Oxherding Picture Number One
By Ruben Habito
We have started a series addressing The Ten
Oxherding Pictures which come from the Zen tradition as an
expression of the path to self-realization. Each of the ten
Oxherding pictures represents a stage along the way. Today, we
will address the first oxherding picture.
The first picture in the series of ten is one where we see a
little child beginning to search for something. So, it is the
beginning of the search for the true self. There is a commentary
entitled Riding the Ox Home, by Willard Johnson, which presents
an interpretative title for this picture: In the beginning,
struggling to emerge from confusion.
Today we would like to just look at some elements pertaining to
our own search, that enable us to appreciate what is going on,
wherever we may be in the path.
Before going into greater detail, let me just recall one
important point in the general introduction offered last time.
What we have here is not just a linear progression wherein the
first is the lowest and the tenth is the highest. Instead, we are
invited to see it in a circular movement.
* * *
Wherever we are, whatever stage we are in,
that is part of the circle, and that constitutes a manifestation
of our true self. Each stage has its own place in the full circle
that is our true self.
One of the koans that those who have experienced some glimpses of
this world of enlightenment are presented with, or challenged
with, has a passage that goes like this: each step is full and
complete. And yet, that fact, that each step already contains a
fullness, does not make us just stop there and not take the next
step. Each step has to be taken in its own due time. And yet,
each step is a fullness to it, so that we are not just saying,
well, I am not complete yet, because I haven’t taken the
next step.
We are invited to experience each step as full, just as it is. So
when we are in a certain stage, we are invited to simply let
ourselves be there, and let that stage take care of itself, and
let that situation be truly a mark of that circular journey where
each step manifests a fullness and yet which leads to the other.
If we are to present this in terms that would also resonate with
a theme in the Christian tradition, we say that the Reign of God
is already there, but also, it is not yet. Now, in conceptual
language these would seem to cancel each other out: already
there, not yet. But seen from within, namely that reality that is
called the Reign of God which signifies an entry of the Infinite
into our finite lives, we realize we are already there. We have
been there right from the start. There was never a time when we
were not, if we can talk along those terms of time and so on. One
other way of putting this is thus: God’s Infinity covers all
time and all space, and therefore there is no place conceivable
that God is not, just by the very nature of what God is by
definition. And yet, in that very realization we experience also
the invitation to continue to manifest it more fully. There is
this paradox of our human existence that we are incomplete
historical beings, moving toward completion in the fullness of
time. God is there every step, and yet, the following step must
be taken.
* * *
So the first step then, involves the
awakening to begin the journey. What goes before that? Well, just
from the implication, we can say that there was a stage of just
being in slumber, of not being awakened at all.
Now, rather than going into too much conceptual detail, let me
offer some illustrations of actual persons who have manifested
this stage in their own path. The first person whom we are
invited to look at is Shakyamuni himself. He was born in the 5th
century or so, BCE. There are differences in scholars’
opinions about the actual birth dates. But in any case, around
the 5th century there was a man born of a royal family, whose
clan owned a big domain in Northern India at that time, which now
is under the territory of Nepal. This young man was named
Siddhartha, which by the way means, one called to complete one’s
being. “Artha” is “goal” or “meaning”
or “purpose” and several other related meanings, and
“Siddha” means to complete. So Siddhartha is a name
that already indicates the actual destiny that this person was
called to realize in his earthly life.
He was born of this kingly clan, and was already destined at
birth to inherit his father's realm. And so, given the
appropriate time, he was destined to become a ruler of that
domain. In a sense, he had nothing more to worry about in life:
everything was taken care of. From his birth, all the stars were
in his favor. He had everything anyone could have wished for in
this earthly life. And yet, somehow, the puzzle is, why would
such a person at 29, set all that aside, really literally divest
himself of everything, and begin a journey seeking “something
more.”
So, again we are told in many of those traditional accounts about
his life that up to that stage his father had tried to ensure
that he would not be exposed to any experience of want or of
suffering. So he was brought up within the palace; given
everything that he would want and so on. His father sought to
assure him that he would be granted all the material and other
needs that one could imagine. And yet, for some reason or other,
he was not satisfied with that. Now, for some reason or other, is
precisely our paradoxical way of saying it. And so, what we can
learn in looking at Gautama’s life, is that even given all
the material satisfaction that a human being can ever want, that
just is not enough. This reminds us of a song that was popular in
the ‘60s or ‘70s, of Peggy Lee who sang “Is That
All There Is?” Now, we may be at a point where everything
goes our way, and yet some twinge of conscience makes us ask,
“Is that all there is?”
* * *
Somehow the human spirit is called to
something greater than whatever material satisfactions can ever
fulfill. So this twinge from our inner voice trying to rouse us
from slumber, seems to be what has propelled many of the great
individuals who have contributed to human culture.
In the Christian tradition, so many of the saints began their
journey with that big question, “is that all there is?”
They began a quest for “something more.” In the Jesuit
tradition, its founder, Ignatius of Loyola, was already in his
early thirties when he began his search. Up to that time he had
been spending all his time and energy trying to gain honors and
prestige at the court of Spain. He was just engaged with all his
energy upon winning the attention of royal personages, especially
the
noble ladies, so that he would win their favors and therefore
rise in the ranks. At one point, he was wounded in a battle, and
that left him hospitalized for about 6 months. But during those 6
months of recuperation, he was able to take stock of his life,
and he felt a big twinge of emptiness and a longing grew in him
which propelled him to understand a sense of a gap in his
existence. He also noticed the sense of fullness he would
experience whenever he would read lives of saints.
Here were individuals who lived not so much to fulfill the
material wants, or drives for power and money and self glory and
so on, but lived fully dedicated to the service of God and
others. So somehow he felt that, looking at his future, he too
was called to a search on the spiritual level. This gave him a
very, very deep and inexorable sense of peace and
fulfillment that enabled him to see through all his worldly and
vain pursuits that had occupied him before, and he simply
realized that this was not the way he was meant to pursue his
life. And again, we don’t need to go into the details, but
to make a long story short, from that time on he undertook a path
which lead him to a spiritual search that eventually enabled him
also to lead others in that kind of path based on his own
experiences.
Now let us go back to the life of Gautama. He had all the
material things that anyone could ever imagine that a human would
ever want: all the material wealth that he needed to maintain his
physical life; all the emotional support from a family; he had a
child at that age of 29 when he began his search. He also had the
realization that he could have a lot of worldly benefits---all
the things that human beings look for: power, authority, wealth,
prestige and so on. And yet, the question for him was, is this
all that I am called to live for? And so, again, to make a long
story short, it is said that he saw his fellow human beings in
different states of suffering; he saw human beings in states of
sickness, states of growing old and therefore losing their
capacities to function as a healthy human being, and he also saw
death in the face and realized this is also something that will
happen to me.
So, face to face with these realities, the big question came:
what is life all about? And how can I really discover that true
peace that will enable me to live content with myself and at
peace with the world? So that was the beginning of his search.
And as I have already noted, he left everything: his social
position, all his material wealth, and so on. He began his
search, which took him six years, until the experience of great
awakening.
* * *
We will talk about that in our continuing
teishos dealing with the Ten Oxherding Pictures. At this point,
what I would like to invite everyone, is to ask yourselves: What
were the circumstances that precipitated the search in my case?
Where, in my own life did I begin this search? And maybe if we
can come back to that original point or that point in our own
historical journey where the questioning began, perhaps we can
again recover some of that zeal, some of that enthusiasm, some of
that freshness that was ours when we began the search. This is
so, especially along the way, if we are in this search for some
time now and we’re beginning to get bogged down in some kind
of routine. It is refreshing to come back to that point where we
ask ourselves: “Is that all there is?” What is there in
life that is calling me to something greater? There is a well
known book by a Zen Master who came to the United States, Shunryu
Suzuki, entitled, “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind.”
This is an invitation to always come back to that initial
question: what is this all about? This is beginner’s mind.
Another person who is of reference to us in understanding this
first picture of the Ten Oxherding Pictures is the Second
Patriarch in China, Hui-k’o, pronounced Eka in Japanese.
“Wisdom Fruit” is the literal meaning of his name. The
Second Patriarch went to visit Bodhidharma, the monk who was
reputed to be a sage from the Western Regions. There was this
person from the Western parts (India), a foreigner, a stranger in
China. He had settled in some place near a forest and he had been
sitting there and had been living his life as a hermit; just
living and spending most of his time sitting, meditating, facing
the wall of his cave.
His reputation grew around the neighboring villages, and so this young man--young, maybe in his early forties at that time--went to this sage and asked him. “Please tell me, what can I do with my life? My mind is not at ease; I am anxious about my life. My mind is not at rest, please set it at rest.” So there is something that made him very anxious or that somehow made him look for something more than what he was already doing at that time. It was a turning point in his life.
And so, Bodhidharma, as the story goes, asked him, “If
your mind is not at rest, bring that mind to me and I’ll set
it at rest.” And that was Bodhidharma’s way of inviting
him to take hold of that mind that was causing that anxiety or
that was in that state of anxiety, by following the way that we
are now taught to sit in the Zen tradition: to sit still in a
straight posture, breath in and breath out in a regular and
rhythmical way, both deeply and naturally, and let our minds
simply be at rest. Or let our mind be there so that we can
present it to Bodhidharma. And so, that’s what the Second
Patriarch tried to do. The punch line of the koan goes: “I
have tried all my best and I have looked for that mind and I have
realized that it is unreachable.”
* * *
And so, the answer of Bodhidharma as the koan
goes is, “There, I have given rest to your mind.” This
interchange is an invitation to those who are practicing to
actually see what was the experience of Eka or Hui-K’o, the
Second Patriarch,when he was finally able to realize “the
unreachable.” That’s the invitation for us. “I
have realized that it is unreachable.”
That is not a statement of despair or giving up the search, but
precisely a realization of something that points beyond oneself.
To point out, or rather exclaim from the bottom of one’s
being that “it is unreachable” is to simply admit that,
what I’m looking for is not within the realm of the finite.
That which we grasp not within the material domain but precisely
something that goes way beyond that. It is that which we can call
unreachable. Hui K’o states: “Now I have realized that;
now I am at peace.” That is the implication of Hui-K’o’s
answer--the experiential dimension of his discovery. It is not
just a denial of the need to go on
further, saying, “it’s unreachable so I won’t go
on from here.” But it is precisely a statement that its
unreachability is what I have realized, and so that gives me
peace.
This again brings us back to the first picture: what is that
which we are looking for in life? We are invited to look at that
particular point, and as I asked each of you who come to dokusan
for the first time (or, for some individuals maybe I need to keep
asking it), what is it that you seek in this practice? And that
is a question that invites each one to come back to that point
that leads us to seek the path that will open our eyes to who we
are.
So this is the invitation of the first picture: to again
search our minds and look for that precise point, so that we can
appreciate what propels us along the path. What is it that I am
seeking? Is it inner peace? Is it the solution to the question of
life and death? These will be cast in different ways depending on
our own personalities, or depending on our own way of seeing
ourselves in the spectrum of different psychological
characteristics and so on.
Well, it can be phrased in many ways, but the main thing that we
can say to describe it, is that it is something that invites us
to go beyond where we are right now. It is something that arouses
us from our slumber, always inviting us to reach for the
unreachable. And reach for an unreachable is not as this song,
“Impossible Dream” says, an impossible dream. But it is
precisely an invitation to take the next step from there.
* * *
So I’d like to just round off by saying that
this first picture is the picture that describes the beginning of
our search. It is a renewed invitation for all of us who are here
to take the next step. And what is the next step? Simply to be
here, in this present moment. We are invited to take Bodhidharma’s
advise to the Second Patriarch: “Bring me that mind that is
anxious and not at rest, and I will set it at rest for you.”
So let us continue letting ourselves be propelled by that anxious
mind that wants to seek peace. And this will enable us to take
the next step, that we may realize the unrealizable; that we may
reach the unreachable.
In Spanish there is a word to describe the starting-point of the
search: the word, “inquietud.” It is not what we would
translate in English as “inquietude.” But in Spanish,
“inquietud” refers to “something in me that leads
me to go on further.” It is not a negative term by any
means. If there is an “inquietud” in me, there is
something in me that is being aroused from its slumber, and leads
me to go on. So let us take that as an invitation. Whatever stage
we are, we are invited to just listen to that
“inquietud,” that dynamic power which invites us to
take the next step. A recollection of the beginning of our path
draws us out of our slumber and stupor; giving us a new sense of
freshness along the way.
(Editor’s Note: This is the second part of a series of
articles on The Ten Ox-Herding Pictures.)