Finishing the ritual sharing of the green tea, the Master put down his cup, picked up his staff and pointed at my face. The gesture was so fast and perfectly executed, I failed to see where the staff started and ended up a mere inch in front of my nose as if it had materialized from a seemingly nowhere into a sudden somewhere.
He said: “How do you produce the Self that is immune against any and all conditions?. Quickly, answer me now, lest the devil enters this house!”
I replied: “I do not know, Master. This body and mind I have at the present being, is like a great weight on my mind, day and night, as such, it is vulnerable against any and all conditions given sufficient time for each effect to play out within its limited sensory field.”
The Master put down his staff, smiled and said; “Engulfed in the illusion of space and time I can see that you think it is only a matter of probability whenever each condition plays out its causation based on an original distortion of the profound dharma. Why are you still holding on to this mess you have conjured up since beginningless time?”
I replied: “I have forgotten the entry point and cannot find a way out. The self you speak of eludes – me. ”
The Master retorted; “And yet, using that pronoun as an insult against it, there it is before you, compassionate and ready to serve in all its glory, with all its wisdom and all its powers as described in all sutras. Why can´t you see it and much more, use it to ascend above and beyond this conditional illusion?”
I replied: “Avidya still reigns before me, Master. My wrong view of the path is unbearable as it produces no spiritual nourishment but dry bones, and a great thirst remaining unquenchable.”
The Master continued; ” I see you have realized that he, or she, who cannot produce the self that is immune to any and all conditions has directly failed to realize the way and thus cannot be said to practice the great dharma as propagated by all Buddhas. You have come to know the devil of all illusions yet you refuse to renounce him. Why is this?”
I replied; This path seemed and still seems so vast to me and yet whenever I try to walk on it, my mind feels like touching a razor’s edge. Whether I choose left, or right, back or forth, I cut myself and my Spirit loses sight of the way in great pain. How can I produce what I cannot see, hear, smell, touch, think [false knowing], or imagine, no less?”
The Master raised his staff and pointed upwards; ” The path before you is perfect in its radiance and impossible to miss once you negate the false and allow the pure to emerge. This purity I speak off cannot be grasped by words and hence much less through thoughts. This purity means you – in charge of your presently willed Avidya, has to surrender in your heart [Hsin] to its PURE presence and forego your own delusional desires. Once allowed to spread within, and outward, the pure will suffuse your being, extend your horizon of gnosis to a reality of no limits, enabling thus a right view of the Self I asked you to produce. Remember, where there is Unborn Mind, and in truth (Dharmakaya), there is nothing but Unborn Mind before you, purity is returned to the awakened and hence the Unborn, perfectly imageless in its singular beauty of non-perception, increases in presence, power, and non-differentiation of one´s Heart/Mind (Hsin) wisdom (Prajna). This final stage is what produces the Self that is immune to any and all conditions. Am I making myself clear?”
I replied; “In words, yes, Master, you are most surely making yourself clear, but I fail to transcend or penetrate the conceptual overlay covering the unborn, and hence I continuously fail to produce a self that is immune to any and all conditions.”
The Master looked at me: “Then you do know that all that remains before you is nothing but ignorance, distress, pain, death and the greater pain of being reborn into something you cannot prevent or control by this spiritual ignorance of being unable to produce a self that is immune to any and all conditions?”
I replied; “This might seem so at the moment, Master, but something is ignited within me [gotra] and I sense a subtle positionless light before me, leading me to a singular point where what you asked initially, now might be a possibility gestated out of a greater probability.”
The Master replied; “Though per the reliance on a deeprooted habit-energy you remain in the conditional, and even refer to it by the same cause thereby acknowledging the conditional illusion of expedient means [Dharmachakra], I can see what you mean. Be on your way to the Main Hall. I will soon join you and perform the proper rituals for your swift realization.”
Tozen