{"id":2810,"date":"2014-12-29T13:44:11","date_gmt":"2014-12-29T19:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/?p=2810"},"modified":"2014-12-29T13:44:11","modified_gmt":"2014-12-29T19:44:11","slug":"radical-vulnerability-the-three-sicknesses-and-two-lights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2014\/12\/radical-vulnerability-the-three-sicknesses-and-two-lights.html","title":{"rendered":"Radical Vulnerability: The Three Sicknesses and Two Lights"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"Moon<\/a>
Moon Garden, Portland, ME, photo by Low Tide<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

In a recent New York Times\u2019 opinion piece, Against Invulnerability<\/a>, Todd May takes a stand against philosophies that advocate that we develop an invulnerable stance in the face of the vicissitudes of this life. \u201cInvulnerabilism,\u201d he writes,\u201drecommends that we secrete a distance between ourselves and the world so that ultimately it cannot touch us.\u201d<\/p>\n

And he includes Buddhism<\/a> as one of these secreting approaches.<\/p>\n

Like most rich religious traditions, Buddhism is a category in which many different teachings and approaches to life are included. So a critic might find grounds to wrap us up with the Stoics, for example, by selectively reading the original teachings of the Buddha.<\/p>\n

The Zen way, though, is emphatically not<\/span> a way of cultivating the delusion of invulnerability \u2013 quite the contrary, the Zen way is about radical vulnerability. Let me cite a couple cases from one old master, Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng,\u00a0<\/span>to make the point.<\/p>\n

Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng was a direct successor of Dongshan Liangjie (Japanese, Tozan Ryokai), a bright light in the Cao-dong\/Soto lineage. Indeed, Dongshan\/Tozan put the \u201cdong\u201d and the \u201cto\u201d in\u00a0Cao-dong and Soto. But little is known of\u00a0Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng, although he appears a few times in the koan literature. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And according to Morten Schlutter in\u00a0How Zen Became Zen<\/em> (p.93), in the oldest records,\u00a0Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng is one of the teachers through whom the later\u00a0Cao-dong\/Soto lineage flowed. But because he was not well known, the 12th Century reconstructionists of the\u00a0Cao-dong\/Soto lineage selected Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng out and the more well-known Yunju in<\/span>. Be that as it may\u2026.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m rather fond of Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng\u00a0<\/span>and his straight-edged way of making the radical-vulnerability point. For example: A monk once asked\u00a0Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng, \u201cHow does one escape the three realms?\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

The three realms are either past, present and future or the spheres of desire, form, and formlessness (click here for more detail<\/a>). To reframe the monk\u2019s question, then, in light of May\u2019s piece, \u201cHow does one escape the world and become invulnerable?\u201d<\/p>\n

Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng said, \u201cCall the temple director and have him chase this monk out of here!\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Apparently,\u00a0Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng was not feeling the monk\u2019s other-worldly question and didn\u2019t even take time to write him a referral. One can only imagine the reception Mr. May might have received from\u00a0Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s another, more complex working of the issue (for a full rendering, see\u00a0Waddell\u2019s\u00a0The Essential Teaching of Zen Master Hakuin<\/em>, p. 19, Ferguson\u2019s\u00a0Zen\u2019s Chinese Heritage,<\/em>\u00a0p. 219, or Cleary\u2019s\u00a0Book of Serenity<\/em>, p. 47):<\/p>\n

Priest\u00a0Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng<\/span>\u00a0addressed his assembly: \u201cThe dharmakaya has three kinds of sickness and two kinds of light. Can any of you clarify that?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The dharmakaya is the truth-body of the buddha, the fundamental, absolute truth, usually grouped with the sambogakya (the bliss-body of the buddha) and the nirmanakaya (the form-body of the buddha). Click here for more detail.<\/a><\/p>\n

Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng says something radical here \u2013 the truth-body of the buddha has three kinds of sicknesses.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

From a standard buddhalogical perspective, you might think that the form-body of the buddha might have sicknesses \u2013 it is a form body, after all, like this body. Or you might think that even the\u00a0form-body of the buddha would be a perfected, not-sick body. In either case, the absolute, beyond duality, dharmakaya, truth body, would be free from sickness and light.<\/p>\n

So Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng utterance is biting in much the same way as the \u201cNo\u201d that Zhaozhou declares the dog\u2019s buddha nature to be.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe dharmakaya (aka, truth body) has three kinds of sickness and two kinds of light.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Wow. Ch\u2019ien-feng makes the world shake and shudder.<\/p>\n

By the way, the three kinds of sicknesses vary by commentary but are along the lines of thinking that there\u2019s something to get from practice, thinking that you\u2019ve got it, and thinking that you\u2019re free of getting and not getting. Or if you prefer beast-of-burden metaphors, then the three sicknesses are searching for a donkey while riding on a donkey; after getting on the donkey, being unwilling to get off; and getting off the donkey and dancing freely. Any position, in other words is a position of sickness.<\/p>\n

The two kinds of light vary even more by commentary. Being a simple person, I like to think of them as the light of samadhi and the light of realization.<\/p>\n

To reiterate, Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng asserts that the highest truth is sickness and light. No invulnerable position is advocated here.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Then Ch\u2019ien-feng asks, \u201cCan any of you clarify that?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Y\u00fcn-men came forward and said, \u201cWhy doesn\u2019t the fellow inside the hermitage know what\u2019s going on outside?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

There is always some blindness. \u201cWhen one side is illumined,\u201d said Dogen, \u201cthe other side is dark.\u201d<\/p>\n

This too is the truth-body buddha.<\/p>\n

Leave it to Y\u00fcn-men to show it so clearly.<\/p>\n

Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng<\/span>\u00a0roared with laughter.<\/em><\/p>\n

Ch<\/span>\u2019ien<\/span>\u2013feng<\/span>\u00a0laughs the laugh of the liberated in this very vulnerable body.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a recent New York Times\u2019 opinion piece, Against Invulnerability, Todd May takes a stand against philosophies that advocate that we develop an invulnerable stance in the face of the vicissitudes of this life. \u201cInvulnerabilism,\u201d he writes,\u201drecommends that we secrete a distance between ourselves and the world so that ultimately it cannot touch us.\u201d And […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nRadical Vulnerability: The Three Sicknesses and Two Lights<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In a recent New York Times' opinion piece, Against Invulnerability, Todd May takes a stand against philosophies that advocate that we develop an\" \/>\n<meta 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