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Teaching You Zazen 4: Don't Be Bewitched by Deviants and Unfinished Teachers

2007/8/17 8:59:11

Last night's Teaching You to Trade Stocks 71 was a re-clarification of existing concepts—so-called "snow in a silver bowl," indistinguishable without discernment. And zazen requires even more discernment. The first thing to discern is the so-called "famous teachers."

From what this ID has observed, among the so-called famous teachers of the modern and contemporary era, you'd have a hard time finding even one with right vision among ten thousand—basically all of them are the blind leading the blind. Here are some of the most basic criteria for evaluating a teacher:

  1. Anyone who hustles for wealth, fame, or the like is absolutely not a true teacher. The great masters of old, after awakening, carried rice and firewood for the community—that is the true exemplary style. How could the rats of today even comprehend that?

  2. The Bodhisattva lowers his brow, but never abandons the wrathful Vajra gaze. Those who passively withdraw from the world, muddling right and wrong—they are all rats. Slaying all the injustice in the world is the true liberation. Spineless cowards, fence-sitters, those who cower from power and flee the world—none of them are truly awakened.

  3. All the upright and deviant games of the world, all the knowledge across schools high and low—one should be well-versed in every one of them. This is the true practice of a Bodhisattva.

  4. Don't try to "cease delusional thoughts" or "purify the mind." The true mind is inherently pure—why labor to purify it? The entire world is one great delusional thought. Playing little thought-games in a ghost cave won't "cease" anything.

  5. As for those who mistake the four dhyānas and eight samādhis for Zen, tossing around a few dead Buddhist terms and hustling everywhere—they don't even qualify as the lion's parasites.

  6. Seeking dharma outside the mind—playing the materialist ghost trick—is nothing but self-deception. Seeking dharma inside the mind—juggling various mentalist poses—is nothing but masturbation in the ghost cave of consciousness. Mind: neither inside nor outside, neither matter nor consciousness, not the present moment yet never apart from the present moment. How can it be sought? Not seeking it, nothing is lost; seeking it, nothing is gained. Running around in confusion—what are you doing?

The above are just a few points written casually. When there's time later, this ID will take representative statements from so-called famous teachers, analyze them, and point out their absurdities and errors. Without reaching that realm, one cannot understand the matter—this ID is precisely going to point out where the path goes astray.

As for the "thought" mentioned in the third installment—the qi delivery from below the diaphragm is not the qi of breathing. There is no principle in the world that breathing qi exists below the diaphragm. It is nothing more than a thought-intention. As long as this thought-intention exists, whether qi actually streams up from below the diaphragm is utterly irrelevant.

Treating everything above the diaphragm as an air nozzle, the body faculty activating and illness-roots activating along with it—these are real, substantive matters, not metaphors, and certainly not "side effects." If you don't activate the dormant illness-roots, you're just waiting for them to become real illnesses that take your life—now that's what you'd call not having side effects? The delusion of ordinary people is truly remarkable. As for real illness that occurs—do whatever needs to be done. None of it is a big deal.

Note: holding this thought-intention is not about thinking about it in your brain and having it disappear when you forget. This thought-intention doesn't leave you even when you're asleep. This thought is like water: when you sleep, the waves on the water subside; when you're awake, the waves on the water rise. But the water is still water, and this single thought is still this single thought—coming from nowhere, going nowhere. You fundamentally don't need to guard it, nor fear losing it.

Gradually, your natural breathing, the flickering of thoughts in your brain, the qi-meridian activities in your body—all will become clear one by one. But all of these are merely waves subsiding and waves rising on the water. The so-called Grand Celestial Circuit, Minor Celestial Circuit—all are nothing but waves subsiding and waves rising.

Going further, all phenomena of this world, this world itself, time and space—are all nothing but waves subsiding and waves rising. Note: this is not imagination, but what you perceive with the most lucid clarity. The waves subsiding and waves rising of the world are just as lucid as those of your body, breathing, and flickering thoughts.