Zen Meditation

The Chinese term tso-ch'an (zazen in Japanese) was in use among Buddhist practitioners even before the appearance of the Ch'an (Zen) school. Tso, literally means "sitting." Ch'an is a derivative of the Indian dhyāna which is the yogic practice of attaining a unified mind in meditation. In a broad sense, tso- ch'an refers to any type of meditative practice based on taking the sitting posture, In a more narrow sense, it indicates the methods of meditation that characterize Ch'an/Zen Buddhism.

The following criteria for correct zazen practice have not changed since ancient days. Sit on the floor with the legs crossed either in the full lotus or half lotus position. To make the full lotus, put the right foot on the left thigh, then put the left foot crossed over the right leg onto the right thigh. For the half lotus position only one foot is crossed over onto the thigh of the other; the other foot remains underneath the raised leg.

Though the full or half lotus are the preferred zazen postures, they may be too difficult for some people. One alternative is called the Burmese position. It is similar to the half lotus, except that one foot is crossed over onto the calf, rather than the thigh, of the other leg. Another acceptable position is kneeling, legs together and back erect. In this position, the buttocks can rest on the heels, on a cushion placed between the feet, or on a specially designed bench. If physical problems prevent sitting in any of the above positions, then sitting on a chair is possible as a last resort.

Sitting cross-legged is most conducive to long periods of zazen with effective concentration. But the position you can take may depend on such factors as physical condition, health, and age. You should use a position in which at least twenty minutes of immobile zazen is feasible and reasonably comfortable. However, do not choose the position that requires the least exertion, because good results cannot be attained without the effort to discipline the body-mind. If sitting on the floor, sit on a Japanese-style zafu (round meditation cushion) or other improvised cushion, several inches thick. This is partly for comfort, but also because it is easier to maintain an erect spine if the buttocks are slightly raised. place a larger square pad, such as a Japanese zabuton, underneath the cushion. Sit with the buttocks toward the front half of the cushion, the knees resting firmly on the pad.

The spine must be upright. Rather than thrusting your chest forward, make sure your lower back is erect. The chin must be tucked in slightly, without tipping the head down. An upright spine also means a vertical spine; do not lean forward or backward, right or left. Let the shoulders be relaxed and the arms hang loosely. If you have any sensation of shoulders, arms, or hands, there is probably tension in that area. The hands are placed in front of the abdomen, resting on the legs. The open right palm is underneath, and the open left palm rests in the right palm. The thumbs lightly touch to form a closed circle oval.

The mouth must always be closed. At all times breathe through the nose, not the mouth. The tip of the tongue should be lightly touching the roof of the mouth just behind the front teeth, if you have too much saliva, you, can let go of this connection. If you have no saliva at all, you can apply greater pressure with the tip of the tongue. The eyes should be slightly open, gazing downward at a forty-five degree angle. Let the eyes rest without focusing on anything. Closing the eyes may cause drowsiness or visual illusions. However, if your eyes feel very tired you can close them for a short while.

Walking meditation is useful for a change of pace when engaged in prolonged sitting, such as on personal or group retreats. In slow walking, the upper body should be in the same posture as in sitting, though the hands are held differently. The left palm lightly encloses the right hand, which is a loosely formed fist. Joined in this way, the hands should be held in front of the abdomen, forearms parallel to the ground. Focus attention on the bottom of the feet as you walk with measured steps. If walking in an enclosed space, walk in a clockwise direction. Fast walking, another method, is walking energetically without actually running; The main difference in posture is that the arms are now dropped to the sides, swinging naturally. Take short fast steps, keeping the attention on the feet.

Regulating the breath is very simple: just breathe naturally. Do not try to control your breathing. The breath is used as a way to focus or concentrate the mind; that is, regulating the breath and regulating the mind are brought together. The basic method is to count one's breath in a repeating cycle of ten. Through concentration on the simple technique of counting, the mind is less vulnerable to wandering thoughts. Starting with one, mentally (not vocally) count each exhalation until you reach ten, keeping the full attention on the counting. After reaching ten, start over again with one. Do not count during the inhalation, but just keep the mind on the intake of air through the nose. When random thoughts occur while counting, ignore them and continue counting. If wandering thoughts cause you to lose count or go beyond ten, as soon as you become aware of it start over again at one. If you have so many distracting thoughts that keeping count is impossible, you can vary the method--counting backward from ten to one, or counting by twos from two to twenty.

When wandering thoughts are minimal, and you can consistently maintain the count without losing it, you can drop counting and just observe your breath going in and out. Keep your attention at the tip of your nose. Do not try to control the tempo or depth of your breathing; just watch it. When you become aware that you have been interrupted by thoughts, return at once to the practice. Another method of regulating the mind is to focus the attention on the tan-t'ien (tanden in Japanese), which is a point located just below the navel. The tan-t'ien is not an organ but a center of psychic energy. This method is best employed when breathing has descended naturally to the abdomen. Mentally follow the movements of the tan-t'ien as the abdomen moves in and out naturally with each breath. This method is more energetic than counting or following the breath, and it should be used only after gaining some proficiency in those two techniques.

In zazen it is important that body and mind be relaxed. At times of excessive physical or mental tension, forced zazen can be counter-productive. If you are relaxed, the various sensations that arise are usually beneficial (pain, soreness, itchiness, warmth, coolness, and so on). For example, a pain that arises during relaxed zazen may mean that unconscious tensions are benefiting from the circulation of blood and energy induced by meditation. A longstanding problem may thus be alleviated. On the other hand, if you are very tense while doing zazen and feel pain, the tension itself may be causing the pain. A safe and recommended approach is to limit sitting initially to half an hour, or two half-hour segments, in as relaxed a manner as possible. If the mind is overburdened with outside concerns, it may be better to relieve some of those concerns before sitting. For this and other reasons, it is best to sit early in the morning, before the mind fills with the problems of the day. Sitting times may be increased with experience.

Although the methods of zazen given here are simple and straightforward, it is best to practice them under the guidance of a qualified Zen teacher. Without a teacher, a beginning meditator will not be able to correct his or her mistakes, and these could lead to problems or lack of results. The fruits of correct zazen practice include centeredness, calmness, and clarity.

Traditional Approaches to Zazen

The earliest Chinese translations of Buddhist sutras that described methods for achieving a unified mind (samādhi) appeared around the end of the second century A.D. In the beginning of the fifth century, Kumārājiva translated into Chinese several more sutras on the practice of meditation, such as the Sutra on Zazen and Samadhi (Tso-ch'an san-mei ching). During these early centuries many Chinese monks practiced zazen to achieve samādhi in the Indian manner. During the Sui dynasty (589-6l7), the T'ien-t'ai master Chih-I wrote two seminal works on meditation. He described zazen in terms of three aspects: regulating the body, the breath, and the mind. He also presented four methods for attaining samadhi: constant sitting; constant walking; half walking, half sitting; and neither walking nor sitting. Thus several centuries before the emergence of the Ch'an school in the seventh century, zazen had already reached a high state of development in China, both as a practice and as a scriptural topic. We also note the close association between zazen and samadhi in Chinese Buddhist practice prior to Ch'an.

What is samādhi? Though Indian tradition defines nine levels of samadhi, each with its own identifying characteristics, a general definition will suffice here. Samadhi is a unified state of mind in which there is no distinction between self and environment, no sense of time or place. This is not a state of no-thought or no-mind, since there is still an awareness of the self experiencing samadhi. Rather, it is a state of one-thought or one-mind. In Ch'an, an important distinction is made between samadhi and enlightenment, as seen in the spiritual path of Shakyamuni Buddha. After years of austere practice as a yogi, Shakyamuni had attained the highest level of samadhi, but he knew that his realization was still incomplete. He sat under the bodhi tree, vowing not to get up until he had fully resolved the question of death and rebirth. Only when he became enlightened, after seeing the morning star, did he rise. His experience became the paradigm of zazen practice.

The First Patriarch of Ch'an, the Indian monk Bodhidharma, reached China around A.D. 520 and established himself in Shaolin temple. While the historical facts of Bodhidharma's life are scant, there is little doubt that he was enlightened before arriving in China. Even so, he continued zazen practice. According to legend, Bodhidharma sat facing a wall for nine years, in the same posture used by previous masters to attain samadhi. However, he did not use Hinayana methods (such as visualizing parts of the body), and his goal was different--to attain liberation without necessarily going through samadhi. Bodhidharma's great contribution to Ch'an was his insistence on directly experiencing Buddha-nature through zazen.

The Fourth Patriarch, Tao-hsin (580-65l), similarly stressed the importance of zazen. For the novice, he advocated contemplation of the five aggregates of human existence: corporeality. feeling, perception, mental formation, and consciousness. In his Methods for Entering the Path and Calming the Mind (Ju-tao an-hsin yao fang-pien men), Tao- hsin quoted an earlier text;

One should contemplate the five aggregates as originally empty, quiescent, non-arising, non-perishing, equal, and without differentiation. Constantly thus practicing, day or night, whether sitting, walking, standing, or lying down, one finally reaches an inconceivable state without any obstruction or form. This is called the Samadhi of One Act.

Tao-hsin's disciple, the Fifth Patriarch Hung-jen (600-674), is said to have foregone sleep to meditate all night. In his essay "Treatise on the Essentials of Cultivating the Mind" (Hsiu-hsin yao lun) he taught, "When the mind is placed at one point, there is nothing that cannot be attained." The one-pointedness to which he referred was not samadhi, but one's original or true mind.

The Sixth Patriarch Hui-neng (638-7l3) offered some novel formulations of zazen. In his Platform Sutra (Liu-tsu t'an ching), he says that if one were to stay free from attachment to any mental or physical realms and to refrain from discriminating, neither thoughts nor mind would arise. This is the true "sitting" of Ch'an. Here the term "sitting" is not limited to physical sitting but refers to a practice where the mind is not influenced or disturbed by anything that arises, internally or in the environment. For Hui-neng, the direct experience of Self- nature, the seeing of one's own unmoving Buddha-nature, is called "Ch'an." One could say that true sitting is the method, Ch'an the result. Yet since Ch'an is sudden enlightenment, when it occurs it is simultaneous with zazen. Hui-neng was critical of certain attitudes in practice which did not conform to his criteria of the true zazen that leads to Ch'an. Such "outer path" approaches to sitting are illustrated in the following two anecdotes.

The first story involves a disciple of Hui-neng, Nan-yueh Huai-jang (677-744). Huai-jang observed a monk named Ma- tsu (709-788), who had a habit of doing zazen all day long. Realizing this was no ordinary monk, Huai-jang asked Ma-tsu, "Why are you constantly doing zazen?" Ma-tsu answered, "To attain buddhahood." Huai-iang picked up a brick and started rubbing it vigorously. After a while Ma-tsu asked, "What are you doing?" Huai-jang said, "I'm making a mirror from this brick." Ma-tsu said, "That's absurd. You can't make a mirror from a brick." Huai-jang said, "Indeed. And how is it possible to become a budgha by doing zazen?" Thereupon Ma-tsu asked, "What should I do?" Huai-jang said, "When the ox won't pull the cart, do you beat the cart or the ox?" Ma-tsu did not know how to reply. So Huai-jang said, "Are you doing zazen to attain Ch'an or to become a buddha? If it's Ch'an, Ch'an is neither sitting nor lying dawn; if it's buddhahood, Buddha has no form. Since the Dharma has no abiding form, there should be no grasping, no rejection. Your attachment to sitting prevents you from realizing buddhahood, and it kills Buddha besides." Ma- tsu became a disciple of Huai-jang and eventually a great master himself.

This story teaches that true zazen is not just a matter of sitting, however dedicated or perfected. To do zazen with Ma- tsu's original understanding will bring some benefits. But it is impossible to attain Ch'an simply by perfecting the external form of zazen. Self-nature is to be found in what Huai-jang called the "mind-ground,', not in the realm of form. Later Ma- tsu reiterated this point in his concept of "ordinary mind" (p'ing-ch'ang). One sense of this expression is a mind that is involved in the ordinary world, moving as usual but not clinging to anything. Another sense comes from the root meanings of p'ing and ch'ang, which suggest a mind that is "level" and "constant," or in a state of constant equanimity. In either sense, there is no attachment.

The second "outer path" anecdote also involves disciples of Hui-neng. When Shih-t'ou Hsi-ch'ien (700-790) was a young monk, he approached the dying Hui-neng and asked, "Master, after you pass away, what should I do?" Hui-neng said, "You should go to Hsing-ssu." Shih-t'ou understood him to say "hsun-ssu " which means "seek thoughts." So he assumed that the master told him to practice watching his thoughts, a known method of meditation. Shih-t'ou was unaware that there was intensely even after becoming enlightened. The descriptions of the earliest Ch'an monasteries in the Biographies of Eminent Monks (Kao-seng chuan) confirm that monks were supposed to spend most of their time in zazen.

Silent lllumination and Koan Practice

Earlier we noted that zazen most precisely refers to the means developed by the Ch'an masters to attain entightenment. The two principal paths of Ch'an which have come down to us are the method of "silent illumination" and the method of the kōan (kung-an in Chinese).

The practice of silent illumination may be traced back at least as far as Bodhidharma. In his (attributed) treatise The Two Entries and the Four Practices (Her ju ssu hsing lun), he states:

Leaving behind the false, return to the true; make no discrimination of self and others. In contemplation one is stable and unmoving, like a wall.

Shih-shuang Ch'ing-chu (805-888) lived on a mountain called Shih-shuang for twenty years. His disciples just sat continually, even sleeping in this upright position. In their stillness they looked like so many dead tree stumps, and they were called "the dry-wood Sangha." Shih-shuang had two famous phrases of advice. One was: "To sit Ch'an, fix your mind on one thought for ten thousand years." The other was: "Become like cold ashes or dry wood."

The Sung dynasty master Hung-chih Cheng-chueh (l09l- 1157), the best-known advocate of silent illumination, studied with a master called K'u-mu ("Dry-wood"), whose body resembled a block of wood when he sat. Hung-chih describes "silent sitting" as follows: Your body sits silently; your mind is quiescent, unmoving. This is genuine effort in practice. Body and mind are at complete rest The mouth is so still that moss grows around it. Grass sprouts from the tongue. Do this without cease. cleansing the mind until it gains the clarity of an autumn pool and the brightness of the moon illuminating the evening sky... In this silent sitting, whatever realms may appear the mind remains very clear in all details, with everything in its own original place. The mind stays on one thought for ten thousand years, yet does not dwell on any forms, inside or outside.

Silent illumination differs from outer path zazen, which generates a samadhi that lacks wisdom. By itself samadhi is silent but not illuminating. In silent illumination the mind is not fixed in samadhi but dwells in a bright state of illumination, which the meditator continually works to maintain. Although there are no thoughts, the mind is still very clear and aware. If such a nonattached state of mind can be maintained throughout one's daily life, that is true Ch'an.

In Japanese Zen the type of zazen called shikantaza ("just sitting") is quite similar to silent illumination. It was introduced in Japan by Master Dōgen (1200-l253) after his return from China. In his work Principles of Zazen for Everyone (Fukan- zazengi), Dōgen writes:

You should therefore 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 yourself. Body and mind of themselves will drop away, and your original face will manifest.

Koan practice is taken up by Roshis Kapleau and Eido in the next two chapters, so the treatment here will be brief. A koan is an account of an incident between a master and one or more disciples which involves an understanding or experience of enlightened mind. A koan usually, but not always, involves dialogue. When the original incident is remembered and recorded, it becomes a "public case," which is the literal meaning of koan. Often what makes the incident worth recording is that the disciple's mind, if only for an instant, transcends attachment and logic, and he catches a glimpse of emptiness or Buddhanature. At that moment there is a "transmission" of Mind between master and disciple. Once, after the Buddha gave a sermon to his senior disciples, he picked up a flower and silently held it up before the assembly. All the monks except one were mystified. Mahakasyapa alone knew the Buddha's meaning, he smiled, saying nothing. Thus the Buddha transmitted to Mahakasyapa the wordless doctrine of Mind. Although this incident preceded the rise of Ch'an by over a thousand years, it exemplifies the spirit of koans.

The earliest koans were spontaneous incidents that arose naturally in the context of practice. During the Sung dynasty (960-l279), Ch'an masters began using these "public cases" as a method of meditation for their disciples. In attempting to plumb the meaning of a koan, one has to abandon knowledge, experience, and reasoning, since the answer is not susceptible to these methods. The student must find the answer by "becoming one" with the koan. Only when there is nothing left in the mind but the koan is awakening possible.

Closely related to the koan is the hua-t'ou (literally "head of a thought"), a question that the meditator inwardly asks himself "What is Mu?" or "Who am I?" are two good examples. As with the koan, the answer is not resolvable through reasoning. The meditator devotes his full attention to asking himself the huat'ou, over and over. His objective is to probe into the source of the question, that is, the state of mind that existed before the question became a thought.

Koans and hua-t'ous are both methods of ts'an Ch'an, "investigating Ch'an." Because the Buddha sometimes used a question-and-answer format to deepen the understanding of his disciples, the word ts'an is also applicable to the Buddha's teaching methods. Another instance of ts'an Ch'an is the practice of making the rounds to accomplished masters in order to engage them in dialogue. Sometimes the practitioner has reached an impasse in his investigation, and he needs some "turning words" from a master to give him the impetus for a breakthrough. Advanced practitioners also visited masters in order to assess their own understanding of Ch'an or certify their own attainment. Koans and hua-t'ous were well-suited to these situations. Any interchange between master and disciple can be an opportunity for a live, spontaneous koan or hua-t'ou; these practices are not limited to sayings and questions from the historical record.

Another way in which koans and hua-t'ous are related is that a hua-t'ou can give rise to a koan, and vice versa. For example, the question "lf all the myriad things in the universe return to the One, to what does the One return?" was originally a hua- t'ou. When a student asked Master Chao-chou this same question, he answered, "When I was in Ch'ing Province I had one hempen shirt made weighing seven pounds." This exchange became an important koan. Conversely, a key phrase in a koan frequently serves as the source for a hua-t'ou. Thus "What is Mu?" is derived from the koan "Does a dog have Buddha-nature?"

P'ang Yun (d. 808), a lay disciple of Ma-tsu, resolved to follow the Path. He threw his wealth into the river and became a basket weaver. While plying his trade one day, he met a monk begging for alms. Giving the monk some money, P'ang asked him, "What is the meaning of giving alms?" The monk said, "I don't know. What is the meaning of giving alms?" And P'ang replied, "Very few people have heard about it." The monk said, "I don't understand." P'ang then asked, ',Who is it that doesn't understand?" This incident became a koan that gave birth to a whole series of hua-t'ous of the "who" type. Some variations on it are: "Who is reciting Buddha's name?" "Who is investigating Ch'an?" "Who is dragging this corpse?" and so on.

Zazen and Enlightenment

The records of the Ch'an sect, including the Transmission of the Lamp and the koan collections, do not refer to zazen practice very often. It was commonly understood that by the time practitioners began to "investigate Ch'an," they already had a good foundation in zazen. Beginners without much zazen experience may get some use out of the constant (silent) repetition of a koan or hua-t'ou, but this will only be like reciting a mantra. Without the ability to bring the mind to a deep quiescent state, it is virtually impossible to experience Self-nature through work on a koan. Thus Ta-hui Tsung-kao (l089-ll63), one of the greatest advocates of koan practice, consistently maintained that zazen was necessary to settle the wandering mind.

If a student's mind has become stable through zazen, the application of the koan may generate the Great Doubt. This doubt is not the ordinary doubt that questions the truth of an assertion. It refers to the practitioner's deeply questioning state of mind which results from investigating the koan. In fact, the resolution of the koan hinges on the nurturing of the Great Doubt. Because the meditator cannot answer his question by logic, he must continually return to the question itself, and this process clears the mind of everything except the Great Doubt The “doubt mass” that accumulates can disappear in one of two ways. Due to lack of concentr ation or energy, the meditator may not be able to sustain the doubt, and it will dissipate. But if he persists until his doubt is like a “hot ball of iron stuck in his throat,” the doubt mass will burst apart in an explosion.

If that explosion has enough energy, it is possible that the student will become enlightened. A master is needed to confirm the experience since the student, with rare exceptions, cannot do that himself. Even as great a figure as Ta-hui did not penetrate sufficiently on his first experience. His master Yuan- wu K’o-ch’in (1063-1135) told him, “You have died, but you haven’t come back to life.” Ta-hui was confirmed on his second enlightenment experience. Without the guidance of a genuine master such as Yuan-wu, Ta-hui may have settled unwittingly for a partial realization.

In the early twelfth century, Ch’ang-lu Tsung-tse wrote the Manual of Zazen (Tso-ch’an i). He insisted that a person who has experienced Buddha-nature should continue to practice zazen. Then one can become like a dragon who gains the water, or a tiger who enters the mountains. A dragon gaining the water returns to his ancestral home, free to dive as deep as he wishes. A tiger entering the mountains has no opposition; he may ascend the heights and roam at will. Thus Zen teaches that zazen after enlightenment enhances and deepens one's realization.

Yueh-shan Wei-yen (745-828), an enlightened monk, was doing zazen. His master Shih-t'ou asked him, "What are you doing zazen for?" Yueh-shan answered, "Not for anything." "That means you are sitting idly," said Shih-t'ou. Yueh-shan countered, "If this is idle sitting, then that would be for something." The master then said, "What is it that is not for anything!" The monk answered, "A thousand sages won't know." On the one hand, we say that persons who have had realization should continue to do zazen to enhance their enlightenment. On the other hand, we say the enlightened person sits without purpose. For the practitioner whose enlightenment is not deep, further zazen is necessary to deepen it; for one who is deeply enlightened, zazen is just part of daily life. Here we recall Hui-neng's conception of true zazen: it is not limited to sitting, and the mind does not abide in anything. The ultimate zazen is no zazen.