Dogen Zen Belfast

Master Dogen is concluding his discussion of 'not doing wrong, doing right' by looking at this koan... Kyo-i asks, “What is the Great Intention of the Buddha-Dharma?” Dorin says, “Not to commit wrongs. To practice the many kinds of right.” Kyo-i says, “If it is so, even a child of three can express it!” Dorin says, “A child of three can speak the truth, but an old man of eighty cannot practice it.” Thus informed, Kyo-i makes at once a prostration of thanks, and then leaves. His commentary begins: Kyo-i, though descended from Haku Shogun, is truly a wizard of the verse who is rare through the ages. People call him one of the twenty-four [great] men of letters. He bears the name of Manjushri or bears the name of Maitreya. Nowhere do his poetical sentiments go unheard and no-one could fail to pay homage to his authority in the literary world.  Master Dogen praises Kyo-i for his great reputation and his talent in writing, but he's going to open a can of whip-ass on him for his ...

In his talk about 'not committing wrongs' Master Dogen has explored the practical point that when we don't do wrong then the 'many kinds of right' are already happening - the fundamentally positive Buddhist view that we can practice zazen and align ourselves with the good and balanced 'not committing' nature of our existence. He draws the chapter to a close on a further practical note with discussion of this koan case, but as we might expect by now he looks at it from non-obvious viewpoints... Haku Kyo-i of Tang China is a lay disciple of Zen Master Bukko Nyoman, and a second-generation disciple of Zen Master Kozei Daijaku. When he was the governor of Hangzhou district he practiced in the order of Zen Master Choka Dorin. In the story, Kyo-i asks, “What is the Great Intention of the Buddha-Dharma?” Dorin says, “Not to commit wrongs. To practice the many kinds of right.” Kyo-i says, “If it is so, even a child of three can express it!” Dorin says, “A child of t...

Master Dogen continues his talk on doing good/ not committing wrongs with quite an important point... If we do not learn how buddhas should be, even if we seem to be fruitlessly enduring hardship, we are only ordinary beings accepting suffering; we are not practicing the Buddha’s truth. Buddhism has sometimes been misinterpreted intellectually as a passive, even a nihilistic, philosophy, or as a private 'spiritual' experience that happens outside of society. But Master Dogen indicates that it's not about just passively accepting suffering or special states of bliss in mountain top caves... Not committing and good doing are donkey business not having gone away and horse business coming in. 'Donkey and horse business' is an expression from a Zen koan meaning the ongoing reality of everyday things, from a time when donkeys and horses were the main mode of transporting goods and people. Things tend to have an order, and we contribute to that every day in the world in ...

Master Dogen continues his discussion of 'doing good' emphasising that 'good', in the Buddhist sense, is something much more direct and fundamental than ideas or theories of doing good... Doing right is good doing, but it is not something that can be fathomed intellectually. Good doing in the present is a vigorous eye, but it is beyond intellectual consideration. Master Dogen uses the term 'a vigorous eye' to represent the view we gain in practice, in 'dropping off body and mind', or our life experienced without it being chopped up by our thinking 'good' and 'bad', 'this' and 'that', 'me' and 'other' etc. All our actions are fundamentally like this, they aren't abstract thoughts or feelings. [Vigorous eyes] are not realized for the purpose of considering the Dharma intellectually. Consideration by vigorous eyes is never the same as consideration by other things.  Learning in zazen is therefore different...

Master Dogen goes on to discuss the nature of 'doing good', but by 'good' he means something much more fundamental and immediate and direct than theories of morality or ethics alone...  The many kinds of right do not arise from causes and conditions and they do not vanish due to causes and conditions. The many kinds of right happening now, that make up our whole existence now, are of a totally spontaneous nature. Our whole existence fundamentally happens instantaneously from moment to moment regardless of what causes and conditions are present. The many kinds of right are real dharmas, but real dharmas are not many kinds of right.  In our experience though, actions are real and have real consequences that may be right or otherwise, but ultimately our actions are beyond 'right' and 'wrong' ideation as they are real things that happen instantaneously outside the sphere of our personal or societal thoughts and values. This seems like a contradiction, but it...

Master Dogen looks at committing wrongs from two important viewpoints: the view of our ideas and values, and the view devoid of those values - idealism and materialism, as Nishijima Roshi discussed it:  Those who recognize that wrongs arise from causes and conditions, but do not see that these causes and conditions and they themselves are [the reality of] 'not committing', are pitiful people. Just looking at it from the point of view of our self, our own ideas and values, is not the Buddhist view of ethical conduct. We have to drop our views and feelings about things, our 'self' as we might generally understand it. The seeds of buddhahood arise from conditions and, this being so, conditions arise from the seeds of buddhahood. As mentioned previously, Master Dogen observes that buddhahood is not beyond the area or influence of cause and effect however, as some people held it to be. A buddha can still commit wrongs, and our Buddhist practice has effects. It is not that wr...