108 Delusions and the Teacher – Student Relationship

Speaking of which, a few years ago I visited Great Vow Monastery in Oregon. I was packing to leave and decided not to carry back on the plane my reading material from the trip out. I went to the office with a magazine rolled up in one hand behind my back.

A nice young man who is now a Great Vow monk sat at the reception desk. With the most Bodhidharma-like intensity I could muster I leaned over the desk and asked,

The young man’s face flushed red and he stammered, “Huh, what … what are you asking?”

I stood up straight and pulled the practitioner’s quarterly, “Buddhadharma,“ out from behind my back. With a matter-of-fact tone I responded, “Do you want this magazine – I’ve already read it.”

He quickly grabbed it and fled.

I wondered about that Great Vow monk today after I retrieved the current issue of “Buddhadharma” from the mailbox. Inside, I flipped open the cover and saw the Wisdom Publications ad for a certain wild fox scoundrel’s book, Keep Me in Your Heart A While: The Haunting Zen of Dainin Katagiri.

James Ford, the steadfast Monkey Mind blogger, wonderful human being, and Zen teacher with Boundless Way is quoted in the ad thusly:

“This is a lovely, lovely book that can be read fruitfully by both beginners and those who are deeply familiar with the Zen way. [Fore mentioned scoundrel] writes with simplicity and clarity; he is a worthy heir to his teacher.”

“Worthy heir?” – wow. I hope so … but that’s another story.

Today though, in the spirit of the sweet delusion after delusion Buddhadharma, I want to address Harry’s question from the comments to my last post.

Harry writes, “Where religion is concerned I can’t help feeling I have a certain responsibility in this troubled world not to blindly follow: so I’m really not inclined to sit and contemplate anything other than what it is demonstrated to be a valid thing to contemplate. To be honest I personally find a lot of Zen to be pretty bullshitty. Now, contemplating an inclination towards cynicism may well be valid!”

Harry had first wondered about finding a modern way of conceptualizing Zen – rather than the old stories. We could slip into the false dichotomy of traditionalist vs. modernist (or interpretationist). However, those are two foci that we’re all working. What to include from past generations and what to bring in from the modern world? It is an important, ongoing conversation within any living teacher and between any living student and his/her teacher.

For me, the essential forms of sitting, clothing, inquiry and liturgy are essential. In my view, great intelligence and love springs forth from those simple forms. It is almost as if great intelligence and love were hidden there by our predecessors, such that it could be discovered by fearless spelunkers.

I agree with Harry that a lot of Zen is bullshit and that it is foolhardy to simply follow blindly (see the movie “Religulous” for more on that!). On the other hand, I have faith (tempered by 30-some years of practice) that the core message of the Buddhas and ancestors isn’t bullshit.

But how can we cull the core from the bullshit? Especially when we begin practice (like the first 20 years), frankly, we just don’t know. We just have our opinions and our intuition – both of which are unreliable. A lot of that which I strongly resisted, I now find to be essential. A little of that which I resisted was I actually right about.

Just a couple more points on this for now. Harry wants only to contemplate that which can first be seen as valid to contemplate before contemplating. He’s not alone – as Katagiri Roshi often pointed out, Westerns tend to want to know before doing. But it is impossible for anything deep and strong to come that way. It is through and within doing that the Way is confirmed – or gone beyond.

So Zuigan Roshi told Morinaga Roshi at their first meeting as recounted in Novice to Master: An Ongoing Lesson in the Extent of My Own Stupidity. Click the above for the selection in Google Books.

There is also no such thing as practice that isn’t repeatedly tested, generation after generation – within the context of the teacher-student relationship. Morinaga also writes (on p. 57 – not included in Google Books so please buy it!), “… it is said that disciples fall into three categories, based upon their relations with their teacher: ‘The best students are attached by hatred, the mediocre by charity, and the worst by authority.'”

The best students are attached to their teacher by hatred because they won’t give up discovering the truth for themselves.