Dogen

Dogen

(Dojen lost his father when he was two. Six years later, his mother died. At her funeral, the newly orphaned boy stood before the incense lit in her honor. Sadly watching it disappear into smoke, he was struck by how fleeting life is. He vowed he would leave home and seek the meaning of life and death. In pursuit of this goal, he traveled to a foreign kingdom, crossing over mountains and rivers to question one wise person after another. At last, in a magical moment, he found the answer within himself.)

Dogen lived from 1200 to 1253 C.E. During that half-century, the world was experiencing an unusual degree of social, political, and religious foment. Genghis Khan was ruthlessly forging an empire from central Asia, where he captured Beijing, to the doorsteps of Europe. Moslems were invading India and driving out Buddhism from its birthplace. In Sung-era China, Zen still held sway as the pre-eminent religious force, but it was rapidly declining from its golden age during the T’ang era (581-907).

Increasing secularization and factional turmoil in Chinese society were pushing worldly matters into the monasteries and laypeople away from them. Meanwhile, a competing philosophy, Neo-Confucianism, was giving birth to the civil service examination system that would reconstruct public life in China over the next few centuries.

Dogen was born into the aristocracy of Japan on January 2, 1200, but his exact parentage is a matter of conjecture. His father was probably, the Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal, the most influential minister in court at the time. His birth entitled him to the most privileged upbringing that existed at the time, including education from the age of three in history and literature — Chinese as well as Japanese. This early, intensive exposure to the most beautifully composed texts in both languages probably nurtured Dogen’s own poetic gift, displayed so originally and remarkably in his later writings.

Dogen immersed himself in sutra studies on Mt. Hiei. Eventually, however, he stalled over one baffling question: “Both exoteric and esoteric teachings explain that a person in essence has true Dharma nature and is originally a body of ‘buddha nature.’ If so, why do all buddhas in the past, present, and future arouse the wish for and seek enlightenment?”

To study the Way is to study the Self. To study the Self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by all things of the universe. To be enlightened by all things of the universe is to cast off the body and mind of the self as well as those of others. Even the traces of enlightenment are wiped out, and life with traceless enlightenment goes on forever and ever.

A commentary about Dogen’s early childhood

At the time of Dogen’s birth the Japanese nobility had become steeped in aesthetic refinement.  This inspired a sense of the transience of beauty, and so focused on the aesthetic, rather than ethical, aspects of religion.  Consequently, they were indifferent to the lot of the masses.  His birth was also preceded by the establishment of feudalism in Japan and the rise of the Samurai class.  In a time of political chaos, many Buddhist monasteries’ concern about their wealth, prestige and power was to the detriment of their moral, intellectual and religious activities.

Though Dogen’s father died when he was two, the death of his mother when he was seven had a bigger impact, as she had requested, on her deathbed, that he should become a monk in order to seek the truth of Buddhism and strive to relieve the sufferings of humanity.  This imperative prevailed against his uncle Moroie’s wish to name him as his heir and to establish him in a career as an aristocrat.

Dogen was ordained in 1213 and began a systematic study of the Buddhist scriptures.  This led him to this seemingly insoluble spiritual question:

In his own words …“As I study both the exoteric and esoteric schools of Buddhism, they maintain that human beings are endowed with Dharma-nature by birth.  If this is the case, why did the Buddhas of all ages – undoubtedly in possession of enlightenment – find it necessary to seek enlightenment and engage in spiritual practice?” 

More as we proceed ….

Some of Dozen’s poems and their narration ..

In the stream

In the stream,
Rushing past
To the dusty world,
My fleeting form
Casts no reflection

 (In the stream,

Rushing past
To the dusty world...

The "dusty world" is daily world, the world of objects and experiences. It is dusty because it isn't swept clean; that is, we tend not to see existence in its luminous purity. We see the surfaces. We don't even see that, actually. We see our thoughts about the surfaces. That's what the dust is, the accumulations of assumptions and projections that cover the world and prevent us from seeing directly.

My fleeting form
Casts no reflection.

In the ecstatic state, the psychic tension that you normally call yourself disappears. Any action you engage in is not personal, not a creation of your personal will; it is just a part of the flow of movement you witness. Your sense of your self is "fleeting," ghostlike, a mere idea. It has no lasting stamp upon the flow of being; it "casts no reflection.

The true person is
Not anyone in particular;
But, like the deep blue color
Of the limitless sky,
It is everyone, everywhere in the world.

(Look for the true person deeply enough, and we find it. We find it in ourselves. But not in ourselves in a particular way. It is not in oneself while absent in another. We are quietly startled to discover that this true person is not contained by our skin. It does not stop at the edges of our lives. It does not even restrict itself to the borders of our far-flung thoughts. No, it flows out in all directions, utterly heedless of walls and distances and the greedy human mind.)

 

Zazen

Dōgen often stressed the critical importance of zazen, or sitting meditation as the central practice of Buddhism. He considered zazen to be identical to studying Zen. Dōgen taught zazen to everyone, even for the laity, male or female and including all social classes.  In referring to zazen, Dōgen is most often referring specifically to shikantaza, roughly translatable as "nothing but precisely sitting", which is a kind of sitting meditation in which the meditator sits "in a state of brightly alert attention that is free of thoughts, directed to no object, and attached to no particular content".

For zazen, cast aside all involvements and cease all affairs. Do not think good or bad. Do not administer pros and cons. Cease all the movements of the conscious mind, the gauging of all thoughts and views. Have no designs on becoming a Buddha. Zazen has nothing whatever to do with sitting or lying down.

Dōgen called this zazen practice "without thinking" (hi-shiryo) in which one is simply aware of things as they are, beyond thinking and not-thinking - the active effort not to think.

The correct mental attitude for zazen according to Dōgen is one of effortless non-striving, this is because for Dōgen, enlightenment is already always present.

  

For Dōgen, the practice of zazen and the experience of enlightenment were one and the same. This point was succinctly stressed by Dōgen in the Fukan Zazengi, the first text that he composed upon his return to Japan from China:

To practice the Way single heartedly is, in itself, enlightenment. There is no gap between practice and enlightenment or zazen and daily life.

Zazen is not "step-by-step meditation". Rather it is simply the easy and pleasant practice of a Buddha, the realization of the Buddha's Wisdom. The Truth appears, there being no delusion. If you understand this, you are completely free, like a dragon that has obtained water or a tiger that reclines on a mountain. The supreme Law will then appear of itself, and you will be free of weariness and confusion.

Thinking that practice and enlightenment are not one is no more than a view that is outside the Way. In buddha-dharma [i.e. Buddhism], practice and enlightenment are one and the same. Because it is the practice of enlightenment, a beginner's wholehearted practice of the Way is exactly the totality of original enlightenment. For this reason, in conveying the essential attitude for practice, it is taught not to wait for enlightenment outside practice.

  

Buddha-nature

For Dōgen, Buddha-nature  is the nature of reality and all Being. Dōgen writes that "whole-being is the Buddha-nature" and that even inanimate things (grass, trees, etc.) are an expression of Buddha-nature. He rejected any view that saw Buddha-nature as a permanent, substantial inner self or ground. Dōgen held that Buddha-nature was "vast emptiness", "the world of becoming" and that "impermanence is in itself Buddha-nature". According to Dōgen:

Therefore, the very impermanency of grass and tree, thicket and forest is the Buddha nature. The very impermanency of men and things, body and mind, is the Buddha nature. Nature and lands, mountains and rivers, are impermanent because they are the Buddha nature. Supreme and complete enlightenment, because it is impermanent, is the Buddha nature.

  “Zen study is the shedding of mind and body.”

WONDROUS HEART OF NIRVANA

Enlightenment in the Buddhist context is represented by the Sanskrit word bodhi, which essentially means “awakening.” A buddha, or one who embodies bodhi, is an awakened or enlightened one.

“Nirvana,” another Sanskrit word, originally means “putting out fire,” which points to a state where there is freedom from burning desire or anxiety, or from the enslavement of passion.

According to a common Asian view that originated in ancient India, one is bound to the everlasting cycle of birth and death in various realms, including those of deities, of humans, of animals, and hell. In Buddhism nirvana is where the chain of such transmigration is cut off and one is free from suffering. That is why the word nirvana is also used as a euphemism for “death.”

Nirvana is regarded as the realm of nonduality, where there is no distinction between large and small, long and short, right and wrong, appearing and disappearing, self and other. It may be called reality itself, or the absolute place beyond time and space. This is a realm that cannot be grasped objectively. The intuitive awareness or transcendental wisdom that goes beyond dualistic, analytical thinking and leads us into this realm is called prajna in Sanskrit.

Dogen calls this place of inner freedom the buddha realm. It is where one is many, part is whole, a moment is timeless, and mortality is immortality. To experience this beyondness in the midst of the passage of time, change, and decay is a miracle. For Dogen, this miracle can happen each moment, as each moment of duality is inseparable from a moment of nonduality.

Duality and nonduality, change and no-change, relative and absolute, coexist and interact with each other.

ENLIGHTENMENT AS A BREAKTHROUGH EXPERIENCE

Enlightenment is commonly seen as a spiritual breakthrough experience. Scriptures say that Shakyamuni Buddha, upon seeing the morning star after days of rigorous meditation, suddenly realized that mountains, rivers, grass, and trees had all attained buddhahood. When a monk was sweeping his hermitage yard, a pebble hit a bamboo stalk and made a cracking sound, and he was awakened. As in these examples, a dramatic shift of consciousness occurs after a seeker goes through a period of intense pursuit and has an unexpected transformative experience. The breakthrough may not only be an in-depth understanding of reality, but a physical experience—such as an extraordinary vision, release of tension, and feeling of exuberance.

In the Zen tradition many stories of this sort are studied as exemplary cases of great enlightenment. In the Linji School and its Japanese form, the Rinzai School, such enlightenment stories are used systematically as *koans to help students break through the conventional thinking that is confined by the barrier of dualism.

(Koans --A puzzling, often paradoxical statement or story, used in Zen Buddhism as an aid to meditation and a means of gaining spiritual awakening.)

CAUSE AND EFFECT REVISITED

The experience of nonduality is the basis for the Buddhist teaching of compassion. When one does not abide in the distinction between self and other, between humans and nonhumans, and between sentient beings and insentient beings, there is identification with and love for all beings. Thus, the wisdom of nonduality, prajna, is inseparable from compassion.

An action that embodies compassion is wholesome and one that does not is unwholesome. Any action, small or large, affects self and other. Cause brings forth effect. Thus, the dualistic perspective of Buddhist ethics—good and bad, right and wrong—is based on nondualism.

The legendary dialogue of Bodhidharma with Emperor Wu of southern China is revered in the Zen tradition exactly because it illustrates this dilemma in a dramatic way:

The Emperor said, “Ever since I ascended the throne, I have built temples, copied sutras, approved the ordination of more monks than I can count. What is the merit of having done all this?”

Bodhidharma said, “There is no merit.” The Emperor said, “Why is that so?”

Bodhidharma said, “These are minor achievements of humans and devas, which become the causes of desire. They are like shadows of forms and are not real.”

The Emperor said, “What is real merit?”

Bodhidharma said, “When pure wisdom is complete, the essence is empty and serene. Such merit cannot be attained through worldly actions.”

The Emperor said, “What is the foremost sacred truth?”

Bodhidharma said, “Vast emptiness, nothing sacred.”

The Emperor said, “Who is it that faces me?” Bodhidharma said, “I don’t know.”

The Emperor did not understand.

Thus the primary concern of the Zen practitioner has been described as the experience of “the pure wisdom” that sees reality as “empty and serene.” This experience was regarded as the source of all scriptural teachings.

 (The legendary dialogue of Bodhidharma with Emperor Wu of southern China is revered in the Zen tradition exactly because it illustrates this dilemma in a dramatic way:

The Emperor said, “Ever since I ascended the throne, I have built temples, copied sutras, approved the ordination of more monks than I can count. What is the merit of having done all this?”

Bodhidharma said, “There is no merit.” The Emperor said, “Why is that so?”

Bodhidharma said, “These are minor achievements of humans and devas, which become the causes of desire. They are like shadows of forms and are not real.”

The Emperor said, “What is real merit?”

Bodhidharma said, “When pure wisdom is complete, the essence is empty and serene. Such merit cannot be attained through worldly actions.”

The Emperor said, “What is the foremost sacred truth?”

Bodhidharma said, “Vast emptiness, nothing sacred.”

The Emperor said, “Who is it that faces me?” Bodhidharma said, “I don’t know.”

The Emperor did not understand.

 (Once, during meditation sitting late at night Rujing said to the assembly, “Zen study is the shedding of mind and body.” Hearing this, suddenly Dogen was greatly enlightened)

Dogen

It was Dogen (1200-1253) who first brought Soto Zen to Japan. Dogen, born in a noble family, quickly learned the meaning of the Buddhist word "mujo" (impermanence). While still young, he lost both his parents. He decided then to become a Buddhist priest and search for truth. He went first to Mt. Hiei, the headquarters of the sect.

At the young age he was assailed by the following doubt Both the esoteric and external doctrines of the Buddha teach that enlightenment is inherent in all beings from the outset. If this is so, why do all the Buddhas, past, present, and future, seek enlightenment? This doubt, clearly pointing to the dualistic contradiction between the ideal and the actual, is the kind of anguish likely to arise in the mind of any deeply religious person. Unable to resolve this great doubt at Mt. Hiei, Dogen decided to study Buddhism under Eisai.

Dogen freed himself from the illusion of the ego, the result of dualistic thinking and he experienced deeply the bliss of Buddhist truth. He continued his religious training in China for two years before returning to Japan at the age of 28.

Dogen is the greatest religious figure and creative thinker in Japanese history. Thoughtful leaders outside the Soto sect have declared that the essence of Japanese culture cannot be correctly understood without considering this great Zen master. Deeply impressed at the thoroughness and depth of Dogen's thought, many Japanese have gained new confidence in the potentialities of their culture.

Contemporary Value of Dogen

What is the basic thought and belief of Dogen?

Dogen, who was free from egotism and vain desires for wealth and fame, rejected the Buddhism of his period as imperfect. In Dogen's view it is precisely because we are now in the period of decline that we must make unrelenting efforts to live in the spirit of the Buddha and to grasp the essence of Buddhism directly. Therefore Dogen says: If you do not enter Buddhism in this life on the pretext that we are in a period of decline and unable to know truth, then in which life will you realize truth? Dogen discovered deep meaning in the efforts of men to discover eternal truths in their own character.

Dogen, the Zen Master

(Before I explain Dogen to you, let this be the introduction, because this is what he is trying to say: that everything passes and yet there is something that never passes; that everything is born and dies and yet there is something that is never born and never dies. And unless you get centered into that eternal source you will not find peace, you will not find serenity, you will not find blissfulness, you will not find contentment. You will not feel at home, at ease in the universe. You will remain just an accident, you will never become essential. – OSHO)

Dogen story

"When I was staying at Tiantong-jingde-si, I came upon a monk named Lu from Qingyuan in front of the Buddha Hall. He was drying mushrooms in the sun. He had a bamboo stick in his hand and no hat covering his head. The heat of the sun was blazing. It looked very painful; his back was bent like a bow and his eyebrows were as white as the feathers of a crane.

I went up to him and asked, "How long have you been a monk?"

"Sixty-eight years," he said.

"Why don't you have an assistant do this for you?"

"Other people are not me."

I was moved . . . I asked, "What is practice?" and was told, "Nothing in the entire universe is hidden."

 (“There is a simple way to become buddha: When you refrain from unwholesome actions, are not attached to birth and death, and are compassionate toward all sentient beings, respectful to seniors and kind to juniors, not excluding or desiring anything, with no designing thoughts or worries, you will be called a buddha. Do not seek anything else.” - - Dogen)

Dogen is best known for his work in bringing Zen practice from China to Japan, and for his discourses on Zen meditation and monastic lifestyle. But we keep coming back to his poetry.

His poetry draws you to the point of stillness where no words exist. The mind is quiet, free, no longer hemmed in by the false notion of boundaries. The rhythm of rain, the drip-dripping of water from the leaves, is truly one with us. There is no longer a dividing line where you can say, "Here I end. Here the sound of rain begins." The sound of rain flows into the awareness, awareness pours into the rain; they are one.

Because the mind is free --
Listening to the rain
Dripping from the leaves,
The drops become
One with me.

 (This poem by the Japanese Zen master Dogen paints a beautiful poetic image, but what does it really mean? What do moonlight and dewdrops have to do with a description of the world?

The moon, is a common spiritual metaphor used to describe enlightenment. Moonlight would be understood to mean the radiance of pure awareness that permeates the universe.

Here, that moonlight, that awareness, is "reflected / In dewdrops." Water is often used in Zen poetry as a symbol for the experience of the world -- it is tangible, yet ephemeral; it cannot be stopped or grasped. In the form of dew, it is in it's most fleeting form, ready to disappear at the slightest heavenly warmth.

Each dewdrop can be seen as an individual experience of the world or, alternately, an individual experiencer of the world. Each drop may appear separate, but they are of one substance. Although these worldly experiences do not generate light of their own, they reflect the light of pure awareness. Each drop, in fact, fully reflects the whole moon. There may be one moon above, but each person and each experience contains the full reflection of that moon within.

This is what Dogen is saying when he answers the question "To what shall / I liken the world?" Our notion of ourselves, our experiences, these are "the world." And, though this world is fleeting, it still offers us glimpses of the enlightenment that permeates all things, so long as we look at what is reflected within.)

Some of his Quotes ..

·         “Enlightenment is intimacy with all things.”

·         “Life and death are of supreme importance. Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost. Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken. Take heed, do not squander your life.”

·         “Your body is like a dew-drop on the morning grass, your life is as brief as a flash of lightning. Momentary and vain, it is lost in a moment.”

·         “No matter how bad a state of mind you may get into, if you keep strong and hold out, eventually the floating clouds must vanish and the withering wind must cease.”

·         “I come to realize that mind is no other than mountains and rivers and the great wide earth, the sun and the moon and stars.”

(Dogen, a Zen master, used to say, when he felt hungry he would say, "It seems the universal feels hungry through me." When he would feel thirsty he would say, "The existence is thirsty within me." This is what this meditation will lead you to. Then everything disperses from your ego and becomes part of the universe. Then whatsoever happens, happens to existence itself; you are no more here. Then there is no sin, then there is no responsibility.
- OSHO)

 

Enlightenment is like the moon

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water.
The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken.
Although its light is wide and great,
The moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide.
The whole moon and the entire sky
Are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass.

Joyful in this mountain retreat yet still feeling melancholy,
Studying the Lotus Sutra every day,
Practicing zazen single mindedly;
What do love and hate matter
When I’m here alone,
Listening to the sound of the rain
late in this autumn evening.

Drifting pitifully in the whirlwind of birth and death,
As if wandering in a dream,
In the midst of illusion I awaken to the true path;
There is one more matter I must not neglect,
But I need not bother now,
As I listen to the sound of the evening rain
Falling on the roof of my temple retreat
In the deep grass of Fukakusa.

On Non-Dependence of Mind

Coming, going, the water-birds
don’t leave a trace,
don’t follow a path.

The migrating bird
leaves no trace behind
and does not need a guide.

To what shall
I liken the world?
Moonlight, reflected
In dewdrops,
Shaken from a crane's bill.

(Dogen is a very unique genius. He is saying, "You may be aware of your buddhahood or not aware of your buddhahood -- don't be worried. When the right time and the right season come you will blossom into a buddha." Just wait ... wait intelligently, wait without desire; enjoy waiting, make waiting itself a blissful silence, and whatever is your birthright is bound to flower. Nobody can prevent a bird from flying, nobody can prevent a cuckoo from singing, nobody can prevent a rose from blossoming. Who is preventing you from becoming buddhas? Except you, nobody is responsible for it.
- OSHO)

Commentary Dozen’s Quotes

Dogen is best known for his work in bringing Zen practice from China to Japan, and for his discourses on Zen meditation and monastic lifestyle.

His draws you to the point of stillness where no words exist. The mind is quiet, free, no longer hemmed in by the false notion of boundaries. The rhythm of rain, the drip-dripping of water from the leaves, is truly one with us. There is no longer a dividing line where you can say, "Here I end. Here the sound of rain begins." The sound of rain flows into the awareness, awareness pours into the rain; they are one.

Because the mind is free --
Listening to the rain
Dripping from the leaves,
The drops become
One with me.

 (This poem by the Japanese Zen master Dogen paints a beautiful poetic image, but what does it really mean? What do moonlight and dewdrops have to do with a description of the world?

The moon, as is said, is a common spiritual metaphor used to describe enlightenment. Moonlight would be understood to mean the radiance of pure awareness that permeates the universe.

Here, that moonlight, that awareness, is "reflected / In dewdrops." Water is often used in Zen poetry as a symbol for the experience of the world -- it is tangible, yet ephemeral; it cannot be stopped or grasped. In the form of dew, it is in it's most fleeting form, ready to disappear at the slightest heavenly warmth.

Each dewdrop can be seen as an individual experience of the world or, alternately, an individual experiencer of the world. Each drop may appear separate, but they are of one substance. Although these worldly experiences do not generate light of their own, they reflect the light of pure awareness. Each drop, in fact, fully reflects the whole moon. There may be one moon above, but each person and each experience contains the full reflection of that moon within.

This is what Dogen is saying when he answers the question "To what shall / I liken the world?" Our notion of ourselves, our experiences, these are "the world." And, though this world is fleeting, it still offers us glimpses of the enlightenment that permeates all things, so long as we look at what is reflected within.)

(One day Ju-ching admonished a monk who had fallen asleep during meditation with the following words:“In za-zen it is imperative to cast off body and mind.  How could you indulge in sleeping?”

The remark shook Dogen to his core and he experienced an inexpressible ecstatic joy that engulfed his heart and Ju-ching acknowledged the authenticity of Dogen’s enlightenment experience.

“To cast off body and mind did not nullify historical and social existence so much as to put it into action so that it could be the self-creative and self-expressive embodiment of Buddha-nature. In being “cast off”, however, concrete human experience was fashioned in the mode of radical freedom – purposeless, goalless, objectless, and meaningless.  Buddha-nature was not to be enfolded in, but was to unfold through, human activities and expressions.) 

Dogen

Do not follow the ideas of others
but learn to listen to the voice within yourself.
Your body and mind will become clear 
and you will realize the unity of all things.

Dogen's poetry

Learn the backward step that turns

your light inward to illuminate yourself.

Body and mind of themselves will drop away,

and your original face will be manifest. Coming, going,

the waterbirds don't leave a trace, don't follow a path. Midnight. No waves,

no wind, the empty boat

is flooded with moonlight.

 

Dōgen quotes 

·         “If you are unable to find the truth right where you are, where else do you expect to find it?”

·         “Do not be concerned with the faults of other persons. Do not see others' faults with a hateful mind. There is an old saying that if you stop seeing others' faults, then naturally seniors and venerated and juniors are revered. Do not imitate others' faults; just cultivate virtue.

·         “Forgetting oneself is opening oneself”

·         “When you ride in a boat and watch the shore, you might assume that the shore is moving. But when you keep your eyes closely on the boat, you can see that the boat moves. Similarly, if you examine many things with a confused mind, you might suppose that your mind and nature are permanent. But when you practice intimately and return to where you are, it will be clear that there is nothing that has unchanging self.”

·         “To study the Buddha Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of enlightenment remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.”

·          “To enter the Buddha Way is to stop discriminating between good and evil and to cast aside the mind that says this is good and that is bad.”

·         “To escape from the world means that one's mind is not concerned with the opinions of the world.”

·         “One must be deeply aware of the impermanence of the world.”

·         “Nothing can be gained by extensive study and wide reading. Give them up immediately.”

·         “Every man possesses the Buddha-nature. Do not demean yourselves.”

·         “A fool sees himself as another, but a wise man sees others as himself.”

Gateway into the mystery

 It has been said, to pursue a purely intellectual understanding of God is like trying to see with your hands. That which is without color or form, unlimited and unfathomable, beyond imagination, without beginning or end, is impossible to conceive with the mind. When it comes to that experience, the brain is not the tool we need. Yet, there is a way, it is built in, as natural as waking up in the morning. This is the message of the mystic poets, who see the relationship between a seeker and God as similar as between a child and a parent, close friends, or a lover and their Beloved. They emphasize simple things like love and faith and consistent remembrance and treating all with respect. Their love for the Creator awakens in the heart a yearning to see and experience for oneself. To touch the ocean of Oneness, to know with certainty, to be washed with contentment and peace, and feel a Love that does not die.

("Life and death are of supreme importance. Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost. Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken. Take heed, do not squander your life.")

One of six verses composed in An'yoin Temple in Fukakusa, 1230:

Drifting pitifully in the whirlwind of birth and death,
As if wandering in a dream,

·         The Way

Studying the Buddha way is studying oneself.
Studying oneself is forgetting oneself.
Forgetting oneself is being enlightened by all things.
Being enlightened by all things is to shed the body-mind of oneself, and those of others.
No trace of enlightenment remains, and this traceless enlightenment
continues endlessly.

·         Those who have wisdom, if they hear [the Dharma], are able to believe and understand at once.

·         If you think you can become enlightened just by worshipping images and relics, this is a mistaken view.

·         Do not discriminate . . . whether the monks are senior or junior. . . . Although there are differences between seniors and juniors, all are equally members of the assembly.

·         Worldly duties do not, in and of themselves, impede the Buddha Dharma.

·         Diligently apply yourself, and whatever arises as 'just for a while'.

·         The recognition of the coming and going of things is a first step in training and practice.

·         Handle even a single leaf of green in such a way that it manifests the body of the Buddha. This in turn allows the Buddha to manifest through the leaf.

·         The sound of running water is Buddha's great speech.

·         A flower falls, even though we love it; and a weed grows, even though we do not love it

·         Swim as they may, fish find no end to the sea; fly as they may, birds find no end to the sky.

(Dogen states the key is to transcend desire. There shouldn’t even be a desire ‘to be another Buddha’)

In 1252, Dogen became ill and in 1253 he died in Kyoto.