Silent lllumination and Koan Practice | Zen Meditation

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 (1091-1157), 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.
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