Enlightenment Stories
Three Pillars of Zen * Gerta Ital * Ramana Maharshi devotee * Bobo-Roshi * A Snake Handler * Tukaram Maharaj
Seven Views from Three Pillars of Zen
From the enlightenment stories in Three Pillars of Zen by Phillip Kapleau, 1965One
At midnight I abruptly awakened. At first my mind was foggy, then suddenly that quotation flashed into my consciousness: "I came to realize clearly that Mind is no other than mountains, rivers, and the great wide earth, the sun and the moon and the stars." And I repeated it. Then all at once I was struck as though by lightning, and the next instant heaven and earth crumbled and disappeared. Instantaneously, like surging waves, a tremendous delight welled up in me, a veritable hurricane of delight, as I laughed loudly and wildly: "Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! There's no reasoning here, no reasoning at all! Ha, ha, ha!" the empty sky split in two, then opened its enormous mouth and began to laugh uproariously ... Shakyamuni and the patriarchs haven't deceived me!"Tell [the american] to vow to attain enlightenment though it take the infinite, the boundless, the incalcuble future.
Two
Hawklike, the roshi scrutinized me as I entered his room, walked toward him, prostrated myself, and sat before him with my mind alert and exhilarated ... "The universe is One," he began, each word tearing into my mind like a bullet. "The moon of Truth-" All at once the roshi, the room, every single thing disappeared in a dazzling stream of illumination and I felt myself bathed in a delicious, unspeakable delight ... For a fleeting eternity I was alone - I alone was ... Then the roshi swam into view. Our eyes met and flowed into each other, and we burst out laughing ...
"I have it! I know! There is nothing, absolutely nothing. I am everything and everything is nothing!"
[I] Feel fresh as a fish swimming in an ocean of cool, clear water after being stuck in a tank of glue ... and so grateful. Grateful for everything that has happened to me, grateful to everyone who encouraged and sustained me in spite of my immature personality and stubborn nature. But mostly I am grateful for my human body, for the privilege as a human being to know this Joy, like no other.
Three
One night during the summer of that year while single-mindedly devoting myself to the practice of my koan, Mu, I experienced a state in which I felt as though I were looking at the vast, utterly transparent sky, and the next moment was able to penetrate the world of Mu with an awareness that was clear and sharp.When we live inattentively we are apt to fall into partial discrimination. This is a state of mind in which egocentricity is fostered and human suffering enhanced. Therefore, whenever I become aware that I am relapsing, I remind myself that heaven and earth have the same root. Everything is One. The visual form of things is no different from the emptiness which is their essential nature.
Four
Abruptly the pains disappear, there's only Mu! Each and every thing is Mu. "Oh, it's this!" I exclaimed, reeling in astonishment, my mind a total emptiness. "Ting-a-ling, ting-a-ling" - a bell's ringing. How cool and refreshing! It impels me to rise and move about. All is freshness and purity itself. Every single object is dancing vividly, inviting me to look. Every single thing occupies its natural place and breathes quietly. I notice zinnias in a vase on the altar, an offering to Monju, the Bodhisattva of Infinite Wisdom. They are indescribably beautiful!Five
My mind was empty as an infant's as I listened to the roshi's lecture. He was reading from an ancient koan: "Not even a sage can impart a word about that Realm [of Silence] from which thoughts issue ... A piece of string is eternal and boundless ... The bare white Ox before you is pure, vivid ..."As the roshi spoke in a calm, quiet voice, I felt every one of his words filter into the deepest recesses of my mind ... All at once everything became sheer brilliance, and I saw and knew that I am the only One in the whole Universe! ... At last it dawned on me: there is Nothing to realize!
Six
Deeper and deeper I went ... My hold was torn loose and I went spinning ... To the center of the earth! To the center of the cosmos! To the Center. I was There. With the sound of the kinhin bell I suddenly knew.
I feel clean. I feel free. I feel ready to live each day with zest, by choice! I am delighted by the adventure of each moment.
I feel as though I have just awakened from a restless, disjointed dream. Everything looks different!
The world no longer rides heavily on my back. It is under my belt. I turned a somersault and swallowed it.
I am no longer restless. At last I have what I want.
Seven
... a warm spot began to grow in my abdomen, slowly spreading to my spine, and gradually creeping up the spinal column.
I was so physically exhausted I could scarcely speak. Imperceptibly my mind had slipped into a state of unearthly clarity and awareness. I knew, and I knew I knew.
Never before had the road been so roadlike, the shops such perfect shops, nor the winter sky so unutterably a starry sky. Joy bubbled up like a fresh spring.
The days and weeks that followed were the most deeply happy and serene of my life. There was no such thing as a "problem." Things were either done or not done, but in any case there was neither worry or consternation ... For the first time in my life I was able to move like the air, in any direction, free at last from the self which had always been such a tormenting bond to me.
... I suddenly felt as though I were being struck by a bolt of lightning, and I began to tremble ... "I'm dead! There's nothing to call me! It's an allegory, a mental image, a pattern upon which nothing was ever modeled." I grew dizzy with delight. Solid objects appeared as shadows, and everything my eyes fell upon was radiantly beautiful.
Gerta Ital
Excerpts from Gerta Ital's book, The Master, The Monks, and I, 1988Heaven and earth melted into one. I was, and I was not, both at the same time. Dissolved into the Void I experienced it as space, as formless space. But I was not the watcher, I was Being.
I am floating about as though my body were no longer subject to the law of gravity. I am wholly and completely "here", but my body feels as though it doesn't weigh anything at all, as though it had become transparent. And as I write these words I realize that this transparency extends to everything, not just to my body: my feelings, my consciousness, my spirit, everything is unbelieveably light, without being any less intense. In fact, now that the body feeling is gone my entire awareness, including the world of my emotions, has become so luminously sharp and cloudless - if this state were permanent it would be heaven on earth. ... It is combined with causeless joy, joy as a state unto itself, not joy 'about' anything.
There was a brief silence. Then he raised his hand and rang his bell. I staggered as I tried to get up, almost falling over. In the moment that his commands had penetrated the very center of my being, like bolts of lightning from another world, I had had an experience of satori.
My everyday consciousness disappeared and was transformed into a superconsciousness in which I was no longer "I" - I was one with the Roshi Buddha-Being sitting before me, and also with my surroundings and with space itself, which had been extended into infinity. Everything was one, and I was this One. ... I knew that I had already died. I had died to everyone and everything which had ever filled up my existence. ... This knowledge, ... was accompanied by indescribable bliss. ... it wasn't bliss about something, the unity itself was the bliss.
All of this took place in a matter of seconds. ... The realized and the realizer were not a duality, subject and object did not exist, everything was one single whole.
Selected thoughts and dialogues with the Roshi during Gerta's work on the koan "One Hand" (Roshi's dialogue in italics):
"How do you hear the voice of the One Hand?"
"There is no voice ..."
"There is no philosophical discussion in Zen! You must hear the sound!"
"How do you hear the voice of the One Hand?"
In reply I raised my right arm slightly, making a vigorous movement.
The Roshi simply rang his bell; that was his only answer.
"How do you hear the sound of the One Hand?"
"I hear it within myself."
"There is nothing there," he answered, without a moment's hesitation. "There is nothing 'within me.' Everything is one. Heaven, earth, man, this room. All is one!"
I had been sitting for many hours on end, with a few short breaks every now and then. My inner world was completely empty, even the thought of the One had completely disappeared. And then something happened, which had, in fact, already happened several times before, but it had never lasted for very long: my sense of myself as something "solid" disappeared. The barrier, if I may use this term to describe the physical body, had dropped away. ... I had dissolved completely. All that was left was Being as such, pure and unadulterated. I was one with Being itself, and thus with all existence.
I know that this sounds incredible, but it is actually not at all dramatic. It is a state which transcends all emotions and feelings, and it is at the same time indescribably blissful and peaceful. ... Peaceful bliss seems to be the original state of all things before they enter into the realm of Existence.
Returning from this state of unity is just as unsensational as entering it. In my case the beginning of this process of returning was always the first conscious mental awareness of the fact that I was in a state of unity in the first place. This awareness brought the first thought with it which was followed by a breath, and I would suddenly be a person of flesh and blood again, sitting there crosslegged on a thin cushion in the middle of the night.
One becomes aware of the fruits of the state of samadhi in small, everyday things. You begin to notice that your reactions to outward events, even if they are of a very personal nature, have become totally calm and relaxed. It is as though the core of one's being is no longer touched by anything, and as a result one finds oneself at peace. And this is a peace which can no longer be shattered by anything, and which is characterized by a sense of serene cheerfulness.
At the same time, however - and this is an experience which everyone who travels this path makes - one is completely alone from this moment onwards, for one has abandoned all of one's human bonds. ... One continues to play one's role as before, but from now on one is aware that one is playing.
"Nothing exists but the One", he said in a loud voice. "The Christians call it God. We say the One. Nothing else exists. You must forget yourself as an ego, as an individual. There is no Gerta Ital. There is only the One."
"How do you experience the One Hand?"
"The One is both the formless and the formed, and the One Hand is everything, I am the One Hand."
"There is no 'I'!" he cried, his voice like a metallic crack of thunder. "There is only the One!"
"There is no Gerta Ital! There is no Roshi! There is only the One!"
"What is your experience of the sound of the One Hand?"
"The One is sufficient unto itself, it lives its life in me - in all beings."
"There is no within. There is no without. There is only the One!"
... everything expanded into infinity and boundlessness. I am not quite sure whether 'boundlessness' is the right word. It is partly right and partly wrong. The main reason that it is wrong is that when we use the word we cannot help imagining 'something', however vague that something is, and that is a mistake. As far as I was concerned there was simply nothing. No vision, no ecstacy, nothing. ... there was nothing at all, and I too was nothing.
But this nothing only appeared to be nothing. In fact it was life itself and I had been devoured by this life, by that which is the All in One. And however hard one tries, there is simply no way of describing the experience of unity with this "all in One", it is indescribable, far beyond all words.
The Roshi realized what had happened the moment I walked into the sanzen room. I was trembling all over, and when I knelt down before him he asked me about the sound of the One Hand, in a very soft and gentle voice. My reply was completely incoherent. I stammered my experience of Unity in bits and pieces, my voice shaking, my body quaking and swaying to and fro as if I were about to collapse completely. He nodded, his face radiant. "Only One Hand!" he cried joyfully. "Only One Hand!"
"How are you?" he asked compassionately as I kneeled down in front of him. My response came immediately, without being interrupted by any thoughts: "Nothing" The Roshi burst into uproarious and hearty laughter ... "Be One Hand!"
Be a mountain, a river, a tree, a flower. Be one with all beings, then you will have the great all-embracing Love.
Devotee of Ramana Maharshi
I was, but I was neither the subject nor the object of this consciousness. I WAS this consciousness, which alone existed. There were no objects. The world was not, neither the body nor the mind -- no thought, no motion; time also ceased to exist. I alone existed and that I was consciousness itself, self-luminous and alone, without a second... Suddenly, and again without any break in my consciousness, I was brought back to my normal, ordinary consciousness.The Bobo-roshi
Han-san relates the following story [note: In Japanese, "bobo" is apparently a word for intercourse, and of course "roshi" means master]:
Bobo-roshi is a Zen master, but different. If you like I'll tell you what I know, but I don't know if it's all true; I only know about him by hearsay and I have only met him once. He seems to be an ordinary man but he laughs a lot and he has a very deep voice and he dresses strangely. He never wears the Zen robes but usually dresses in a simple kimono, like artists do, and sometimes he wears western clothes, jeans and a jersey, like you do. They say he has spent years in a Zen monastery, in the southern part of Kyoto. It's a severe monastery, the rules are applied very strictly, more strictly than here. For instance, I believe they get up at 2 a.m. every day. He is supposed to have been a very diligent monk, rather overdoing things even, making extra rules for himself and all that. But he didn't understand his koan and the master was hard on him; whenever he wanted to say something the master would pick up his bell and ring him out of the room. He was treated that way for years on end. He was doing extra meditation, sleeping in the lotus position, trying everything he could think of, but the koan remained as mysterious as ever. I don't know how long this situation lasted, six years, ten years maybe, but then he had enough. I don't think he even said goodbye, he just left, in ordinary clothes, with a little money he had saved, or which had been sent to him from home.
Now you must realize that he had been a monk a long time and didn't know anything about civilian life. He had never climbed the wall at night [i.e. sneaked out of the monastery as many did for less, umm, spiritual pursuits]. He was a real monk, sober, quiet, always in command of himself. And there he was, in a sunny street, in a busy city, thousands of people all about, all doing something, all going somewhere. He wandered about the city and found himself in the willow quarter, perhaps within an hour of leaving the monastery gate. In the willow quarter there are always women standing in their doors, or pretending to be busy in their gardens. One of the women called him, but he was so innocent that he didn't know what she wanted. He went to her and asked politely what he could do for her. She took him by the hand and led him into her little house. They say she was beautiful; who knows? Some of these women aren't beautiful at all but they are attractive in a way, or they wouldn't have any earnings.
She helped him undress - he must have understood then what was going on. She must have asked him for money and he must have given it to her. Then she took him to her bath, that's the custom here. Your shoulders are massaged and you are dried with a clean towel and they talk to you. Slowly you become very excited and when she feels you are ready she takes you to the bedroom. He must have been very excited after so many years of abstaining. At the moment he went into her he solved his koan. He had an enormous satori, one of those rare satoris which are described in our books, not a little understanding which can be deepened later but the lot at once, an explosion which tears you to pieces and you think the world has come to an end, that you can fill the emptiness of the universe in every possible sphere. When he left the woman he was a master.
from The Empty Mirror, by Janwillem van de Wettering, 1972
A Snake Handler
Nothing had to be given up except my own will. This was the moment. I didn't stop to think about it. I just gave in. I stepped forward and took the snake with both hands. Carl released it to me. I turned to face the congregation and lifted the rattlesnake up toward the light. It was moving like it wanted to get up even higher, to climb out of that church and into the air. And it was exactly as the handlers had told me. I felt no fear. The snake seemed to be an extension of myself. And suddenly there seemed to be nothing in the room but me and the snake. Everything else had disappeared. Carl, the congregation, Jim - all gone, all faded to white. And I could not hear the earsplitting music. The air was silent and still and filled with that strong, even light. And I realized that I, too, was fading into the white. I was losing myself by degrees, like the incredible shrinking man. The snake would be the last to go, and all I could see was the way its scales shimmered one last time in the light, and the way its head moved from side to side, searching for a way out. I knew then why the handlers took up serpents. There is power in the act of disappearing; there is victory in the loss of self. It must be close to our conception of paradise, what it's like before you're born or after you die.
I came back in stages, first with the recognition that the shouting I had begun to hear was coming from my own mouth. Then I realized I was holding a rattlesnake, and the church rushed back with all its clamor, heat, and smell.
from Salvation on Sand Mountain, by Dennis Covington, 1994
Tukaram Maharaj
... the imaginary distinction between unity and duality vanished. My sense of difference regarding space, time, and substance totally disappeared. There is no space, no time, no substance; there is no diversity. My Self appeared as the universe, and the universe, which we call objective reality, appeared as my Self. There is no outer world. Only the Absolute exists.