Why Do We
Bow?
Norman Fischer
tricycle
Many people have this question the minute they walk
into the zendo and are told to make full prostrations to the Buddha
image on the altar. They come with an idea that Zen is beyond words
and letters, beyond religion, beyond rules, beyond piety, and so
the idea of such a thorough-going and outrageous display of what
seems like religious fervor seems quite disturbing to
them.
So why do we bow? I had this same question myself in
the beginning of my practice. My teacher at the time took me up to
the altar and let me look closely at the tiny Buddha there. He
pointed out to me that the little Buddha was also bowing. So I was
bowing to the Buddha and the Buddha was bowing to me. “If he can do
it you can do it,” he said. I thought that was fair
enough.
Bowing is just bowing. You do it mindfully, in a
particular way, aware of the body and mind in the doing of it. The
so-called meaning of it is extra. It’s not a symbolic or conceptual
act. It’s just another form of sitting practice. You sit, you walk,
the bell rings, you get up and bow. To just do what you do withfull
attention and without much worry is an important part of the method
in Zen.
And there’s another way of looking at it: We are
bowing to an image which suggests for us. So the bowing is a
training method. We offer our whole body and mind to wisdom or to
compassion, opening ourselves, in the act of the bow, to that
quality letting go of everything else in our life but that quality,
bringing it out, making it big, fashioning it day by day, bow by
bow.
When I bow to the Buddha on the main altar at Green
Gulch, I train my mind deeply, creating a powerful predisposition
in myself toward the development of love and appreciation for the
Buddha nature that is my own nature. When I bow to Tara, I am
training my mind, creating a predisposition in myself toward the
feminine and active in my own nature.
This kind of training is not something most of us
are used to. Our sense of training has largely to do with will or
skill, and this kind of training has to do with warmth and
devotion. Yes, piety. But after all, piety is all right, devotion
is all right. In fact, they are very tender and splendid emotions
if you can cultivate them without getting hysterical about it. It’s
okay to respect Buddha and make offerings to Tara. We can
appreciate Buddha and Tara and all the other figures that we
practice with as “other” when we really appreciate that they aren’t
really other. The more familiar we are with ourselves as we
actually are, the more comfortable we are with Tara and Manjushri
and everyone else. As my first teacher said, the bowing is always
mutual; there is one bow back and forth. Buddha bowing to Buddha,
Tara bowing to Tara.
A long time ago, when I was serving as his
attendant, I noticed that Katagiri Roshi always mumbled something
as he bowed. I asked him what it was but he couldn’t tell me since
it was in Japanese. Later on, I received in the mail a translation
of the bowing verse, which I have used ever since.
“Bower and what is bowed to are empty by nature,” it
goes. “The bodies of one’s self and others are not two/ I bow with
all beings to attain liberation/ To manifest the unsurpassable mind
and return to boundless truth.”