Crossing Nebraska

Koku is one of the shorter fascicles of Dogen’s Shobogenzo . Notwithstanding its brevity, it is still as dense and difficult to comprehend as many of his other works. One can glimpse the nature of this difficulty by contemplating for a moment the various English translations of the one word title alone: Space (Nishijima, 2009), On the Unbounded (Nearman, 2007), and, of course, Universal Emptiness (Nishiyama, 1975). Each of these reveals a slightly different way of thinking about the Buddhist concept of shunyata (Sanskrit) or ku (Japanese). According to Okumura (2012) koku actually has three different possible meanings. In our very ordinary way of looking at things it can refer to the empty space that is between objects or which is bounded in some way. It can also refer to space which does not lose its nature on account of being occupied. Yet another meaning, however, points to the most profound of Buddhist teachings, i.e. the emptiness of all phenomena. As Okumura says: ...

Zen student to teacher: "I come seeking liberation." Zen teacher to student: "Who has enslaved you? Show me your chains!" + I’d departed from Shoshoni that morning with 100 miles of ‘rattlesnake country’ to ride through before arriving in Casper, Wyoming – my evening destination. I pedaled slowly, knowing full well that the afternoon would bring the hottest weather that I’d ridden in all year, and my longest ride in many, many a year. And on top of all of that I was tired. I was tired before I’d even begun, still recovering as I was from the sinus infection that had laid me low back in the Tetons, and the long ride from Cody to Thermopolis and then up through the Wind River Canyon – back in time and smack dab into the center of a raging thunderstorm. (See  Desire, Aspiration, and Doing What We Can .) But none of that was of any consequence anymore, for there was nothing left to do but ride. Now, it might seem as though having nothing left to do would epit...

Poetry and Zen, Part 1 left off with Ryokan sitting in a place beyond the words of even a master of poetry like himself; and yet he took the time to craft a poem that might allow us to share that view – however imperfect or incomplete words might be with respect to describing it. Why? Why did he bother? Why didn’t he simply spend the rest of his days advancing toward that buddha realm and enjoying the suchness of his mountain heaven? The Buddha himself, so the story goes, faced a similar quandary after realizing his enlightenment some 2,500 years ago. Should he simply remain where he was in that place of ultimate realization? Who was prepared to hear his teaching, after all? Who was capable of understanding it? Anyone? Central to Mahayana Buddhism is the bodhisattva vow – the vow to forego one’s own salvation until every other being is saved. Thus, a Zen poet like Ryokan might be motivated to make the most of his skill with words and his grasp of ultimate truth in order to be of ...