Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Song of Zazen
(The above is a drawing of Bodhidarma by Hakuin. Bodhidharma carried Zen Buddhism to China from India in ancient times.)
Song of Zazen
by Hakuin (Zen monk, Japan, 1680-1769
All beings are primarily Buddhas.
It is like water and ice:
There is no ice apart from water;he
There are no Buddhas apart from beings.
Not knowing how close the truth is to them,
Beings seek for it afar -- what a pity!
They are like those who, being in the midst of water,
Cry out for water, feeling thirst.
They are like the son of the rich man,
Who, wandering away from his father,
Goes astray amongst the poor.
It is all due to their ignorance
That beings transmigrate in the darkness
Of the Six Paths of existence.
When they wander from darkness to darkness-death?
...........................
But how much more so (will you benefit) when you turn your eyes within yourselves
And have a glimpse into your self-nature!
You find that the self-nature is no-nature -
The truth permitting no idle sophistry.
For you, then, open the gate leading to the oneness of cause and effect;
Before you, then, lies a straight road of non-duality and non-trinity.
When you understand that form is the form of the formless,
Your coming-and-going takes place nowhere else but where you are
When you understand that thought is the thought of the thought-less
Your singing-and-dancing is no other than the voice of the Dharma(sacred teachings)
How boundless is the sky of Samadhi (Enlightenment)
How refreshingly bright is the moon of the Fourfold Wisdom
Being so is there anything you lack?
As the Absolute presents itself before you
The place where you stand is the Land of the Lotus,
And your person - the body of the Buddha.
I think that Hakuin is telling us that "heaven" is no where but where you are, and that your own body is the body of the Buddha. Of course, Hakuin is speaking of the path of Zen, that uses meditation and Koans to attain this understanding. But I think that when we undergo Kundalini awakening, we discover the truth of his message. Our own bodies become the centers of unconditional divine love, felt as bliss flows within, and we know that we too are part of sacred creation, for the divine is everywhere, including inside our own beings.
Here once more is a familiar message--the divine resides not just outside us but within our own selves, and we are participants in the divine dance of joy.
