Just found an article.
Zen Master Sheng Yen speaks here of four general stages of
experience/view -- from the scattered mind to a concentrated mind,
from the concentrated mind to the One Mind (an all-reflecting
mirror) also called by Master Sheng Yen as the 'Unified State' (as
Thusness commented in his 'Stage 5' that at Stage 4, the
practitioner sees that subject/Mind and object is an inseparable
union, but it is not yet the no-subject/no-mind/no-mirror
experience), and then later progress from the One Mind to the
No-Mind (no-mirror) experience. The latter two stages are also
described and commentated according to our moderator Thusness's
experiences in the Thusness's Seven Stages of Experience,
especially Thusness's Stage 4 and 5.
http://www.chan1.org/ddp/channews/02-1986.html
Four Views of Ch'an
(Lecture given by Master Sheng-Yen at the Great Taoist Center in
Washington, D.C., November 22, 1985)
Let me begin with a koan. In the T'ang dynasty there was a Ch'an
patriarch named Yao-shan Wei-yen. A disciple once asked him,
"Before Bodhidharma came to China, was there Ch'an in China?" The
Master replied, "Ch'an originally existed in China." "In that
case," the disciple continued, "Why did Bodhidharma come to China?"
The Master said, "It is precisely because there was Ch'an in China
that Bodhidharma came to China."
So you see I've come to Washington today because there is Ch'an in
Washington. I've come here because all of you know about Ch'an.
Those of you who know something about Ch'an, please raise your
hands... Those of you who didn't raise your hands probably know
more than those who did!
Tonight I will talk about Ch'an from four points of view. These
topics should help you to raise some questions about Ch'an: the
theory of Ch'an, the experience of Ch'an, the goal of Ch'an, and
the training and practice of Ch'an.
1. There is really no theory in Ch'an. If we theorize about Ch'an
-- that is not Ch'an. Ch'an cannot be understood by any logical
reasoning. It can't be explained in words. Nevertheless, I will use
some theoretical description in my talk.
There are two basic concepts associated with Ch'an. One is causes
and conditions. The other is emptiness. These two concepts are
linked; they cannot be separated. When we talk about causes and
conditions and emptiness, we are really talking about the nature of
existence, which is temporary and impermanent. All phenomena arise
because of the coming together of the proper causes and conditions.
All phenomena perish because of change in the causes and
conditions.
Chinese Taoism and Confucianism use a text called the "I Ching."
"I" means change. This is continual, constant change. It is called
"arising." Constant arising means that causes and conditions change
continually -- all phenomena are ever-changing. Ordinary sentient
beings see things as arising and perishing. In the "I Ching" there
is no perishing, only constant arising. Seeing something disappear,
you miss seeing something else arise.
In the Buddhist view, when causes and conditions change, phenomena
arise. But because this arising is rooted in temporary, constantly
changing causes and conditions, the phenomena which arise can be
nothing more than temporary themselves. Because they only have
temporary existence, they are said to have no real existence. Hence
these phenomena are called empty. Emptiness only means that there
is no unchanging eternal existence; it doesn't mean that nothing
exists at all.
All phenomena and existence can arise only because they are empty.
It is because they are empty that there is nothing permanent or
unchanging about them. If things never changed, there would be no
arising. If nothing changed in our present configuration, it would
mean that this lecture would go on indefinitely. But when this talk
ends, the configuration changes. If everything were unchanging and
solid, if there were no emptiness, then this lecture would go on
forever. It is because of the present situation -- this particular
configuration of constantly changing causes and conditions -- that
we are all gathered in this room.
Therefore when we ask about Ch'an, we find that Ch'an is just a
word, a bit of terminology. Very few people can say what it is. For
over a thousand years masters and disciples in the Ch'an tradition
have been asking questions such as, "What was it that Bodhidharma
brought to China?" Many people have sought the answers to these
questions. The masters never gave direct answers. Some simply
ignored the questions. If they didn't ignore the question, they
only would give very simple answers.
A T'ang dynasty master, Chao-chou once had a disciple who asked
him, "Master, what are we really learning here?" Chao-chou said,
"All. right, you can now go and have a cup of tea." Another
disciple came and said that he had had a certain experience the day
before, and he wanted to know it his experience was really Ch'an.
Chao-chou said, "All right, you can have a cup of tea now." A third
disciple was quite puzzled after he heard this exchange. He asked,
"Master, you had two disciples ask you entirely different
questions, and you simply told them to have a cup of tea. What did
you mean by this?" The Master replied, "You can also have a cup of
tea."
There is another story along the same lines involving Chao-chou.
Two disciples were arguing. One said, "The Master said that men
have Buddha nature, but dogs and cats don't." The other disciple
said, "That's impossible, the Master could not have said anything
like that." They both went to see Chao-chou. One said, "Master, you
couldn't possibly have said anything like that." And the Master
said, "You're right." But the other disciple said, "I'm positive
that is what you said." And the Master said, "You re right." A
third person, an attendant said, "But Master, only one of them can
be right." And the Master said, "You're right."
These stories sound like meaningless exchanges, like nonsense, but
the underlying implication is that existence or non-existence, or
ideas of right or wrong, are things which only live in your own
mind, your personal experience, your knowledge. These things can't
be Ch'an.
2. The experience of Ch'an must be personal and direct. It cannot
come from education or be arrived at by logical reasoning. In a
retreat I will often try to help a student get an experience of
Ch'an by telling him to bring himself to the state that existed
before he was born. After birth, we begin to acquire experience,
and we are trying to look beyond what we have learned.
Before your life began, who were you? What was your name? How would
you answer these questions? There is a story of a Ch'an Master who
told his disciple to wash charcoal until it was clean. The disciple
complained that it was simply impossible. A somewhat dimwitted
disciple took the charcoal and began to wash it. He didn't have a
thought in his mind other than that his Master had told him to wash
the charcoal. So he simply washed the charcoal. One day he asked
the Master why the charcoal was still not white. The Master said,
"Isn't it already white?" The disciple took another look at it and
said, "Indeed it is white; it has always been white." When most of
us look at charcoal, we see black, but the Master and disciple saw
it as white.
In Ch'an we say that training and practice will make our
discriminations disappear. These thoughts and feelings of liking or
disliking come from our experience. If you can go back to the state
before you were born, then you arrive at the point where
discriminations do not exist. It no longer matters whether
something is black or white. What is important is that your mind is
free from discrimination and conceptualization.
In China between the fourth and sixth centuries, there was a period
called the Northern and Southern Dynasties. At that time a famous
Taoist, T'ao Hung-ching lived in the mountains. He was a well-known
scholar, and the emperor had great respect for him, and wanted him
to serve as his minister. But T'ao declined. The emperor asked him
what it was in the mountains that attracted him so much that he
preferred his hermitage to the glories of the court. T'ao wrote an
answer to the emperor in the a four-line poem:
You ask me what I find in the mountains,
I say: white clouds are in the mountains,
This I alone can enjoy,
It is not something I can offer you.
The emperor read the poem and realized there was something that
made no sense: white clouds can be seen anywhere, not just in the
mountains. But the point is that the white clouds that T'ao
Hung-ching saw were quite different from the ones the emperor could
see. This is experience. A practitioner's experience of the Tao is
quite different from that of a non-practitioner.
There was a famous monk, Han Shan, who was often asked, "What do
you have?" He would say that he had everything: "The white clouds
in the sky serve as my blanket, the earth is my bed, the mountains,
my pillow. And the four seas are not big enough for a bath or a
somersault."
That was his experience: oneness with nature. There was no
separation between him and the world. But most people thought that
he had nothing. His shoes were made from the bark of a tree; his
pants, from the leaves of a tree.
It's only after you've put down everything that you've acquired
since the time you were born, that a Ch'an experience can manifest.
When I teach my students how to practice Ch'an, I tell them to
first separate their thoughts into three categories: the past, the
present, and the future. Then I tell them to discard the thoughts
of the past, then the thoughts of the future. Only thoughts of the
present moment are left. The next step is to let go of the present
moment, because there is no such thing as the present moment. It is
only a bridge between the past and the future. When you let go of
the present moment, the Ch'an experience can manifest, but only at
the most elementary level.
One question that might occur to you is: we have to discard our
experiences until we reach the state we were in before we were
born, so does this mean that a new born baby is closest to Ch'an?
No, a new born baby does not know about Ch'an because a baby's
mental faculties are hardly developed, and he is not in control of
them. The control of mental functioning is necessary. When you have
this control, then you can let go of knowledge and reasoning. Then
there is a possibility that the Ch'an experience can
manifest.
If you knock someone into unconsciousness, is this like Ch'an? This
is nonsense. If you know nothing of the past or future, and your
mind is a blank, that is also not Ch'an. A mind that is blank in
this way is a very tired mind. Only a very clear, alert mind can
experience Ch'an.
I can only describe the experience of Ch'an by using an analogy.
Consider the surface of water and consider a mirror. The surface of
water will move at the slightest touch, but a mirror is unmoving. A
mirror can be obscured by dust, but remove the dust and it will
reflect clearly. If water is agitated, it will not be able to
reflect an image, only a distortion of the image. The movement in
water is like the movement in our minds. Our minds move because of
the knowledge we have and the experience we have acquired. Because
of these things, we are constantly making judgments. Just as moving
water cannot reflect well, so a moving mind cannot see clearly --
what we see or think we see is not real.
For example, there are about fifty people in the audience. You all
have different backgrounds, different experiences, and different
levels of education. Because of these differences, each of you will
hear the same thing a little differently. Each of you judges this
lecture in your own way. It may be one lecture, but it could also
be fifty different lectures. That is not Ch'an. If it were, when
one person spoke, it would be as if there were one person
listening. And if that were the case, there would be no need for me
to speak, because you would know what I was going to say before I
said it.
This is illustrated by a story from the early days of the Ch'an
sect. The emperor at the time asked a certain Ch'an Master to give
a discourse. To make ready for the occasion, the emperor commanded
his workmen to build an elaborate platform from which the Master
would speak. When the time arrived, the Master mounted the
platform, sat down, and then quickly left. The emperor was quite
surprised. The Master said, "I've said everything I wanted to
Say."
The unspoken Dharma and only the unspoken Dharma is the highest
Dharma. Whatever can be said or described is not the real Dharma.
Chan Masters have been talking about this for many, many
years.
When we speak about reflection in water and in a mirror, note that
a mirror that is perfectly clean will reflect better than water
that is stable and unmoving. However, the Sixth Patriarch was
opposed to using the analogy of the mirror. He pointed out that if
there were a mirror, there would be a mind, and this would not be
Ch'an. Nonetheless, we will use the mirror to a make a point.
Later, we will throw out the mirror.
What is reflected by a mirror is outside the mirror. If a person is
in a mirror-like state, everything that is reflected is on the
outside. For such a person, there is no self involved. What he sees
and feels is only the existence of phenomena -- when there is no
self, there is no experience of discrimination, of liking or
disliking.
This is not the ultimate state, because if you have nothing but
awareness of the environment and there is no self apparent, there
must still be a self to be aware of the environment. Someone who is
in this state is certainly in a unified state, because there seems
to be no self and only the environment seems to exist. This is
called the state of "one mind," but still it is not Ch'an. There
must be "no mind' if it is to be Ch'an.
A true Ch'an state should not be compared to an all-reflecting
mirror. All things exists without the mirror. In this state
everything is seen very clearly, but there is no concept of outside
or inside, existing or not existing, having or not having.
3. What is the good of this kind of experience? This leads us to
the third section, the goal of Ch'an practice. There are so many
benefits to Ch'an practice -- for myself and many more for others.
These benefits can be seen on three levels: First, there is
physical benefit, then mental balance and good mental health, and
last, the potential to become enlightened -- the spiritual
benefit.
By helping a practitioner attain a more stable mind, Ch'an practice
can improve mental health. And the reason for an unhealthy body is
really psychological imbalance. Ch'an practice can strengthen
mental power and capacity. Even with physical sickness, a
practitioner will have a positive attitude and will not be hindered
from doing what he needs to do. Good mental health is a fundamental
aim of the practice, but in the beginning stages, physical strength
is acquired through physical sitting. Practicing in this way helps
maintain and focus the flow of energy known as "ch'i." Taoism and
Yoga share this aspect of practice.
The highest benefit of practice is enlightenment, the genuine Ch'an
experience. What good is this? I can only say this: before
enlightenment, there are things that one needs and there are things
that one would rather do without, there are things that are liked
and things that are disliked. After enlightenment, there is no such
thing as that which I need or don't need, what I like or don't
like. Do you understand? That's why I said that all of you already
know Ch'an. You see, before we are enlightened, we have many
vexations, and there are many things that we have to do; there are
many things that we don't want to do. We may seek and attain
enlightenment, but once we have experienced it, there is no longer
any such thing as enlightenment. At this point there is nothing
that we have to do; there's nothing that we don't have to do.
Lin-chi Yi-hsuan, a famous Ch'an Master, was studying with his
Master when he got enlightened, but his Master was not immediately
aware of Lin-chi's enlightenment. One day the Master was making his
rounds and checking to see that all of his students were practicing
hard. He came upon Lin-chi lying on his mat, fast asleep. The
Master woke him with his staff, and asked, "How can you be so lazy,
when everyone around you is practicing diligently?" Lin-chi just
looked up at his Master, picked up his blanket and cushion, and
went to lie down in another place.
The Master watched Lin-chi move, and asked, "What are you doing
now?" Lin-chi Yi-hsuan answered, "What else is there for me to do?"
When the Master heard this, he walked over to a disciple who was
practicing particularly hard. He took his staff, gave him several
stiff blows, and said, "There's someone over there who's practicing
very hard, what are you doing here, sleeping like this?" The
Master's eldest disciple said to himself, "This old Master has
really gone crazy." From that point on Lin-chi didn't remain
sleeping -- he traveled spreading the Dharma. The lineage that
evolved from him is called the Lin Chi sect; in Japanese it is
known as the Rinzai sect.
The story of Lin-chi shows that after enlightenment, there is
nothing, no practice or striving, that is needed for oneself. There
are only other sentient beings to work for and to help.
4. The training and practice of Ch'an can be divided into three
levels. First, to move from a scattered to a concentrated mind.
Second, to move from a concentrated mind to one-mind. Finally, to
let go of even one-mind, and reach no-mind.
The scattered mind is easy to see. We can all be aware of this
state where thoughts come and go in a haphazard manner. Let's try
an experiment. Everyone raise your index finger and look at it.
Just look, and have no thoughts. Do this in a relaxed manner.
We did that for thirty seconds. Were you able to do it with no
thoughts? If you couldn't do it, you had a scattered mind. When we
do things with a scattered mind, we are not using our fullest
capacity.
A Ch'an Master once told his disciples: Chan practice is very easy.
When you eat, just eat; when you sleep, just sleep; when you walk,
just walk." One disciple said, "I know how to eat, sleep, and walk.
Everybody knows that, so is everybody practicing Ch'an?" The Master
said, "That's not true: when you eat, your mind is not on eating;
when you sleep your mind is either filled with dreams or lost in a
muddled state of blankness; when you walk, you're just
daydreaming."
Once in our Center in New York, we hired a carpenter to do some
work for us. He was nailing a nail into a wall, when he looked out
the window, and saw a pretty woman passing by. He hit his finger,
and twisted the nail. He had to start all over again. What was he
doing with his mind? It certainly wasn't on his work. Most of us
function like this. We must use special methods to bring our
scattered minds into a concentrated state. Do as the Master said:
when you eat, eat; when you sleep; sleep; when you walk, walk. When
you practice, keep your mind in a concentrated state. Then if you
hear a sound, visualize or feel something -- whatever you do, you
will be doing just that and nothing else. This is a concentrated
mind.
When you expand this state further, you will eventually get to the
point where the separation between self and environment disappears
-- there is no distinction between you and the world. If you are
repeating a mantra, then you and the mantra become one. There are
many levels to this state. At the elementary level you and your
method of practice become one. A deeper state is when you feel that
whatever your senses encounter, what you see and hear, is the same
as yourself. At this point there is no distinction between what you
see and what you hear. The sense organs no longer have separate
functions. This is an intermediate level. Deeper still is the state
where you sense an unlimited universe within yourself. Still this
is not the experience of Ch 'an.
From here we must use the methods of Ch'an -- the gung-an (koan)
and the hua-t'ou -- to break apart the state of one-mind. In this
way we can reach enlightenment, we can reach Ch'an.