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Whatever spiritual or religious tradition we follow (or don’t follow, as the case may be), it doesn’t have to hinder us in our commitment to see reality and to be real. Notice that I don’t say what’s “true,” because as we’ve learned throughout history, truth can be a matter of opinion. And often, truths derive from the very tradition one follows. And that can be troublesome.
It’s important to realize and remember that traditions, of whatever kind, are built on top of what is. They’re like the constellations that the ancients drew over the stars in the sky. There’s no big dipper or little dipper in the sky; no Orion or Leo or Cassiopeia. These are products of the imaginations of some very clever people who lived hundreds or thousands of years ago. We know what the stars are now, and thanks to some very smart people, we know where they are in relation to us. And we know that they don’t conform to the fanciful figures we have drawn around them.
In the Eastern spirituality we study, some ancient masters actually caution us about hewing too closely to tradition. Take the 5th century Indian master, Bodhidharma, who is said to have brought a form of Buddhism into China. Bodhidharma taught that his teaching represented:
A special transmission outside the scriptures,
Not depending on words and letters;
Directly pointing to the mind
Seeing into one’s true nature and attaining Buddhahood.
Now, we’re all familiar with these words. Old Bodhidharma kind of established a tradition of his own, didn’t he? He probably didn’t realize his description would come to be that, but nonetheless, we still put much store in his description. Five hundred years after the old man lived. And even he drew on his own tradition when he spoke of “attaining Buddhahood.” By Buddhahood, he meant “awakening,” or at least that’s our current understanding.
Jesus, too, invoked tradition in his teaching – sometimes the Hebrew scriptures, sometime stories that he used to convey a meaning. Here’s a passage from Matthew, Chapter 13, in which Jesus tells why he used stories in his teaching. This is from a contemporary New Testament translation known as The Message (see https://www.bible.com/bible/compare/MAT.13.10-17). This translation is said to use colloquial language that’s supposedly easier to read and understand than the older versions we’re familiar with. (Note that I’m not recommending this version; I just found it interesting.) Here:
The disciples came up and asked, “Why do you tell stories?” He replied, “You’ve been given insight into God’s kingdom. You know how it works. Not everybody has this gift, this insight; it hasn’t been given to them. Whenever someone has a ready heart for this, the insights and understandings flow freely. But if there is no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. That’s why I tell stories: to create readiness, to nudge the people toward a welcome awakening. …”
These lines don’t exactly parallel what Bodhidharma described, but they convey a similar meaning. What’s real doesn’t necessarily come from the words a teacher says, or even from sacred scripture, but from the “ready heart” that is created when people hear a story and see into it. This, Jesus says, can “nudge the people toward a welcome awakening.” See into story – that’s the operative phrase.
In ancient China, some masters went so far as to dispense with any allegiance to or residence in a particular Buddhist monastery. And later, in Japan, such “rebel” masters as Bassui (1327 – 1387), Ikkyu (1394 – 1491), and Bankei (1622 – 1693) disdained the trappings and politics of monasteries and even, to varying degrees, the authority of Buddhist scriptures and rituals. For instance, here is Bankei (from Bankei Zen, © 1984, tr. Peter Haskel and Yoshito Hakeda, Grove Weidenfeld, New York, p. 8):
I don’t teach people by quoting from the words of the buddhas and patriarchs. Since I can manage simply by dealing with people’s own selves, there’s no need on top of that to quote the words of the buddhas and patriarchs. I don’t talk about Buddhism, and I don’t talk about Zen. There’s really no need to talk about these things. Since I can manage perfectly just by dealing with people’s own selves as they are right here today, there’s no need for me to talk about Buddhism, or Zen either. …
It seems that old Bankei has just dealt a blow to even this very Dharma talk! Oh, dear …
Now, I’m not saying that tradition and scripture and ritual are useless. Not by any means are these bastions of spiritual practice superfluous. Words can transmit to us inspiration and ideas that are crucial to our embrace of the transcendent wisdom and experience of those who came before us – those who saw deeply into that wisdom. But, we are best served when we commit not just to the words and ideas themselves, but to our shared experience of the reality they’re trying to awaken in us. At least this is how I see the matter.
It’s not necessary or advisable to discard or abandon or even question our spiritual or religious tradition. We should just be mindful of when we are falling into line behind it – into lock-step with it – and when we are seeing through it to experience and embrace what is real within it.
We must keep our hearts and minds open in order to see beyond the finger that points to the moon and experience the moon itself. Or, as Bankei says, to experience “people’s own selves as they are right here today.”
Just this.
Thank you.
EMPTY CLOUD ZEN 