Rethinking
Zen and Kensho
There
are many examples of zen practitioners, both monastics and laypeople,
who experienced seeing one's true nature, or kensho, first by
cultivating one-pointedness (skt. samadhi, jp. zanmai), and then
shattering that one-pointedness through various spontaneous or
purposeful ways. What happens when one-pointedness becomes shattered
is that one's mind shifts from self-based and self-experienced
concentrative calm, to one's natural state, or buddhanature.
I
have questioned the necessity of cultivating samadhi because, from
the point of view of having kensho, it seems quite useless, that
takes a lot of time and effort to come up with. While from one
perspective being mindfully concentrated is better than being
distracted, neither of these conditions are the natural state, that
is, kensho. Thousand hours of concentration on one's breath or koan
is little, based on queries and observations, and still it is not
certain that kensho will happen. All in all, it is very unreliable.
The good side is that it needn't be so.
Buddhism
teaches that all sentient beings have buddhanature, so the question
is how can we most effectively access this buddhanature of ours,
instead of remaining in our samsaric state? If we managed to
recognise our natural state correctly, on regular basis, we'd
be glimpsing and familiarising (kensho) our buddhanature all the
time.
In
my view, the reason why kensho zen is near to extinction is
because training in samadhi has taken the place of prioritising
kensho. It's all backwards. If recognition of one's buddhanature was
prioritized, we would instantly see a change in our sanghas and in
the whole zen culture.
The
thing is that in order to have kensho, we need not cultivate samadhi.
We need not go through the hardship of learning how to concentrate
but by the means of dynamic
concentration (pg.
21 in What's Next? On Post-Awakening Practice) can access the
natural state as soon as we utter a sharp shout. In this way we can
bypass samadhi cultivation and save a lot of time and energy, while
inevitably having one kensho after another.
Thank
you.
-Kim
Katami
Open
Heart Sangha,
