February 1965
Originally offered: February 1st, 1965 | Modified October 27th, 2009 by Shunryu Suzuki Roshi
MODEL SUBJECT NO. 82
FROM THE BLUE CLIFF RECORDS
DAIRYŪ”S IMMUTABLE LAW-BODY
Translation and Commentary by Reverend Suzuki
Introductory Word:
Introducing, Engo said: Only a man with open eyes knows the catgut line of the fishing rod. Only an advanced mind catches the true idea of the extraordinary procedure. What is the catgut line of the fishing rod and the extraordinary procedure
Main Subject:
Attention! A monk asked Dairyū, “The physical body is disintegrating, but what about the immutable spiritual body
”
Note:
As you may see, this monk is apparently asking a question based on a dualistic idea: an immutable spiritual body and as a disintegrating physical body. However, not speaking of Zen experience or pure Enlightenment, according to the Buddhist philosophical canon: every existence has the same essential nature which is spiritual and physical, permanent and impermanent.
The constituents of every existence are supposed to be the five aggregates (skandhas): matter (rūpa), feeling (vedanā), ideas (samjñā), volition and other faculties (samskāra), and pure sensation and consciousness (vijñāna). Each existence is spiritual as well as material because these constituent elements are sense data itself or the so-called five doors. These elements are not substantial or idealistic, but are pure momentary flashes (of appearance) in the phenomenal world.
Space and time are the same as each existence, and existence can be viewed in two ways. One is as an endlessly changing continuity (in this sense nothing really exists), and the other view is that the world is an eternal moment: each existence manifested in each moment and manifested again in each successive moment. These two views are two sides of one coin, but for this Model Subject let us concentrate on the second view. From this view each momentary existence seems to be independent and disconnected from existence in successive moments. In each moment each existence is perfect and immutable. Although this is true, each existence arises moment after moment contiguous to the existence which came before it and to the one which will come after it and also concurrent with all existences in each moment. Between each successive manifestation of existence there is no connection and yet there is a connection which is in a realm beyond our intelligibility.
This is an intellectual interpretation of the non-duality of duality. Our intellectual desire for the non-duality of duality is really at the same time an absolute desire for attaining the oneness of duality in the pure experience of Zen practice, and our intellectual desire gives rise to right effort (to improve our true Zen life).
However, when the monk asked Dairyū, “The physical body is disintegrating, how about the Immutable spiritual body
” his intellect was content with an external observation of the world. His practice was probably aimed at the attainment of some psychological state, and was probably not based on the inmost claim of the essential nature of all existence (as we have discussed it).
There is a saying that if you want a true answer and true meaning, don”t ask a question which is based on a dualism (some aspect of a dualistic conception of the world). You cannot understand the meaning of our existence with dualistic ideas. But when you are through with dualistic conceptions and have attained the non-duality of duality, then you will understand the true meaning of the phenomenal world as well as the immutable Law-Body (Dharmakāya Buddha).
Dairyū knew that if he answered the monk”s question in a dualistic form, the monk would not be able to get free dualistic ideas, an…
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