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{"id":333,"date":"2009-05-14T11:20:00","date_gmt":"2009-05-14T11:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2009\/05\/the-self-studying-itself-and-shut-your-mouth-too\/"},"modified":"2013-04-23T12:01:12","modified_gmt":"2013-04-23T18:01:12","slug":"the-self-studying-itself-and-shut-your-mouth-too","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/wildfoxzen\/2009\/05\/the-self-studying-itself-and-shut-your-mouth-too.html","title":{"rendered":"The Self Studying Itself and Shut Your Mouth Too"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a>Above is the crab apple tree in the Yugeji front yard, blooming so fully and briefly just now. With the air filled with aroma, memories come of sitting under the apple trees in my parents\u2019 front yard as a boy with my dog Tippy and of the apple tree that I\u2019d pass walking to the zendo and back when I trained with Katagiri Roshi.<\/p>\n

Are such sweet memories the self? Is there anything that is the self that is constant in time and place and body that sensed those apple trees?<\/p>\n

Gereon Kopf Beyond Personal Identity: Dogen, Nishida, and a Phenomenology of No-Self (only $149.99! at Amazon.com and I can\u2019t find in any local libraries, I assume because of the high demand) has this (take a deep breath, friends, this dude\u2019s been trained to think):<\/p>\n

\u201cDogen uses the term \u2018jiko\u2019 [usually translated \u201cself\u201d] \u2026 to denote a temporary awareness event in the noetic polarity within the existenial ambiguity of the self and other and self and myriad dharmas, which Tamaki renders \u2026 into contemporary Japanese as \u2018environment\u2019 (Jap.: kankyo). \u2026The term \u2018jiko\u2019 implies the self-reflexive nature inherent in self-awareness as the self studying itself in the sense that \u2018I am aware of myself as I.'\u201d<\/p>\n

Phew! Are you still with me? What I get out of this is that \u201cto study the self\u201d implies both the self as environment (\u201cthe radiance of all worlds in the ten directions\u201d>\u201d) and the sense of subjectivity itself (\u201cthe nose inadvertently in the hand of the self ). I\u2019ve sometimes felt lonely in the Zen world for emphasizing this aspect of \u201cto study the self\u201d so it\u2019s neat to see this presented, albiet in a difficult way, in a scholarly work.<\/p>\n

Then on the way to work this morning I listened to an old Katagiri talk called \u201cDon\u2019t Stick Your Nose Into Zen Buddhism<\/a>.\u201d I\u2019ll come back to this material in future posts because there\u2019s a lot of fun stuff here \u2026 but for now just this quote from Roshi to conclude,<\/p>\n

\u201cAccording to my technical term,\u00a0 just shut your mouth and take care of your life.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"