Dogen Zenji was the 13th century founder of Soto Zen in Japan, and we trace our practice here back through Dogen. When he returned to Japan after practicing in China, he wrote the "Fukanzazengi." This two page text was Dogen’s main meditation manual, which he continued working on for about twenty-six years until near the end of his life. Dogen was a major figure in Japanese Zen who considered zazen or Zen meditation the most essential, fundamental and important practice of Buddhism. Given how much of his written teaching exists today, I think it is interesting how little he wrote specifically about the practice of zazen, at least in the ways we are used to hearing practice described. Dogen is not known for using language to try to describe the experience of non-duality or how to arrive at it. Instead, the way he used language itself approached being a non-dual expression, as much as any language can. The word "zazengi" refers to a short, easily memorized text that is devoted to the method and importance of zazen. It is a kind of how-to-do-it manual, and Dogen wrote three of these, "Zazengi," "Zazenshin" and the "Fukanzazengi" which are translated in the book Beyond Thinking.

In my last talk, I began looking at the "Fukanzazengi" and I would like to continue today. The first section begins, "The Way is basically perfect and all-pervading." And it ends, "It is never apart from one right where one is. What is the use of going off here and there to practice?" This leads into, "And yet, if there is the slightest discrepancy, the Way is as distant as heaven from earth. If the least like or dislike arises, the Mind [or Original Mind] is lost in confusion."

The word "Way" is Tao in Chinese, and it can mean both the path or method of practice as well as the unconditioned or enlightenment. Tao is used in Chinese for the Sanskrit word marga which means the Buddhist Path, including the eight-fold path. Dogen copied part of an earlier text, the "Hsin Hsin Ming," when he wrote: "And yet, if there is the slightest discrepancy, the Way is as distant as heaven from earth. If the least like or dislike arises, the Mind is lost in confusion."

The "Hsin Hsin Ming" is a poem by the Chinese Ancestor Seng-ts’an, or Kanshi Sosan, who lived in 6th century China when Zen or Ch’an was beginning to emerge as a separate tradition. The "Hsin Hsin Ming" or "Trust in Mind" is one of the most beloved texts in Chinese Zen, and a prominent theme in it is that Buddha mind, or Original Mind, exists within our ordinary activity, right where we are.

The "Hsin Hsin Ming" begins, "The Great Way is not difficult, for those who have no preferences. When freed from grasping and aversion, it reveals itself clearly and undisguised. A hair’s breadth difference, and heaven and earth are set apart. If you want it to appear, have no opinions for or against. The duality of like and dislike is the dis-ease of the mind." Similarly, Dogen taught that since we are inherently enlightened, we are never apart from Enlightened Mind or Original Mind; however, whenever discriminating consciousness is engaged – in thinking, ideas, wanting or anything else – Original Mind is obscured; and the oneness of mind splits into subject and object, and the gap of this separation might as well be as distant as heaven is from earth. Non-duality has no degrees; experience is either dual or non-dual.

The "Fukanzazengi" continues, "Suppose one gains pride of understanding and inflates one’s own enlightenment, glimpsing the wisdom that runs through all things, attaining the Way and clarifying the Mind, raising an aspiration to escalade the very sky. One is making the initial, partial excursions about the frontiers but is still somewhat deficient in the vital Way of total emancipation." Being proud of realization is different from the experience of realization – pride is extra, something that occurs after the realization is over and we’re thinking about it.

Dogen levels these experiences of glimpsing the wisdom that runs through all things, attaining the Way and clarifying the Mind, and raising an aspiration to escalade the very sky. He describes them all as initial and partial experiences that are somewhat deficient in the vital Way of total emancipation. For Dogen, they are worthwhile, but we shouldn’t stop there. His emphasis is on continuous practice. In another text, "Bendowa", he wrote, "Although this inconceivable dharma, that has been transmitted by all Buddhas, is abundantly inherent in each person, it is not actualized without practice, and it is not experienced without realization." For total emancipation, experiencing realization once is not enough, practice/realization must be a way of life.

The "Fukanzazengi," continues, "Need I mention the Buddha, who was possessed of inborn knowledge? – the influence of his six years of upright sitting is noticeable still." This refers to the historical Buddha’s six years of practice before his enlightenment. In the Zen version of Buddha’s enlightenment, before he was enlightened, he practiced zazen for six years after his six years of ascetic practices and practicing trance meditation. Whereas in other legends, once he stopped doing ascetic practices, he sat in upright meditation one night and was enlightened the next morning.

"Need I mention the Buddha.... Or Bodhidharma’s transmission of the mind-seal? – the fame of his nine years of wall-sitting is celebrated to this day. Since this was the case with the saints of old, how can we today dispense with negotiation of the Way?" Bodhidharma was a monk in India who traveled to China and is attributed with having established Zen. This refers to the story of Bodhidharma meeting Emperor Wu who was known for supporting the development of Buddhism in China by building temples, having sutras copied into Chinese, and for making donations to feed and clothe monks. When Emperor Wu couldn’t understand the non-dual perspective of Bodhidharma’s teaching, Bodhidharma left the court and went to a cave and sat in meditation, facing the wall for nine years. "Facing the wall" in meditation is sometimes referred to as "wall gazing."

Next, "You should cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate your self." Rather than seeking outside ourselves by reading sutras or trying to understand practice through speculation or reason, Dogen taught that we should practice with our own mind directly and intimately by turning our attention away from the objects of our senses and returning it to the source of awareness. Letting go of thinking and distractions, preoccupations, and other contents of mind allows awareness to come to rest on itself.

By turning the light of awareness around, we direct our attention inward to the source of consciousness, reversing the usual process of going outward to external objects or engaging in thinking. When we talk about "turning the light around," it may sound dualistic, or like an exercise like steering our attention the way we steer a car, but I don’t think that’s what is meant. Tom Cleary talks about this practice as using awareness itself as the object of consciousness which, because it cannot be grasped as an object, becomes the practice of engaging in an objectless focus.

When this happens, our awareness is non-dual since there is nothing outside the awareness – we are the awareness. Awareness is both aware of itself, and aware of the surroundings, not as an object, but as a wholeness. Dogen compared our thoughts to wild birds flying about and our emotions to wild monkeys racing around. He said, "If you once make these birds and monkeys reverse their course and reflect back, you will naturally become unified."

"Turning the light around" was practiced in Chinese Zen and Taoism long before Dogen’s time. Some examples: Kyogen, who asked his teacher Kuei-shan, "Where is the abiding place of the Real Buddha?" Kuei-shan replied, "Imagine the wonder of no thought, and trace it back to the infinity of light." When Kyogen became a teacher, one day he entered the hall and addressed his monks, "The Way is attained by means of enlightenment and is not found in words. It is mysterious and majestic, and without the slightest gap. Don’t belabor your mind! Just turn the light inward. Those disciples using total effort every day to realize enlightenment are just backward and confused." This criticism of "using total effort everyday to realize enlightenment" may sound strange, but I would guess that Kyogen is referring to a grasping, goal-oriented practice that is trying to gain something called "enlightenment."

Kyogen’s dharma brother, Kyozan who also studied with Kuei-shan, asked, "What is the true abode of Buddha?" Kuei-shan answered, "Using the subtlety of thinking without thought, return to the inexhaustible numinous light. When thinking comes to an end, return to the source, where true nature is revealed as eternally abiding, where affairs (conventional reality) and principle (Ultimate Truth), are non-dual."

So, "Using the subtlety of consciousness without thinking, return to the inexhaustible numinous light." Consciousness without thought is mind settled on itself, in its original state before it splits into thinker and thoughts. This shifts awareness from the active thinking process that carries us away, and returns awareness to the origin of thought – being present with preverbal awareness, residing in awareness itself. Talking about this is much different from doing it. We can’t decide, "OK, now I’m going to pay attention and steer my awareness inward." We can intend it, but we cannot will it, which is why ongoing practice is so important.

The last story I want to talk about today takes place when Kyozan was a teacher.

One day he asked a monk, "Where do you come from?"
The monk said, "From Yun province
Kyozan asked, "Do you think of that place?"
The monk replied, "I think of it often."
Kyozan said, "That which thinks is mind, that which is thought of is the environment. In the environment are various things – mountains, rivers, earth, buildings, houses, people, animals. Bring awareness back to the mind which creates thought – are there so many things in there?"
The monk said, "When I get there, I do not see anything existing at all."
Kyozan said, This is right for the stage of faith, but not yet for the stage of person."

The stage of faith refers to disentangling from objects of mind in meditation while still maintaining awareness. Once we are no longer thinking, the tendency is to zone out or fall asleep. I think letting go of objects of mind while staying awake and present, with bare bones consciousness, is like walking on a tight rope, trying not to tip and fall into thinking on one side or fall into sleeping on the other. Being aware without thinking is referred to as taming the mind. The word "faith" is used to mean trust or confidence – confidence in our own Buddha Nature, confidence that since our very own mind is inherently enlightened that our own experience is enough for practice. Searching outside ourselves for enlightenment or realization is indicative of a lack of trust in Buddha Nature.

Tom Cleary considers the practice of ‘turning the light around and looking back,’ a way to disentangle ourselves and become free from objects. The "stage of person" is a further maturing of practice, of going beyond calming and disentangling the mind in meditation, so that outside meditation we are be able to move about freely wherever we are without getting caught, because whatever we meet is fundamentally the light of Buddha’s mind. Liberation isn’t just stillness of mind, it is freedom to be in the midst of everyday activity without losing awareness.

The process of reversing the light back to the source of awareness is called eko hensho in Japanese. It is looking into the mind itself, sitting with the experience of bare mind, instead of trying to practice with the contents of mind.

Where is the light? Is it located in your eyes, in your brain, your heart or hara? Where does our awareness reside? Returning the light to its source, is not something to think about – it’s not a mental exercise; and it is not a visualization. Katagiri Roshi used the phrase, "settle the self on the self." When we do this, we are no longer looking around to be entertained by sense objects or our storyline. Bring the mind that seeks out objects back to awareness itself, and settle in this ungraspable place. Maezumi Roshi said, "The point of our practice...is to realize ... that we are intrinsically, originally the Way itself, which is complete and free."

Dogen’s disciple, Koun Ejo, said, "Just sit as if you were the boundless, empty sky or a ball of fire. Trusting everything to inhalation and exhalation. Even if eighty-four-thousand deluded thoughts arise, each and every one may become the Light of Wisdom if you do not pay attention to them and simply let them go."