r June 1988 pRIMARY pOINT 5 tioning and corresponding doubt. It be­ fathom them. The koan cannot be under­ SPECIAL ISSUE comes a means to see through the false stood by the intellect through study and mind of duality that creates and per­ speculation. This is why it is said, "The petuates a life of pain, suffering and Buddha has no theories." One must direct­ Practice in America anxiety. Without the focus of the koan ly experience the truth out of which these Kong-an one can often feel torn, scattered, and koans arise- not just dwell in theories and alone. ideas. There is no need to arouse an artificial People ask how to use a koan. There sense of doubt, or "doubt mass" when is no one way to work on a koan. As an What Is A Koan? working on a koan. Just look! It's right old verse goes, "One way to awakening, a there. As Dogen Zenji observed, "imper­ thousand masters can't point it out." Yet manence and are before because koan work is an intense form of by Zenson Gifford, Sensei suffering right your eyes." And if you look and don't practice, it is best to work with a teacher. doesn't that make It is to have the assistance of one is a koan? This question itself From an early age we all question. As question, you question? helpful Who doesn't feel that in who has worked the koans him­ IS a for a koan can't be children are often wrenching pain through W�t koan, . grow, their questions the at the of the cold and home­ self/herself. A teacher answered or understood by the intellect. answered, explained, and rationalized guts sight good continually the abused the lives wasted tests a the work Mumonkan's comment, "You describe it until their natural curiosity begins to be less, children, student, always putting and the themsel­ back on him/her to resolve the mat­ in vain, you picture it but to no avail" is submerged. Yet sensitive persons, at one by drugs, people killing great . ves in senseless wars? Isn't this what ter. Without a teacher it is to be­ applicable to the koan. People persist, time or another, find themselves again very easy come or however, to ask, "What is a koan?" Is it a asking those same questions: "Where confused, go astray, to work oneself into direct expression of our true mind and did I come from? What is the meaning negative mind states or fool oneself therefore a means to awaken? Alternative­ of life? What happens when I die? that one has attained some­ ly, is it, as some have said, a dualistic Why is there so much hatred and a teacher is form of practice, or a Zen game? Let us violence? Who am I?". thing. Although he or she cannot look at some of the essential of important, aspects This mind is seen in questioning resolve the koan or do the the koan and to some of the respond the life of all spiritually sensitive criticisms made of this work for the student. practice. people and certainly in the lives of Another criticism of koan A koan is literally a precedent setting great masters in all traditions. has been that it is public record, or as one Zen master said, However, as we painfully see in our practice oriented and thus revol­ "it is the place where truth is." Generally own life and in the lives of loved ones, goal ves on the karmic level of speaking, koans are taken from live ex­ people often ignore, suppress or run and loss. one changes between Zen masters and ad­ away from these questions. They cover gain However, 'lJ·",· , can also-become vanced students, or between advanced them over with all sorts ofgames and goal'" . oriented in 'practitioners, or from sutras or ancient pleasures, and respond to them out of any practice- even a out of sit­ sayings. Most often koans are of a fear and ignorance. For some, making goal with a clear mind and paradoxical nature and cannot be grasped however, these questions and the deep ting no In koan by the intellect. Therefore a koan can need to know keep coming back. For having goals. there is noth­ only be understood through direct ex­ these persons there is no escape and no practice really to or achieve. The perience of the true mind out of which it rest. The great matter must be ing get best to work on the originat�d. resolved. This urgency and question­ way just koan is to let it work on The sayings and exchanges that be­ ing is often triggered by a personal life you, that is all crisis. Sometimes this leads one to a because ultimately came koans were compiled into various there is to do. texts such as the Mumonkan and the Blue "natural koan" such as "who am I?", or . "what is the of existence?" Cliff Record. These were, and still are, meaning In getting through a first Zens�� Sensei, an ordained Ze� Buddhist For the Zen it lead to Gifford, and with used as manuals for Zen Koans practitioner, may . koan, subsequent training. priest, began zazen practice under Kapleau. � , of one of the formal koans. Phillip can can basically be divided into two adoption kOan�work;'there 6'�-fhe Roshi in 1970 at the age of21.After- completing.his.jor­ of how one comes to a .' falsesense of some­ the or . Regardless attaining categories: primary, mal training in 1979, he continued full-time anhe� once arrived it becomes an ef. This can lead to and the "sub­ koan, at, thing. "breakthrough" koan, Rochester Zen Centeruntil leaving for an extended fective to focus natural a koans. of break­ way question­ spiritual pride and become sequent" Examples pilgrimage in 1981. During his pilgrimage, he lived in on a level. All of one's real hindrance to koans would be: "Who am ing spiritual practice. through "Mu", a and a under Harada and for Japan for year half, training "What is and "What is the deep questioning longing Teachers must be constantly I?", mind?", Roshi. In 1981 he was named Dharma Heir to liberation is focused in the koan. Tangen the students' sound of one the showing grasp­ hand?" The role of Roshi Kapleau. Zenson Gifford Sensei is currently mind to them. This can koan is to smack or break Critics have that a ing breakthrough suggested using- Abbot of the Northern Zen Sangha, with centers in be effectively done with the through the dualistic, conceptual thought formal koan involves substituting Toronto, Canada and Warsaw, Poland. koans themselves, of consciousness based on a false sense of someone else's question/problem for many which show us that even brings people to Zen practice- not as an we think we are escape or a means to cope- but in order to though getting something there is to Teachers ':4 koan is a means to be able to bring insight and strength to really nothing get. must also make koans directly truly help? subsequent relevant to modem times, eventually our Some scholars contend that in early . focus natural, questioning bringing students to the ongoing life/prac- times chose koan as many people practice tice beyond the formal koans. a to with the way grapple suffering they \ I mind to the bar­ One important aspect of koan training penetrate through experienced. The koan gives one the 1\ is that a student must before chance to strongly practice, not only constantly go 1 � his or her teacher in dokusan (interview, a 1 riers delusion and to awaken to while sitting in zazen but in the midst of \ of which in itself is life's turmoil. It provides the concrete process good training). j In the breakthrough koan practice stu­ our true nature." means to break through the- bonds of suf­ \ dents must demonstrate the truth of the i fering in times of strife and uncertainty. koan and can't theories 'or an self. one's mind is one's own merely present ego-I Thus, opened question/problem. However, With intense effort the breakthrough ideas. see their false notions in the to the endless fundamental don't all share the same fundamen-. They beginningless, beings koan takes one's natural questioning the teacher holds them or truth of the universe--in there is tal of existence? the ob-' mirror before essence, questions Despite and beyond thought perception, beyond have the of deluded notions cut out an to one's nature. vious differences in times and legs awakening sovereign cultures, the relative and the to awaken to absolute, from under them. In koan koans are used to aren't we all concerned with the same subsequent Subsequent perfect that which has been there but has always there is a constant for one's to free one basic our ancestors were con­ practice refining spiritual understanding, problems been obscured clouds of delusion. This by there is more to from the bonds of and cerned with? If don't look at the always "not-do", yet not lingering delusion, you just is like some­ breaking through recalling to leave undone.. to into one's branches, aren't fears, integrate awakening daily people's hopes, thing always known yet somehow forgot­ life. and sorrows arising from the same If anything, the koan involves joys ten. It's comparable to turning a light on practice root, the same karmic wheel of cause and a of false notions rather than a What is the special power of this uni­ in a dark room.