Tying Up Loose Ends

I can't sleep so might as well try and finish up what i started with my last post before i realized i was getting too long winded and cut it off. I suppose i could/should go downstairs and sit for a while instead, but am just too lazy to get out of bed. :-)

What is the one thing that almost every henro does at both the Hondō and the Daishidō of each temple? They recite the Heart Sutra. It's a magnificent document if you take the time to study it (and i'm thinking in terms of years, not hours, days, or weeks).

Without question, the most famous lines in the sutra are "Form is not different from Emptiness. Emptiness is not different from Form. Form is exactly Emptiness. Emptiness is exactly Form." In fact, a lot of people, Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike, can probably quote those lines, but not one other single line from the entire sutra.

Go back and look at the first paragraph of the Zenki chapter of the Shōbōgenzō that i quoted yesterday.

The Great Way of all the Buddhas and the ultimate goal in Buddhism is detachment from life and death and the realization of enlightenment. We must be detached from life in life and death in death, i.e., when we are alive life is total activity; and in death, death is total activity. Life is the experience of life and death is the experience of death. Life and death together are the actual appearance of truth. The ultimate goal is detachment from, that is total immersion in, life and death. Understanding life and death are [the means whereby the Bodhisattva achieves salvation for himself and other].

One of the things i wanted to say last night is that you could easily replace 'life' and 'death' in that paragraph with 'form' and 'emptiness' without losing any significance — and in some ways, gaining a little.

The Great Way of all the Buddhas and the ultimate goal in Buddhism is detachment from form and emptiness and the realization of enlightenment. We must be detached from form in form and emptiness in emptiness, i.e., when we are form form is total activity; and in emptiness, emptiness is total activity. Form is the experience of form and emptiness is the experience of emptiness. Form and emptiness together are the actual appearance of truth. The ultimate goal is detachment from, that is total immersion in, form and emptiness. Understanding form and emptiness are [the means whereby the Bodhisattva achieves salvation for himself and other].

The ultimate goal in Buddhism is detachment from form and emptiness. I believe that to be a given. But, it doesn't say to embrace form over emptiness, or to swing the other way and embrace emptiness over form. Both must be embraced, and both, taken together, are the manifestation of truth. Or, as Dōgen chose to say it, we have to detach ourselves from form and emptiness, although he is saying the same thing.

How do you detach yourself from form? You immerse yourself totally into it; you embrace it completely, until there is no longer an embracer and that which is embraced, there is only form. How do you detach yourself from emptiness? You immerse yourself totally into it; you embrace it completely, until there is no longer an embracer and that which is embraced, there is only emptiness.

It is through the process of completely immersing yourself in both form and emptiness that you detach yourself from them. By becoming first form, then emptiness, then both, you come to the point where there is no longer you and them, but one. Not one, but not two, just is.


Jumping to the second and third paragraph of Zenki we could also say:

... When we actualize enlightenment the full meaning of form and emptiness becomes clear. However, this experience cannot be defined by consciousness or cognition, large or small, limited or unlimited, long or short, near or far.

Our present life is formed by this experience; in the same way, this experience is formed by life. ...

Dōgen doesn't say that our life is formed by how well we sit, or how many hours we do it, but by how well we understand the meaning of form and emptiness. Life and death. All and nothing. Infinity and zero. And our understanding of them is also formed by our life.

Walking on the henro trail all day, day after day, week after week, for several months — under clear skies or in the rain, when you're tired or when you're juiced, when it's hot or when it's freezing cold, when you're with other henro or when you're all alone — is therefore the perfect time to work on embracing form and embracing emptiness. All you have to do is take Dōgen's advice; when you are form, let form be total activity. When you are emptiness, let emptiness be total activity.

The rest will come in due time.