The Religion of the Samurai: A Study of Zen Philosophy and Discipline in China and JapanNukariya, Kaiten
Religion
The Religion of the Samurai: A Study of Zen Philosophy and Discipline in China and Japan
Nukariya, Kaiten
Buddhism -- China; Buddhism -- Japan; China -- Religion; Human beings -- Origin; Japan -- Religion; Zen Buddhism
--The Song of the Sannyasin.
3. Buddha is Unnamable.
Give a definite name to Deity, He would be no more than what the name
implies. The Deity under the name of Brahman necessarily differs
from the Being under the appellation of Jehovah, just as the Hindu
differs from the Jew. In like manner the Being designated by God
necessarily differs from One named Amitabha or from Him entitled
Allah. To give a name to the Deity is to give Him tradition,
nationality, limitation, and fixity, and it never brings us nearer to
Him. Zen's object of worship cannot be named and determined as God,
or Brahman, or Amitabha, or Creator, or Nature, or Reality, or
Substance, or the like. Neither Chinese nor Japanese masters of Zen
tried to give a definite name to their object of adoration. They now
called Him That One, now This One, now Mind, now Buddha, now
Tathagata, now Certain Thing, now the True, now Dharma-nature, now
Buddha-nature, and so forth. Tung Shan[FN#141] (To-zan) on a certain
occasion declared it to be "A Certain Thing that pillars heaven above
and supports the earth below; dark as lacquer and undefinable;
manifesting itself through its activities, yet not wholly comprisable
within them." So-kei[FN#142] expressed it in the same wise: "There
exists a Certain Thing, bright as a mirror, spiritual as a mind, not
subjected to growth nor to decay." Huen Sha (Gen-sha) comparing it
with a gem says: "There exists a bright gem illuminating through the
worlds in ten directions by its light."[FN#143]
[FN#141] Tung Shan Luh (To-zan-roku, 'Sayings and Doings of Ta-zan')
is one of the best Zen books.
[FN#142] So-kei, a Korean Zenist, whose work entitled Zen-ke-ki-kwan
is worthy of our note as a representation of Korean Zen.
[FN#143] Sho-bo-gen-zo.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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