BEGINNER'S MIND
Zen masters say that they have nothing to teach. This is half true. The problem is that what they have to teach is not teachable, not in so many words. Their task is the short-circuiting, in effect, of a person's analytical mind. If successful it will land the person where he was at the start of it all, at what is called beginner's mind, the state of one's mind when he is born.
The Ch'an school of Buddhism in China goes by the name of Zen in Japan, for this is how "ch'an" is pronounced in Japan. Three branches of Zen were established in Japan in the 12th, 13th, and 17th centuries. The two sects that are now most active are derived from the two most durable Chinese sects: the Rinzai, so named from the Japanese pronunciation of Lin-Chi, one of the Chinese sects, and the Soto, from the Chinese Ts'ao-tung, the other Chinese sect. The former favors the koan method where there is an enigma or puzzle that forces the student's mind outside its normal processes in order to gain instant insight. The Soto school prefers the zazen approach, or sitting in meditation on a regular, formulated basis under the direction of competent authority in order to attain gradual awakening. In both instances the aim is beginner's mind. When it occurs it is called satori. Rinzai's most vigorous advocate is the world-famous professor Dr. D.T. Suzuki whose description of his own satori is found in the entry in this blog THE MYSTIC. Alan Watts liked to recount Suzuki's informal description of his satori: "It is like everyday experience, only about two inches off the ground."
In beginner's mind a person sees the unitary character of reality. "I" and "not-I" are one. Deliberative reason will not succeed here. One cannot THINK oneself into this realization. This is to say, there are two ways of dealing with the world. One is to distinguish, describe, analyze, and, in pursuit of practical ends, manipulate its objects from the outside. This is to deal in concepts and acts that are disjunctive and misleading. The other is to contemplate the world, Nature, much as Taoists do, from the position of one who is indistinguishably at one with it.
This feeling of oneness is the mystical component of Zen, but it is different from the oneness in, for instance, Vedanta, which speaks of the oneness of Brahman and Atman. Dr. Suzuki points out that there is always what may be called a sense of the Beyond to Zen's oneness. The experience is indeed our own, he says, but we feel it to be rooted elsewhere. However, a SENSE of the Beyond is all that can be said about it. "To call this the Beyond, the Absolute, or God, or a Person is to go further than the experience itself and to plunge into a theology or metaphysics," which is not what Zen is about.
The Ch'an school of Buddhism in China goes by the name of Zen in Japan, for this is how "ch'an" is pronounced in Japan. Three branches of Zen were established in Japan in the 12th, 13th, and 17th centuries. The two sects that are now most active are derived from the two most durable Chinese sects: the Rinzai, so named from the Japanese pronunciation of Lin-Chi, one of the Chinese sects, and the Soto, from the Chinese Ts'ao-tung, the other Chinese sect. The former favors the koan method where there is an enigma or puzzle that forces the student's mind outside its normal processes in order to gain instant insight. The Soto school prefers the zazen approach, or sitting in meditation on a regular, formulated basis under the direction of competent authority in order to attain gradual awakening. In both instances the aim is beginner's mind. When it occurs it is called satori. Rinzai's most vigorous advocate is the world-famous professor Dr. D.T. Suzuki whose description of his own satori is found in the entry in this blog THE MYSTIC. Alan Watts liked to recount Suzuki's informal description of his satori: "It is like everyday experience, only about two inches off the ground."
In beginner's mind a person sees the unitary character of reality. "I" and "not-I" are one. Deliberative reason will not succeed here. One cannot THINK oneself into this realization. This is to say, there are two ways of dealing with the world. One is to distinguish, describe, analyze, and, in pursuit of practical ends, manipulate its objects from the outside. This is to deal in concepts and acts that are disjunctive and misleading. The other is to contemplate the world, Nature, much as Taoists do, from the position of one who is indistinguishably at one with it.
This feeling of oneness is the mystical component of Zen, but it is different from the oneness in, for instance, Vedanta, which speaks of the oneness of Brahman and Atman. Dr. Suzuki points out that there is always what may be called a sense of the Beyond to Zen's oneness. The experience is indeed our own, he says, but we feel it to be rooted elsewhere. However, a SENSE of the Beyond is all that can be said about it. "To call this the Beyond, the Absolute, or God, or a Person is to go further than the experience itself and to plunge into a theology or metaphysics," which is not what Zen is about.
posted by Donald L. Simons at
8:27 AM
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