, p 101)

Just abiding in the “perfect rank” (yuanwei; en’i), practicing the “perfect and immediate” awakening (yuandun; endon), and externally practicing the precepts of restraint to prevent wrongs while internally benefiting others out of compassion—this is called the principle of the Zen school; it is called the Buddha-Dharma.
(p 115-116)

Question: As for this Zen school in relation to sila, samadhi, and prajñå, what would you say it is?
Answer: Its principle is the Tathågata’s dhyåna, which does not set up words out of which to make any dogma. Positively expressed, it is common to all the Mahayana schools. Negatively stated, it is free from mind, ego consciousness, and perceptive consciousnesses; it is free from verbal expression.
(p 122)

The principle of this Zen school does not set up any words out of which to make dogma. It has been specially transmitted outside of scriptural teachings. It does not cling to passages taught; it only transmits the seal of the mind. It is free from letters, being without words. Through directly pointing to the source of the mind, it has one attain awakening.
(p 137)

First, by teaching I mean various teachings. People of not very brilliant capacity will first examine the admirable ideas of various teachings and schools. When they learn the essentials of Zen, those teachings will serve as the means for cultivating themselves to enter Zen. The Collection of Records from the Ancestral Mirrors quotes sixty sutras and sastras, collects the excellent purports of the three schools, and comments on the expressions of more than three hundred authorities. It does so in order to expound the essentials of the Chan school.
Second, by Zen I mean the Buddha’s dhyåna. It is not adhering to words, not being bound by mind or thought. Therefore, one penetrates this by getting free from mind, ego consciousness, and perceptive consciousnesses. One learns this by transcending the paths of the unawakened and the awakened. In this way Zen concerns people of superb brilliance.
Third, by the general aspect I mean what follows. The so-called teachings and so-called Zen are nothing but names. To say “penetrating” and “learning” are also provisional matters. “I,” “others,” “living beings,” “awakening” (bodhi), and “nirvana” are all names, too. They don’t substantially exist. The teachings expounded by the Buddha are also names; there is nothing expounded. Therefore, the Zen principle is free from the characteristics of words, free from those objects of the mind. It is beyond thought and deliberation and ultimately unobtainable. Concerning the Buddha-Dharma (lit., “the Buddha’s awakened truth”), what has no Dharma to be expounded is called the Buddha-Dharma. What I now call Zen is an expression of that characteristic.
Since the three aspects mentioned above are provisional names, if anyone insists that the Buddha’s dhyåna has letters and words, he is blaming the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Therefore, the patriarch [Bodhidharma] did not set up words out of which to make any dogma but, by directly pointing to the human mind, causes one to see one’s self-nature [as no-mind] and attain awakening. This was the so-called Chan (Zen) gate.
He who takes hold of names and letters misses the Dharma. He who clings to characteristics and appearances is also perverted. Originally there being no moving and nothing to be obtained is called the Buddha-Dharma,130 the Buddha’s truth. The Buddha-Dharma lies just in walking, standing, sitting, and lying down. Adding even a bit to it is impossible, whereas taking away just a bit is also impossible. Realizing this, you will not waste even the slightest energy. As soon as you estimate it by deliberation to be something marvelous and mysterious, you already have nothing to do with it. Therefore, if you move, you will be arousing the base of birth and death. If you stay quiet, you will be getting drunk in the area that is dark and heavy. If you forget both movement and quietude, you will squander your Buddha-nature. When nothing like this is available, what will you do?
(p 144-145)

Therefore, through first gaining confidence in a few words of one’s master, one enters the dhyåna sea of the Buddha-Dharma. One can enter all the Buddha’s teachings only through one’s confidence in them.
(p 157)

Basically, the Buddha-Dharma does not itself speak out; it assumes scriptural expressions to manifest its teachings. Originally dhyana has no intent to introduce itself; it actualizes itself only through our self-concentration (samadhi). Therefore, the expressions by which people characterize Zen, such as “the hair of a tortoise” or “the horns of a hare,” naturally reveal the living principle that is hard to be manifested, whereas the awakened truth of mind that is free from mind (wuxin; mushin) or from thought (wunian; munen), profoundly accords with the One Mind, the innermost shrine.
(p 186)

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