New Koans

This question is a question about enlightenment.

Doing you may become aware of several ways of looking at the world.

Your "normal" views are not the one only right ones.

You may become more open to the world in its many shades.

In traditional Zen an enlightened master acknowledges his students' status of enlightenment.

Given enlightenment doesn't exist, there's nothing to acknowledge.

Acknowledgement is just one of those Buddhist rituals to recruit subordinate members for the hierarchy.

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Self-mutilation is seen in Zen as a strong commitment to achieve "enlightenment" and to blindly obey a master.

Self-mutilation has it's roots in Indian (Hindu) asceticism.

Later, in China, the legendary "second patriarch" of Zen, Hui-ko, cut of his arm because Bodhidharma (who had brought Zen (Chinese: Chan) to China) refused to teach Hui-ko.

This story most probably refers to a historic person, Tan-Lin ("the armless Lin"), whose late 6th century text: "Treatise on the Two Entrances and the four Practices" is seen by some scholars as a basic text for the later Chinese Zen school.

At the time of Tan-Lin/Hui-ko (6th century) bandits frequently cut off the arms of travellers who had no, or not enough, money to satisfy them.

This root was "forgotten" when Hui-ko became a role model for self-mutilation in monastic Zen.

In China and Japan monks often cut off part of the small finger to show their commitment to attaining enlightenment.

Similarly a famous Japanese master (Hakuin) cut off of his eyelids so that he couldn't sleep during his night-long meditation practice.

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Buddhists like to play blame games with people who want to be blamed. Newcomers to Buddhism are especially welcome.

Quite popular games include questions about the meaning of "not knowing", "not thinking", "karma", "enlightenment".
These have no answers. These expressions make no sense.

They are used in Koans only to mess up a student's mind.

Don't even bother to be serious about "not knowing", "not thinking", "karma", "enlightenment". Just meditate, focus your mind, look at the thoughts coming and going. ..and sit.

You'll find a bit more about this "problem" on my page about Zen enlightenment

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That's one of the Zen-Koans used to irritate students. Zen teachers like to do that...

The question is irritating, because a Buddha is a Buddha, a teacher is a teacher and meditation is meditation.

There's not much more to say, no need to mix up these simple things.

So the best way to answer the question is not to answer it.



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Your question lacks a main feature of Koans, the contradiction.

A Koan is at first glance irrational.

To deal with a Koan a student of Zen has to confront her/his mind with its absurdity in order to find an answer which represents the reality the Koan points to.

To make your sentence a Koan change it a bit e.g.:

Does a grasshopper need wings to dig a hole?

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That's a nice Koan.

Not too difficult, if you find the "real" thing in this Koan.

Right, the only real thing is the cat. So, you are the cat now.

How will you prove that? "Miauw, miauw".

Zen loves cats.



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The Koan is only about grass.

No Why.

Grass is there.

You're the grass.

Keep this question in your mind for about half a year.

Seriously practice Zen-Meditation during this time.

The grass should be mowed by then.



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Just "play" the two statements:

Eat like a mouse: crunch, crunch, crunch.

Take some of the food, hold it in front of you:

"hmm, very nice."

"Miauw, Miauw."

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There are some variations of this Koan. The traditional version is case no. 5 of the 13th century Wu-men Hui-Kai collection.

It's about a man clinging with his teeth to a high tree, being asked a Zen-question.

If he doesn't answer it's again the basic rule of Zen to be kind but if he answers he'll fall to his death.

What's this Koan about? It's about death. You're threatened with death.

You may be dead at the end. Your friend may be dead. Death belongs to reality.

You express that in your answer. Not by talking but by falling to the ground mourning, crying.

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Zen doesn't care about logic but only about reality, real everyday life.

Forget about the question and find what is real in it.

It's nothing else but the tree.

The answer could be just to stand up and move your arms like the branches of a tree.

But there's another level of understanding. The Koan is about life.

In this case it's described as a tree. It constantly changes its shape, the leaves swirl. That's how life is.

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The Koan makes something simple difficult.

Water is water. All the Rest, the sound, the mirror, the dust etc..... is just the imagination of a person, in front of Water.

The dust in the second sentence could be seen separately. Just as dust on the surface of something.

As an Answer: just blow it from your sleeve.
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There may be a "secret of the universe" or not.

It doesn't matter.

Whether you hide it in your hands or not, or whether it's hidden somewhere else, don't bother.

That's only mucking around with talking, talking, talking.

There are only your hands: palms and backs.

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This is a slightly changed version of Koan no. 46 of Wu-men Hui-Kai collection ("Gateless Gate"):

"You're sitting on top of a flagpole and you're asked to take a step."

To answer this koan forget about the complicated question. Only steps happen in reality.

All the rest is complicated thinking.

Making just normal steps on the ground is seen in Japan as a sign of enlightenment.

Enlightenment has to be shown like knowledge at school. Foolish these Japanese, aren't they?

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This is Koan no. 46 of the 13th century collection of Wu-men Hui-Kai ("Gateless Gate")

Who Bodhidharma was and whether he had a beard or not is just a question of fashion, culture or history.

Bodhidharma, a legendary Indian monk, who brought Buddhism to China in the 1st century was always depicted with a wild beard.

The 10th century Chinese version of Buddhism, "shaved" Bodhidharma, to make him look Chinese.

In this Koan the only real thing is a beard.
Therefore the answer is to just show your beard e.g. by holding two fingers to your chin and scratching your beard. That's it.

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This is Koan no. 23 of the 13th century collection of Wu-men Hui-Kai ("Gateless Gate")

This Koan is known in many variations. The most common is:

What was your original face, before your parents were born?

Ancestors are very important in Chinese culture. Up to six generations back are remembered in Chinese homes.

In this perspective the Koan could probably mean: Do you look like your grandparents or your greatgrandparents?

But this is deliberately misleading.

The Koan is about YOUR “original”, actual face. Forget about parents or ancestors.

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This is Koan no. 1 of the 13th century collection of Wu-men Hui-Kai ("Gateless Gate")

This Koan is known as the basic koan of Zen which shows the first gimps of enlightenment.

(A bit of a stupid assumption, because the Koan is quite simple.)

According to Chinese Buddhism animals had no "Buddhanature" (soul). Therefore the answer is simply no or MUUUU).

The Japanese thought, "Mu" would mean "Yes" as well as "No". Now the Koan could mean anything.

There are two real things in the Koan: the sound of "MUUUUU" and the dog, waving his tail or barking.

Both can be shown to answer the Koan.

In addition the koan (as always) points to the person dealing with it.

Zen masters like to play around with these three types of answers. Be patient with them.

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This is Koan no. 7 of the 13th century collection of Wu-men Hui-Kai ("Gateless Gate")

It's a quite famous Koan for it refers to the situation of newbies in Zen.

They are often impatient. Something has to happen immediately!

The master should accept the newbie by giving a teaching. Now.

Wu-men uses the situation to shows what Zen is about:

Nothing special at all, just everyday life e.g. washing dishes.

That's the theory.

But the Koan also shows what Zen wants a newbie to learn first: obedience.

Only the master knows what's right. Obey!

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The story is derived from a Taoist story about a butcher.

He was able to cut an ox without any effort, using his knife without concious thought.

In Japan an umbrella-story was added: Master Banzan while listening to the dialogue, becomes enlightened himself.

Good on him!

Banzan heard the enlightened, wise talking of the butcher about his meat and became enlightened as well.

This is nonsense. A butcher is a butcher. Meat is meat. The customer wants it for a meal.
That's all that's real in this case.Yum, yum.

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