Rinzai Gigen - There is no path
Fun facts: Linji Yixuan was a Chinese monk of the 9thc CE. The Japanese monk Myoan Eisai brought his teachings to Japan, where ’Rinzai’ Zen became one of the several Zen schools in that country. As usual, not much is known about the life of the founder. But some of his dharma talks, lectures, and immense sense of humour have been passed down through the centuries.
Here are a few of my favourites:
“Followers of the Way, Buddha is not to be attained. There is no real Dharma; it is all but surface manifestations, like printed letters on a sign board to indicate the Way.”
“I have no dharma to give. I only cure diseases and undo knots. Followers of the Way who come from everywhere, try not to depend on anything. … There is no Buddha, no Dharma, no training and no realisation. What are you so hotly chasing? Putting a head on top of your head, you blind fools. Your head is right where it should be.”
Followers of the Way, when I say that there is no Dharma outside, the students do not understand and deduce it is necessary to search within themselves. Then they sit, leaning against a wall, tongue pressed to the upper palate, and remain so motionless. That they take for the patriarchal gate of the Buddha-Dharma. What a great error! If you take the state of immovable purity for THIS, you acknowledge ignorance as your master. An old master said: “To get lost in the depth of the dark cave, is surely a cause for fear and trembling.”
But if you take the moving as THIS, all the grasses and trees can move and so should possess the Way.
Therefore, what moves belongs to the element of air(wind); what does not move belongs to the element of earth; and what both moves and does not move has no being in itself. If you think to grasp the moving, it will hold itself motionless. And if you try to grasp the motionless, it will take to moving, “as a fish in a pool rises when waves are stirred.” So, venerable ones, the moving and the motionless are two types of circumstance. But the man of the Way who does not depend on anything makes use of both the moving and the motionless. — Translated by Irmgard Schloegl
Rinzai had been invited to an army camp for a banquet. At the gate post met two army officers. Pointing at the wooden post, Rinzai asked: “Is this worldly or is this sacred?” The army officers did not know what to say. So Rinzai struck the wooden post saying: “Doesn’t mater how you respond, it is still a wooden post”
