Dharma Transmission in Zen by Stuart Lachs

Dharma Transmission in Zen

by Stuart Lachs

Despite its iconoclastic image, Zen has in actuality been a remarkably conservative institution throughout its history, almost always tied to and controlled by the state and elite elements of society. There is certainly nothing anti-authoritarian about the notion of unbroken lineage going back to the historical Buddha. Likewise, Dharma transmission was as much about institutional prosperity, prestige, authority, continuity and acceptance and control by imperial authorities as it was about notions of enlightenment and spiritual perfection. The Zen master is a role that stands as a representative of the entire Zen institution. He occupies an authoritative place in East Asian cultures that have already been imbued with a special level of hierarchy since ancient times. It could fairly be said that what is effectively transmitted by Dharma transmission is institutional authority, rather than religious wisdom. However, I do not mean to imply there is no inner spiritual content to the Zen tradition.

Dharma transmission has been awarded and is still awarded for many reasons besides spiritual attainment. In fact, it was often not based on spiritual attainment at all, most especially so in Japanese Soto Zen, which is the sect of Suzuki, Baker and the San Francisco Zen Center. In this sect, Dharma transmission is commonly a father-son transmission ritual culminating in the son's inheritance of the family temple. Spiritual attainment, insight into timeless truth(s) or any other profound changes in one's inner life play virtually no part in the majority of these Dharma transmissions or in the every day functions of these roshis.

But the Soto sect tries to have it both ways. It allows bureaucratic transmission, but it also uses "historical" biographies of eminent masters presented as desireless beings, the koans, and the many Zen stories and dialogues (mondo) to legitimize and to enhance authority, that make clear that transmission is given because of a deep insight into reality or spiritual attainment. Read any of these texts of Zen, The Book of Serenity, a Soto sect koan collection, being one prominent example, and this will be abundantly clear.

"Hollow" transmissions such as those between father and son are incorporated into the unbroken lineage to the Buddha. (If the reader wants to argue that Dharma transmission in the Rinzai sect or in the modern Sanbokyodan sect so popular in the West matches the ideal of Zen rhetoric, please feel free to email me at my address listed in the Notes.)
Even when Dharma transmission does reflect some level of something we may call spiritual attainment, it is not based on the idealized version proffered by the Zen institution: a mystical meeting of minds between teacher and disciple sharing a timeless truth that unvaryingly matches the minds of all teachers going back in the lineage, through the six Chan Patriarchs in China, and the twenty eight generations of the supposed Indian lineage going back to the historical Buddha, and beyond. This is a mythology of Zen, a pure fiction. The Zen institution requires the master because he is supposedly a living example of the ideal of Zen and, as such, represents all of its legitimacy and authority. A large institution like Zen requires hundreds of such living role players. This necessitates the production of virtual quotas of such highly exalted people, while in the realm of "spiritual attainment" it is rare to produce just one such person. Therefore, in the living world of flesh and blood we have people with some very limited level of attainment occupying a role that is defined as Buddha-like, actualizing perfect freedom and unfathomable compassion beyond the ordinary person's understanding and hence above question. However Zen texts may define the role, Zen masters have not been fully enlightened beings beyond question.

Quoted from Richard Baker and the Myth of the Zen Roshi by Stuart Lachs.

Find the full article here:

http://www.thezensite.com/ZenEssays/CriticalZen/Richard_Baker_and_the_Myth.htm

Shodo Harada Roshi's Awakening

Shodo Harada Roshi's Awakening

At one point during my training I could not pass a koan*, and was packing up my things in the monastery, ready to leave, giving up. At that time I thought it should not have taken me, or anyone else, more than three years to reach kensho**. I remember my tears at the end of my first rohatsu sesshin*** when I couldn't realize kensho. Was something wrong with the way I was sitting in the zendo? I would even go out and sit all night long, but still I could not break through. So I packed my things and went to the roshi (Yamada Mumon Roshi). I told him I was going to go sit for as long as I possibly could alone. The roshi asked, ”Then what are you going to do?” I said I would know then, that I did not know at the moment, but when that time came I would know what I had to do. The roshi did not say anything.

I went to the Nara mountains, doing one sesshin after another on my own, I then went to different mountains in another area and did the same thing, sitting one sesshin after another. It was nearing the time of rohatsu when a young man appeared in the mountains. Neither of us had seen anyone for a few days and we were eager to talk. He asked me if I was practicing Zen, and I said, ”Yes.” The other young man had been doing the practice of chanting the Buddha's name, and he exclaimed, ”How lucky you are, to be spending all of your time, your whole life, doing your practice!” This from someone who was able to practice only a few days a week. His words hit me like a blow on the head. At that moment, all the burdens I had been carrying around fell away, and I knew that I had never left the Buddha's palm. I became suddenly light, as if my body was weightless. I returned to Nara and found a letter from my previous training temple asking me to come there for rohatsu.

Knowing the path would always open in front of me, I have never lost that confidence that I have never left the Buddha's palm at any time in any way. From that time on, sanzen**** was never terrible again. All of the koans were just my karma ripening, and to be done going on and on. Since then, the path has always been open to me. I could accpet whatever came. If there was no food, it would be OK to die sitting. This is the important point: to entrust completely, to live today with one's fullest energy, to have no anxiety deep within, to have no sense of having done this or that, leaving it all up to the natural way, leaving it all up to heaven and earth.

From ”The Path to Bodhidharma” by Shodo Harada.

*koan, zen practice of poems and riddles

**kensho, awakening

***rohatsu sesshin, the most intensive zen retreat of the year that lasts 8 days

sesshin, zen retreat

****sanzen, meditation interviews with a zen master

Omori Sogen Roshi's Awakening

Omori Sogen Roshi's Awakening

For eight years Omori Roshi (1904-1994) commuted between Kyoto and Tokyo. In 1933, finally, he ”broke through” and passed the koan Mu. About this realization, Omori Roshi says:

”My experience was not very impressive or glorious, so I don't like to talk about it but... One day after finishing zazen, I went to the toilet. I heard the sound of the urine hitting the back of the urinal. It made a splashing sound. It sounded very loud to me, and at the very moment I realized, ”AHA”, and I understood. I had a realization.

”I AM!” I was very happy. But it was not a showy experience. It was not even very clean. Sound is not the only thing that can trigger this experience. Yamada Mumon Roshi, with whom I trained, had a very different experience. He was walking down the hallway when he saw the red color of the autumn leaves, and suddenly he was enlightened.

When you are enlightened, you realize very clearly that you are right in the middle of Mu. This becomes a little theoretical, but according to Nishida's philosophy, it is stated that the infinite circle has infinite centers. In effect, what happens is that you realize that that center of the infinite circle is you.

When you are in the state of samadhi, whether you call it Mu-samadhi or another type of samadhi, you are unconditionally in the realm of Absolute Nothingness (zettai mu). At that time, because of some incident, when you break through the samadhi, you will attain realization. It is like ripe fruit on a tree. When the wind blows or the branch sways, the fruit will just fall from the tree. If the fruit is not ripe, though the wind may blow or the branch sway, the fruit will not fall.

You will realize with your entire being that you are at the center of Absolute Nothingness (zettai mu) and at the center of the infinite circle. To be at the center of the infinite circle in this human form is to be BUDDHA himself. You have been saved from the beginning. You will understand all these things clearly and with certainty.

Even if you are in the state of samadhi but do not have this realization, you are merely in that state. You will not feel that, ”I am glad I am who I am. A great burden has been lifted from my shoulders. I am content. I am saved”.

From ”Omori Sogen, The Art of a Zen master” by Dogen Hosokawa.

Kim's note: Omori Sogen Roshi was the teacher of my teacher, Terayama Tanchu Sensei.