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Secrets of the Blue Cliff Record

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Secrets of the Blue Cliff Record “Authentic traditions of commentary have been hard to find— until this fluidly translated work, which includes commentaries by two of the greatest Zen masters of early modern Japan . their words shine light on this deep and extraordinary work.” —Tricycle “These commentaries make the challenges of the Zen masters available to the spiritually courageous among us.” —Bodhi Tree Book Review ABOUT THE BOOK The Blue Cliff Record is a classic text of Zen Buddhism, designed to assist in the activation of dormant human potential. The core of this extraordinary work is a collection of one hundred traditional citations and stories, selected for their ability to bring about insight and enlightenment. These vignettes are known as gongan in Chinese and koan in Japanese. Secrets of the Blue Cliff Record is a fresh translation featuring newly translated commentary from two of the greatest Zen masters of early modern Japan, Hakuin Ekaku (1685–1768) of the Rinzai sect of Zen and Tenkei Denson (1648–1735) of the Soto sect of Zen. This translation and commentary on the Blue Cliff Record sheds new light on the meaning of this central Zen text. THOMAS CLEARY holds a PhD in East Asian Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University and a JD from the University of California, Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law. He is the translator of over fifty volumes of Buddhist, Taoist, Confucian, and Islamic texts from Sanskrit, Chinese, Japanese, Pali, and Arabic. Sign up to learn more about our books and receive special offers from Shambhala Publications. Or visit us online to sign up at shambhala.com/eshambhala. SECRETS OF THE BLUE CLIFF RECORD Zen Comments by Hakuin and Tenkei Translated by Thomas Cleary SHAMBHALA Boston & London 2013 Shambhala Publications, Inc. Horticultural Hall 300 Massachusetts Avenue Boston, Massachusetts 02115 www.shambhala.com © 2000 by Thomas Cleary All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Library of Congress catalogs the hardcover edition of this book as follows: Secrets of the Blue cliff record: Zen comments by Hakuin and Tenkei/ translated by Thomas Cleary. Selections of Hakuin’s and Tenkei’s commentaries on Blue cliff record, compiled and translated by Thomas Cleary. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. eISBN 978-0-8348-2883-4 ISBN 1-57062-738-X (hardcover) ISBN 1-57062-912-9 (pbk.) 1. Yüan-wu, 1063–1135. Pi yen lu. 2. Koan—Early works to 1800. I. Hakuin, 1686–1769. II. Denson, 1648–1735. III. Cleary, Thomas F., 1949– IV. Yüan-wu, 1063–1135. Pi yen lu English Selections V. Title. BQ9289.Y823 Z46 2001 294.3′44—dc21 00-058329 CONTENTS Translator’s Introduction 1. The Highest Meaning of the Holy Truths 2. The Supreme Way is without Difficulty 3. Sun Face Buddha, Moon Face Buddha 4. Bundle and All 5. A Grain of Rice 6. A Good Day 7. Asking about Buddha 8. Eyebrows 9. Joshu’s Four Gates 10. Thieving Phony 11. Gobblers of Dregs 12. Three Pounds of Flax 13. Snow in a Silver Bowl 14. An Appropriate Statement 15. An Upside-Down Statement 16. The Man in the Weeds 17. The Meaning of the Coming from the West 18. The Seamless Monument 19. Fingertip Zen 20. The Meditation Brace 21. Lotus Blossoms 22. The Turtle-Nosed Snake 23. The Summit of the Mystic Peak 24. The Iron Grindstone 25. The Hermit’s Staff 26. The Peak of Great Valor 27. The Body Exposed in the Autumn Wind 28. Not Mind or Buddha 29. The Aeonic Fire 30. Big Radishes 31. Carrying the Ringed Staff 32. Standing There 33. The Symbol of the Circle 34. Five Elders Peak 35. Questions and Answers 36. Roaming the Mountains 37. Nothing in the World 38. The Workings of the Iron Ox 39. A Flowering Hedge 40. A Flower 41. One Who Has Experienced the Great Death 42. Nice Snow 43. No Cold or Heat 44. Knowing How to Beat a Drum 45. Joshu’s Cloth Shirt 46. The Sound of Raindrops 47. Not Contained by Six 48. Making Tea 49. Passing Through the Net 50. Concentration on Every Atom 51. Going Back Inside with Lowered Head 52. The Stone Bridge of Joshu 53. Wild Ducks 54. Extending Both Hands 55. Won’t Say 56. Breaking Through Three Barriers 57. Nondiscrimination 58. Couldn’t Explain for Five Years 59. The Supreme Way 60. A Staff Turns into a Dragon 61. One Particle 62. Hidden in the Mountain of Form 63. Killing a Cat 64. Straw Sandals 65. A Hindu Questions Buddha 66. Getting the Sword 67. Expounding a Scripture 68. A Big Laugh 69. Nansen’s Circle 70. Mouth Shut (I) 71. Mouth Shut (II) 72. Mouth Shut (III) 73. Permutations of Assertion and Denial 74. The Rice Pail 75. Unjust Beating 76. Have You Eaten? 77. A Piece of Cake 78. Awakened People Bathe 79. All Sounds 80. On Rushing Water 81. The Elk of Elks 82. The Physical Body 83. The Mixing of the Ancient Buddhas 84. Nonduality 85. A Tiger’s Roar 86. The Kitchen Pantry and the Main Gateway 87. Medicine and Disease 88. Three Kinds of Handicap 89. Hands and Eyes All Over 90. Wisdom 91. The Rhinoceros 92. Buddha Takes the High Seat 93. A Dance 94. Not Seeing 95. Two Kinds of Speech 96. Three Pivotal Sayings 97. Scornful Revilement 98. Two Mistakes 99. The Ten-Bodied Tamer 100. The Razor-Sharp Sword Further Reading E-mail Sign-Up TRANSLATOR’S INTRODUCTION The Blue Cliff Record is a classic text of Zen Buddhism, specially designed to assist in the activation of dormant human potential. The core of this extraordinary work is a collection of one hundred traditional citations and stories, selected by one of the greatest masters for their Zen impact on the mind. These vignettes, known as gongan in Chinese and koan in Japanese and English, are intended to foster specific perceptions and insights whose absorption in experience enable the mind to work in a more coherent and comprehensive manner than conventional education can produce. Japanese Zen tradition speaks of seventeen hundred koans to represent the totality of Zen lore. In reality there are far more than seventeen hundred classical koans extant, as well as a cumulative body of commentary on more than one thousand of them. The reputation of the Blue Cliff Record as an unrivaled classic in its field was thus established in a most rigorous atmosphere of spiritual inquiry. In its total spectrum of Zen teachings, the Blue Cliff Record contains some of the most popular koans as well as some of the most obscure, with pragmatic comments and explanations by two of the greatest expositors of Zen. The Blue Cliff Record was so popular in China from the time of its first publication in the twelfth century that it was temporarily suppressed in the next generation because people memorized it and repeated its sayings as slogans instead of absorbing the living Zen meanings. Several versions continued to exist in manuscript nonetheless, and a new, emended edition was published in the fourteenth century. In Japan, where it has been a tool of Zen study for more than seven hundred years, the Blue Cliff Record is traditionally called the foremost book of Zen. By far the greatest number of secondary commentaries on the Blue Cliff Record as a total text were composed in Japan over the last few centuries. The complete text of the Blue Cliff Record, translated from the original Chinese, has now been available in English for nearly a quarter of a century. In spite of the difficulties inherent in a work like the Blue Cliff Record, and in spite of the ready availability of less disconcerting approaches to religion, psychology, and spirituality, the Western audience of this remarkable Zen classic continues to grow. In the years since the Blue Cliff Record has been available in English, many other traditional Zen texts have also been translated. A considerable context for this classic has thus been established, but authentic commentarial traditions on the text of the Blue Cliff Record itself have hitherto been unavailable to the public, indeed unavailable even to the majority of specialists in the field. The present volume addresses this gap in the East-West transmission of Zen lore with commentaries on the Blue Cliff Record by two of the greatest Zen masters of early modern Japan, Hakuin Ekaku of the Rinzai sect of Zen (1685–1768) and Tenkei Denson of the Soto sect of Zen (1648–1735). Hakuin and Tenkei were two of the outstanding figures in the reformation of Zen in Japan during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Through their writing and teaching, both of them contributed to the revitalization of near-senile Zen, each one emitting a brilliant burst of energy with a residual force of uncommon power. The koans forming the core of the Blue Cliff Record were originally selected by the great Chinese Zen master Hsueh-tou (980–1052; pronounced Setcho in Japanese) and compiled into a collection with an illustrative verse for each example. This work was then taken up by another great Zen master, Yuan-wu (1063–1135; pronounced Engo in Japanese), who added his own introductions and commentaries to both the original koans and Hsueh-tou’s verses. The final product of these efforts was the Blue Cliff Record, which has remained a monumental classic of Zen even up to the present day. In the Buddhist lands of eastern Asia, Zen has often been regarded as the most subtle and sophisticated of all schools of Buddhism, and the classics of Zen, intended to affect the mind at an uncommonly deep level, are among the most challenging literature ever produced by any culture.
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