“Earth house hold” (Publication, 1969)
Year
1969
Text
Snyder, Gary. Earth house hold. (New York, N.Y. : New Directions, 1969). [Enthält Eintragungen über China]. (Sny17)
Type
Publication
Contributors (1)
Snyder, Gary
(San Francisco, Calif. 1930-) : Schriftsteller, Dichter, Professor of English, University of California Davis
[Reproduction of the texts with the permission by Gary Snyder, January 2013].
[Reproduction of the texts with the permission by Gary Snyder, January 2013].
Subjects
Literature : Occident : United States of America : Prose
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References / Sources
Chronology Entries (1)
| # | Year | Text | Linked Data |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1969 |
Snyder, Gary. Earth house hold [ID D29212]. Were it not for Kuang Chung, we should be wearing our hair unbound and our clothes buttoning on the left side. A man should stir himself with poetry Stand firm in ritual Complete himself in music Lun yü The sravaka disciplined in Tao, enlightened, but on the wrong path. If a Bodhisattva retains the thought of an ego, a person, a being, or a soul, he is no more a Bodhisattva. Fretting with the Huang Po doctrine of Universal Mind. What a thorny one. Government Confucianism, as in the Hsiao-ching / Filial Piety – a devilish sort of liberalism. Allowing you should give enough justice and food to prevent a revolution, yet surely keeping the people under the thumb. 'If you keep the taxes just low enough, the people will not revolt, and you'll get rich.' Movements against this psychology – the Legalistic rule of Ch'in ; Wang An-shih perhaps ? This is Chinese ; plus Blake's collected, Walden and sumi painting, pass the time. Poetry is to give access to persons – cutting away the fear and reserve and camping of social life : thus for Chinese poetry. Eroticism of China and Japan a dark shadowy thing – a perfumed cunt in a cave of brocades Usui. The term is literally 'cloud, water' – taken from a line of an old Chinese poem, To drift like clouds and flow like water. It is strictly a Zen term. The Japanese word for Buddhist monks and priest of all sects is bozu (bonze). One takes no formal vows upon becoming an Unsui, although the head is shaved and a long Chinese-style robe called koromo is worn within Sodo walls. Koans are usually short anecdotes concerning the incomprehensible and illogical behavior and language of certain key Chinese Zen Masters of the T'ang Dynasty… Roshi. Literally, 'old master' – Chinese Lao-shi. A Roshi is not simply a person who 'understands' Zen, but specifically a person who has received the seal of approval from his own Zen Master and is his 'Dharma heir'. The Jikijitsu sits at the head of the hall, marking the half-hour periods with wood clackers and bell. He keeps a stick of incense burning beside him, atop a small wood box that says 'not yet' on it in Chinese. Only the great wall of China could be seen from the moon. A higher sense of responsibility to holy ghosts and foolishness and mess. (The Chinese shot : A young man's love for a girl ; an old man viewing nature. All the different figures one becomes- old Japanese woodcutter ; exiled traveler in a Chinese scroll. In China it manifested as Taoism, not only Lao-tzu but the later Yellow Turban revolt and medieval Taoist secret societies ; and the Zen Buddhists up till early Sung. Russia and China today are among the world's staunchest supporters of monogamous, sexually turned-off families. The suspicion grew that perhaps the whole Western Tradition, of which Marxism is but a (Millennial Protestant) part, is off the truck. This led many people to study other major civilizations – India and China – to see what they could learn. It's an easy step from the dialectic of Marx and Hegel to an interest in the dialectic of early Taoism, the I ching, and the yin-yang theories. From Taoism, it is another easy step to philosophies and mythologies of India… It became evident that the 'truth' in Buddhism and Hinduism is not dependent in any sense on Indian or Chinese culture ; and that 'India' and 'China' – as societies – are as burdensome to human beings as any others ; perhaps more so. Peasant witchcraft in Europe, Tantrism in Bengal, Quakers in England, Tachikawa-ryû in Japan, Ch'an in China. These are all outcroppings of the Great Subculture which runs underground all through history. By civilized times, hunting was a sport of kings. The early Chinese mperors had vast fenced hunting reservies ; peasants were not allowed to shoot deer… One finds evidence in T'ang and Sung poetry that the barren hills of central and northern China were once richly forested. The Far Eastern love of nature has become fear of nature : gardens and pine trees are tormented and controlled. Chinese nature poets were too often retired bureaucrats living on two or three acres of trees trimmed by hired gardeners… 'Wild' in the Far East means uncontrollable, objectionable, crude, sexually unrestrained, violent ; actually ritually polluting. China cast off mythology, which means its own dreams, with hairy cocks and gaping pudenda, millennia ago… Christianity, Buddhism, Confucianism, temper the power of hunger of states and castles ; with emphasis on individual responsibility and liberation. Record of the life of the Ch'an master Po-chang Huai-hai [Bojang Whyhigh]. Transl. from the Ching-tê Chuan-têng Lu, 'Transmission of the Lamp' Ch. VI. Taisho Tripitaka 51.249b ff. Ma-tsu (Ta-chi) (?-788 AD) Po-chang Huai-hai (720-814) Huang Po (?-850) Lin-chi (?-867) (Rinzai) background and youth The Ch'an Master Huai-hai of Po-chang mountain in Hung-chou was from Chang-lo in Fu-chou. When he still had his hair tied in knots, he split from society. He was well-drilled in the 'Three Studies' (morality, meditation and wisdom). While Ma-tsu was teaching in Nan-k'ang, Huai-hai whole-heartedly became his disciple. Po-chang and His-t'ang Chih-ts'ang were called 'room-entering' disciples. At that time these two fine yogins were rivals in their Ch'an study. One evening the two were with Ma-tsu at the harvest moon-watching. Ma-tsu said "When it's just like this, what about it ?" His-t'ang replied, "A fine time to make an offering". Po-chang said, "A fine time to practice". Ma-tsu commented - "The sutras went into Ts'ang /'Tripitika'; meditation returned into Hai/'Sea'." he rolls up his mat Ma-tsu was to give a lecture ; people had gathered like clouds. He ascended to his place and sat a while. Then Po-chang rolled up his bowing mat. Thereupon Ma-tsu left the hall. One day Po-chang went to visit the Master Ma-tsu in the lecture hall. Ma-tsu took a flywhisk from the corner of his chair and fooled with it. Po-chang asked "Just this, or is there another way ?" Ma-tsu put it back saying "After this what will yu use to help men ?" Po-chang himself took the flywhisk and displayed it. Ma-tsu said "Just this, or is there another way ?" Po-chang hung the flywhisk up, and waited. Ma-tsu shouted "K'AAA !" he begins teaching From that time on, his thunder reverberated. Sure enough, some believers invited him to the Hsing-wu district in Hung- chou, to live at Mt. Ta-hsiung. Since he lived in a dangerously steep, mountainous place, they called him 'Po-chang' (Hundred Fathoms). Before he had been there a full year, students of the profound treasure had gathered like clouds from the four directions. Among them, Kuei-shan and Huang-po became the leaders. Po-chang and Huang-po One day the master addressed the group : "The Buddha-Dharma is not a small affair. I twice met with the Greater Master Ma's 'K'AAA! ' It deafened and blinded me three days." Huang-po hearing this, unconsciously stuck out his tongue* saying "I don't know Ma-tsu, and after all I never met him." I won't be Ma-tsu's heir" Huang-po replied. "Why ?" "– Afterwards I'd have no descendants". The Master said "That's so, that's so". (* From here to the end of this anecdote the Ming version is as follows : The Master said, "Aren't you going to become the heir of Ma-tsu? " Huang-po said "Indeed not. Today, because of your exposition, I have been able to see Ma-tsu's power in action. But I never knew him. If I were to be Ma-tsu's heir, afterwards I'd have no descendants." The Master said, "That's so, that's so. If your understanding is equal to your teacher's, you diminish his power by half. Only if you surpass your teacher, will you be competent to transmit. You are very well equipped to surpass your teacher.") the crying comrade One day a comrade came into the lecture hall weeping. The Master said "What's up ?" He replied "My father and mother have both died. Will the Master please set a date for their funeral service ?" The Master said "Come tomorrow and we'll bury them both at once". speak without using your mouth At lecture the Master said "Choke your throat, shut your mouth, now quickly speak" ! Kuei-shan said "I won't, you speak !" The Master said "I don't refuse to talk with you, but afterwards I'd have no heirs." Wu-feng said "The Master also should shut up". The Master said to him "If we were here alone, I'd be shading my eyes looking up at you". Yun-yen said "I also have something to say. Please ask the question again". "- Choke your throat, shut you mouth, speak quickly !" "- Now the Master has it !" Po-chang said : "I'll have no heirs". who'll go to Hsi-t'ang ? The Master said to the group "I need someone to carry a message to Hsi-t'ang, who'll go?” Wu-feng said "Me." "—How are you going to transmit the message?" Wu-feng said "When I see Hsi-t'ang I'll tell him." "—What will you say?" "—When I come back, I'll tell you." is there fire or not The Master and Kuei-shan were out working, and the Master asked "Is there fire?" "—There is". "Where?" Kuei-shan took a stick, blew on it two or three times and passed it to Po-chang. "This worm-eaten stick!" what is the Buddha like? Someone asked "What's the Buddha?" and Po-chang said "Who are you?" The Wayfarer said "Me". The Master said "Do you know 'me'?" "Clearly." The Master lifted his flywhisk, "Do you see?" "—I see." Po-chang said nothing more. the dinner drum Once when everyone was working together hoeing, a comrade heard the dinner drum and suddenly putting up his mattock with a big laugh he left. Po-chang said "Brilliant! This is the gate where Avalokitesvara enters the Principle." The Master returned to his quarters and sent for that comrade, asking, "What truth did you perceive just now to act thus?" "—I just heard the dinner drum pounding and went back to eat." The Master laughed. depending on the sutras Someone asked, "If we interpret in accordance with the sutras, the Buddhas of the Three Worlds hate sutras, every word, as though they were the chatter of demons. What about this?" Po-chang said "If we hang on tight to circumstances the Buddhas of the Three Worlds hate it; if we seek anywhere else outside this, it’s the chatter of demons." a comrade and Hsi-t'ang A comrade asked Hsi-t'ang, "There is a question and there is an answer. What about it when there's no question or answer?" Hsi-t'ang said "You mean to say you're afraid of rotting?" The Master heard about this and said "I've always wondered about that fellow Hsi-t'ang." The comrade asked the Master to comment on it. He said "The world of phenomena is not to be perceived." the hungry man and the full The Master said to the community "There's a man who doesn't eat for a long time—but doesn't say he’s starving; there's a man who eats every day but doesn't say he's full." No one could answer this. the needy man Yun-yen asked "For whom are you bustling about like this every day?" Po-chang replied “There's a man needs me.” Yen said "Why don't you let him do it himself?" "—He can't even make his own living." Bojang's Big Lecture A comrade asked "What about the Dharma-gate of Mahayana Sudden Enlightenment?" The Master said: "All of you: first stop all causal relationships, and bring the ten thousand affairs to rest. Good or not good, out of the world or in the world—don't keep any of these dharmas in mind. Don't have causally conditioned thoughts. Relinquish both body and mind and make yourself free, with a mind like wood or stone—making no discriminations. Then the mind is without action, and the mind-ground is like the empty sky. Then the sun of wisdom will appear by itself, like clouds opening and the sun coming out. Completely stop all involving causes: greed, anger, lust, attachment. Feelings of purity or impurity should be extinguished. As for the five desires and the eight lusts, one need not be bound by seeing, hearing, perceiving or knowing; or be deluded under any circumstance. Then you will be endowed with supernatural and mysterious power. Thus is the liberated man. As for all kinds of circumstances, the mind of such a man is without either tranquillity or disorder—neither concentrated or scattered. Then there is no obstruction to the complete comprehension of Sound and Form. Such may be called a man of Tao. He is bound in no way by good or bad, purity or impurity, or the uses of worldly happiness and wisdom. This is what we call Buddha-Wisdom. Right and wrong, pretty and ugly, reasonable and unreasonable—all intellectual discriminations are completely exhausted. Being unbound, his mental condition is free. Such a man may be called a Bodhisattva whose Bodhi-mind arrives the instant it sets out. Such can ascend directly to the Buddha lands. All the dharmas, basically, are not of themselves empty. They do not, themselves, speak of form; also they say nothing of right and wrong or purity and impurity; and they have no intention of binding men. The fact is that men themselves deludedly speculate and make several kinds of understanding and bring forth several kinds of intellectual discrimination. If feelings of purity and impurity could be exhausted, if one didn't dwell in attachments and didn't dwell in liberation— if there were absolutely no drawing-of-lines between conditioned and unconditioned—if the mind analyzed without making choices—THEN THAT MIND WOULD BE FREE. One would not be tangled up with illusion, suffering, the skandhas, samsara or the twelve links of the chain. Remote, unattached, completely without clinging. Going or staying without obstruction; entering into or coming out of Birth-and-Death is like going through opening gates. Even when that mind meets with various sorts of suffering and things that go wrong, that mind does not retreat groveling. Such a one is not concerned with fame, clothing or food. He doesn't covet merit or profit; he is not obstructed by social things. Though he may be brought up against pleasure or pain, he doesn't get involved. Coarse food sustains his life, patched clothes resist the weather. He is vacant, like a complete idiot or deaf man. If one has the least inclination toward broadly studying Understanding within samsara—seeking fortune and wisdom— it will add nothing to the Principle. Instead one will be hung up by the circumstances of understanding; and return to the sea of samsara. Buddha is an unseekable One: if you seek it you go astray. The Principle is an unseekable Principle; if you seek it you lose it. And if you manage not to seek, it turns to seeking. This Dharma has neither substance or emptiness. If you are able to flow through life with a mind as open and complete as wood or stone— then you will not be swept away and drowned by the skandhas, the five desires and the eight lusts. Then the source of Birth-and-Death will be cut off, and you will go and come freely. You will not in the least be bound by the conditions of karma. With an unfettered body you can share your benefits with all things. With an unfettered mind you can respond to all minds. With an unfettered wisdom you can loosen all bonds. You are able to give the medicine according to the disease. the comrade who had received precepts A comrade asked, "Now that I have taken these precepts my body and mouth are pure—I have already possessed only the good—have I not achieved liberation?" Po-chang said "To some degree you are liberated. But you are not yet mentally liberated. You don't yet have complete liberation." The comrade asked "What’s mental liberation?" "—Don't seek Buddha or understanding; exhaust feelings of pure and impure. Also don't hold on to this non-seeking as right. Don't dwell where you exhaust feelings, either. Don't dread the chains of Hell and don't love the pleasures of Paradise. Don't cling to any dharma whatsoever. Then you may begin to be called liberated without hindrance; then body and mind and all may be called liberated. You shouldn't say you have a small part of the good of the precepts, and take it to be enough. Though you may have mastered the countless-as-river-sands purities of the gates of Morality, Meditation and Wisdom, you have not yet touched on a fraction of an atom of it. Strive courageously and get down to work. Don't wait until your ears are blocked, your eyes clouded, your hair white and your face wrinkled; your body aged and suffering and your eyes filled with water; your mind filled with anxiety, and no place to go. When you get to that point you won't be able to even set your hands and feet in order. Even though you have fortune, wisdom and much information, it won't help you. Since the eye of your mind is not opened, and your thinking is connected with circumstances, you will not know how to reflect inwardly, and will be unable to see the Buddha-way. Then all the karma of your whole life will appear before you—whether it is pleasing or whether it is terrifying— the Six Roads and the five skandhas all appear visible before you. Because you have given reign to your own greediness what you see will all be transformed into the highly desirable: ornamenting houses, boats and carriages in glittering display. Attaching importance to what you see, your rebirths will not be free. Dragon, beast, freeman, slave—it's still all undecided." The comrade asked "How do you get freedom?" The Master answered "Now in regard to the five desires and eight lusts, have no feelings of either acceptance or rejection. Let 'purity' and 'impurity' be completely exhausted. Like the sun and the moon in the sky—shining without causal relationships. Have a mind like wood or stone; or like the mind of Gandhahasti—who cut the flow and went beyond, without obstruction. Such a man cannot be gathered in by either Heaven or Hell. Also, he doesn't read the sutras and scan teachings; language should pliably return into oneself. All verbal teachings merely illuminate his present understanding of his own nature. He is in no way being revolved by the dharmas of existence or non-existence. Such is a guiding master; able to see though all the dharmas of existence and non-existence. Such is the VAJRA. Then he has his portion of freedom and independence. If he cannot obtain it in this way, although he may be able to chant the twelve Vedas he only becomes arrogant, and this is slandering the Buddha, not a spiritual practice. From a worldly standpoint, reading sutras and observing the teachings is a good thing; but from the standpoint of an illumined person it obstructs men. Even a man who has mastered the Ten Stages (Dasabhumi) cannot avoid flowing along in samsara's river. There is no need to seek understanding via speech, values in words. Understanding belongs to greed, and greed turns into illness. If you can separate—right now—from all the dharmas of being and non-being—and pass straight through the “Three Phrases” then you will naturally be no different from the Buddha. If you yourself are Buddha, why worry that Buddha cannot speak? My only fear is that you are not Buddha, and that you will be revolved by the dharmas of being and non-being, and not be free. That is why, before Principle has been established, you will be carried about by happiness and wisdom. It's like the slave employing the master. Better to establish Principle first, and later have happiness and wisdom. At the proper time you'll get powers—you'll be able to take dirt and make gold, to turn seawater into buttermilk, to break Mount Sumeru down into dust; to take one meaning and make countless meanings; to take countless meanings and make one meaning." The Master had finished his talk, and the community was leaving the hall. Then he called after them, and they all turned their heads. He called "What is this?" Po-chang's death In the ninth year of Yuan Ho, T'ang dynasty, on the seventeenth day of the first month, the Master returned to the silence.. He was ninety-five. In the first year of the Ch'ang-ch'ing era (821 AD) he was given the Imperially-conferred posthumous title of "Ta-chih Ch'an Master." His stupa was titled "Great Precious Excelling Wheel." The Regulations of the Ch'an Line The Ch'an line, from the time of its founding by Bodhidharma, to the Sixth Patriarch, and on up to the time of Po-chang, usually made its quarters in the temples of the Vinaya sect. Although it had separate buildings, there was yet no agreement on rules concerning teaching and administration. The Ch'an Master Po-chang Ta-chih, constantly concerned about this, said: "The Way of the Patriarchs should be one of expanding and transforming mankind. We hope that it will not die out in the future. Why should we accord our practices with every detail of the Agamas (Theravada Vinaya rules)?" Someone said, "The 'Yoga-sastra' and the 'Ying-lo Ching' contain the Mahayana regulations. Why not follow them!" Po-chang said "What I follow isn't bound by the Great or Small Vehicles, and doesn't differentiate between them. We must strike a balance between the broad and the narrow, and establish rules that are suitable." Thereupon, beginning a new idea, he established entirely different meditation dwellings. In the community, everyone whose Dharma-eye is respectably powerful is called "Chang-lao" just as in India men of age and understanding were called "Subhuti", etc. After they have become "Transformers" or "Refiners" they live in the fang-chang room. Like Vimalakirti's room, it is without individual bedrooms. The reason that we build lecture halls, but no Buddha-halls, is to show that the Buddhas and Patriarchs personally appoint the Masters even today, and it is they who become the "Buddha". Students enter the Comrades' Hall, without distinction of many or few, high or low. In order of how many seasons they've spent, they arrange and set up long connected benches and put up clothes racks to hang their equipment on. They sleep with their pillows leaned against the edge of the bench, on the auspicious right side of the body, because they do zazen for long hours, and need a little rest. Thus they have all the Four Dignities (standing, sitting, walking and lying down). Aside from entering the Master's room to receive the teaching, students are permitted to be diligent or idle; the high and the low are not bound to a common rule. This whole group has study in the morning and an assembly in the evening. When the old chief ascends his high seat and gives a lecture, the leaders and the group stand in rows listening. The "Guest" and the "Host" trade questions and answers to display the principles of the Dharma—to display how they follow and live by the Dharma. Meals are held twice a day at suitable times, because it is necessary to be frugal, and to show that Dharma and food go together. When working outside, those of high and those of low rank work equally hard. Po-chang established ten offices and called them "liao-she" ("huts"). Each office has one man as chief, who is in charge of a number of men who each look after the affairs of their own department. Item: the man in charge of cooking is called "The rice head". The man in charge of vegetables is called "The greens head". The others all follow this pattern. If there is someone who has falsely taken the name and stolen the form of a comrade, muddying the pure community and obstructing its affairs, then the welfare worker (Wei-na) investigates, removes his nameplate and clothes rack, and has him leave the grounds. The reason for this is to preserve the peace of the community. If that person has actually transgressed in some serious way then he should be beaten with a staff; assemble the group and burn his robe, bowls and equipment, and chase him out by a side gate. This shows his disgrace. Being particular about this one custom has four advantages: First, not muddying the pure community will give birth to reverence and faith. Item: if the three inheritances (word, deed and thought) are not good, men cannot live together. In accordance with the customs it is sometimes appropri¬ate to use the “Brahma Altar” method to regulate someone [ostracizing an offender with total silence]. Some persons must be thrown out of the community— when the community is tranquil, reverence and faith will grow. Secondly, the forms of the comrades are not destroyed, and the Buddhist precepts are complied with. Item: punish offenders properly, if they were allowed to keep their robes you'd regret it later. Third, this way you don't trouble the law courts, and you keep out of criminal litigation. Fourth, it doesn't leak to outsiders—this protects the harmony of the tradition. Item: when people come from all over to live together, what distinguishes the common man and the sage? Even when the Tathagata was in the world there were six classes of common monks; how much more today, in the decline of the Dharma, we cannot hope to have absolutely none. If one comrade com¬mits an error, and all the other comrades make accusations, they surely don't realize that they are demeaning the community and destroying the Dharma; how great this destruction is. If the Ch'an group of these days wishes to move without hindrance, we must rely on Po-chang's Thick Grove regulations to manage affairs. Furthermore, it is not on account of the worthy ones that we set up a law guarding against transgressions. It is better to have rules and no faults, than it is to have faults and no rules. With Master Po-chang's protection, the Dharma has flourished and grown! That the Ch’an Line is nowadays standing foremost can be traced to Po-chang. We have related the essentials and displayed them for comrades of future generations, that they forget not their roots. The complete rules are provided at all "Mountain Gates". (I am indebted to Dr. Yoshitaka IRIYA, Head of the Chinese Department of Nagoya University, and Fellow of the Jimbun Kagaku Kenkyusho, Kyoto, for valuable help in this translation.) |
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Cited by (1)
| # | Year | Bibliographical Data | Type / Abbreviation | Linked Data |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zentralbibliothek Zürich | Organisation / ZB |
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