Azedia

In This Lifetime
by nyogen senzaki

I could show you my clenched fist and open it like this-and bid you all good night.  Unfortunately, however, educated on this side of the Pacific, you Westerners are somewhat deficient in intuitive matters, and so I am forced to give as a substitute, dualistic explanations, though that’s not at all the way to express Zen.

Man began by assuming that the things about which he wished to learn existed outside of himself. Wondering what that is, he established so-called “science,” which is the study of thatness. Soon, however, he discovered that his science explained only how things are, not what they are, and so man turned inward. Seeking to understand what this is, he established psychology and epistemology. Together these constitute the study of thisness. But, paradoxically enough, when the mind itself thus became an object of study, it ceased being this and became that. The experience of true thisness had been rendered impossible by the very nature of man’s science (which can only understand thatness).

Of course Zen monks in China and Japan do not traffic at all in thisness or thatness. Somehow they manage to live quite happily and peacefully, for all that! Do you want to know the trick? They dwell in the region of what is known as suchness.

there’s more | flower sermon

Share This