In this post I’m continuing the journey through the Zen poem, Hsin Hsin Ming (click here to purchase your copy). You can read part 1 here. The Hsin Hsin Ming is such a beautiful piece of art. As with any work of art, it is subject to many interpretations. However, in reality, no interpretation is actually needed. When one reads or hears the Hsin Hsin Ming, one either instantly gets it, or doesn’t. And, when one “gets it”, this implies that the reader/hearer is presently in the state of being from which the Hsin Hsin Ming itself was written. In other words, it takes one to know one!
I said in part 1, most will attempt to read the Hsin Hsin Ming as something designed to be informative or instructive. They will approach the Hsin Hsin Ming with the “tell me what to do” approach. Of course, there are plenty of verses in the poem that seem to be instructive, telling the reader what to do. However, the poem is quick to dash those hopes of doing upon the rocks over and over again. For example, in the passage I’m reading today, it says, “When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity
your very effort fills you with activity.”
So, it turns out that the Hsin Hsin Ming is a descriptive poem. When one is in the same state of awareness from which the poem was written, one instantly and intuitively knows what every word of the poem means, by way of experience rather than conditioned interpretation.
The Way is Perfect
The poem continues,
The Way is perfect like vast space
where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.
Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject
that we do not see the true nature of things.
Live neither in the entanglements of outer things,
nor in the inner feelings of emptiness.
Be serene in the oneness of things
and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.
When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity
your very effort fills you with activity.
As long as you remain in one extreme or the other,
you will never know Oneness.
Those who do not live in the single Way
fail in both activity and passivity,
assertion and denial.
To deny the reality of things is to miss their reality;
to assert the emptiness of things
is to miss their reality.
The more you talk and think about it,
the further astray you wander from the truth.
Stop talking and thinking
and there is nothing you will not be able to know.
Beyond the Words
Perfect and imperfect. We use these words so often. The Hsin Hsin Ming itself uses these words, because words are what we have to convey ideas and thought. But, words are very much like scalpels. They slice and dice by their very existence. When I use the word “one”, I immediately imply not one. If I were to say that reality is nondual, I imply the concept of duality, creating a separation between two ideas. The illusion of separation is inescapable when using words.
This is why so many of the “sages” preferred silence over the use of words, and only used words when necessary. Even St. Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words.” After some sort of enlightening experience, Thomas Aquinas himself denounced all that he had ever written and said in the midst of his largest work, “I can write no more. All that I have hitherto written seems to me nothing but straw.” Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj ironically spoke about silence being the language of truth and only using words as a lesser form of conveyance for those that need them. Lao Tzu writes in the Tao Te Ching, “The Tao that can be told/spoken is not the eternal Tao.”
Even the Hsin Hsin Ming ends by exclaiming, “Words! The way is beyond language, for in it there is no yesterday, no tomorrow, no today.”
Where Lao Tzu goes on to write a book about the Tao experience after stating the impossibility of putting the Tao into words, the Hsin Hsin Ming describes the experience and then exclaims the impossibility of putting it into words.
Illusory Words
What does this actually mean? It means that in the experience of absolute identification with existence itself, with the single flow of cosmic energy, with the universe, with the Tao, with the ocean of being, with what cannot be named…, words have no reality; not in the way we think of reality. Words are part of the illusion of separation. They don’t exist as separate things, thoughts, sounds.
From within this experience “perfect” and “imperfect” lose their meaning altogether. Ideals of perfection are obliterated. This experience is beyond ALL human concepts, ALL human thought. The very idea of putting anything into words becomes utterly ridiculous. They “seem to me nothing but straw.”
Where many see the absurdity of using words and give them up altogether in some sort of vow of silence, there are others who see the use of words as the dance of existence, the flow of cosmic energy, and the waves of the ocean of being, and let them flow as part of the single process that they are without effort, without judgment, without strain.
The Play of Words
The Hsin Hsin Ming is just this. Seng-ts’an’s play of words is none other than the flowing cosmic energy of all things. If this sounds spectacular and smacks of a sense of the religious idea of divine inspiration, let me correct that now by stating that your play of words, too, are none other than the flowing cosmic energy of all things, whatever they may be. In fact, to stop the temptation to think of even your own words as the words of divine god, let me take it to the furthest point and say with the zen master Yunmen in his response to the question “What is the Buddha?”, the Buddha is “a dried turd.”
Seng ts’an’s words, your words, Seng ts’an himself, you yourself, me, your pet, your phone, the trees, and even shit, it is all Existence itself, cosmic energy, the universe, the Tao, god, the ocean of being. Nothing sacred. Everything sacred. Beyond the idea of sacred. Beyond the words. Beyond concept.
The one who knows this plays with words, just as Seng ts’an, just as I am doing now.
Serenity in Oneness
When one lives in this state of awareness one experiences the serenity of oneness. “Be serene in the oneness of things.” This is the bliss spoken of by those know it. This is the bliss, the serenity, that religions promise, yet can never provide. This serenity emerges from the depths of self-nature. It doesn’t come from anywhere outside. It doesn’t actually come from anywhere at all! It is always…not here, not there…it IS…always. Just as we, human beings, are only capable of hearing certain sounds, or seeing certain colors, or experiencing certain dimensions, serenity is beyond the capability of experience for the ego.
The ego is none other than the illusion of separation. These are one and the same. Ego exists in the unreality of separation. Apart from the illusion, a “separate” ego doesn’t exist. Apart from the “separate” ego, the illusion doesn’t exist. With the transcendence of the belief in the separate ego, serenity, bliss, emerges and becomes the experience underlying all else.
Activity and Passivity
In this serenity one is not active, one is not passive, one simply and blissfully is. This isness is beyond activity and passivity, and is the flow of energy that is perceived as activity and inactivity. These are “the extremes” that are perceived without the awareness of oneself as “Oneness”.
The ego thinks, “I am active” or “I am passive”, and continues to operate at all times in these extremes. The awakened one flows as all that happens of itself and has not a thought of being active or being passive. The awakened one knows oneself as all that is perceived to be active or passive. Once again, the concepts are transcended.
Transcending Spirituality
Ultimately, even the concepts of spiritual and unspiritual, along with all the facets of spiritual language, are moved beyond as all becomes one inseparable whole. To speak of spirituality is to miss reality. “To deny the reality of things is to miss their reality; to assert the emptiness of things is to miss their reality.”
The Chinese Zen master Wei-hsin said, “Before I had studied Zen for thirty years, I saw mountains as mountains, and rivers as rivers. When I arrived at a more intimate knowledge, I came to the point where I saw that mountains are not mountains, and rivers are not rivers. But now that I have got its very substance, I am at rest. For it’s just that I see mountains once again as mountains, and rivers once again as rivers.”
Before Zen Wei-hsin saw mountains and rivers in the ordinary, egoic, unremarkable way. During Zen study he saw mountains and rivers as empty forms, illusions to transcend and leave behind. He must have seen this as quite deep and spiritual. After study, however, he once again sees mountains and rivers from the most profound place of rest. Beyond something ordinary, beyond something spiritual. He sees all, including the mountains and rivers, as existence, or for him, Buddha nature. They aren’t illusions in the sense that they don’t exist, or have no reality, or are merely empty. The illusion is to see them in the ordinary way of separation. Once this third phase of Wei-hsin is understood, all that exists is the play of cosmic energy, even the ideas of spiritual and unspiritual.
Lost in Thought
Finally, Seng-ts’an says, “The more you talk and think about it, the further astray you wander from the truth. Stop talking and thinking and there is nothing you will not be able to know.”
We can be lost in thought about ordinary, everyday life, and we can be lost in thought about extraordinary, “spiritual” matters. To be lost in thought at all is to be caught in a trap. It isn’t about not thinking or having thoughts. The difference is between being lost in thought and being aware of thought and thinking. It isn’t about not having emotions or suppressing emotions or stopping emotions. The difference is between being lost in emotions and being aware of emotions. To be lost in these is to forget your true nature. To be aware of these is to realize they are merely the dance of cosmic energy, the ocean of being waving this way and that.
To stop talking and thinking doesn’t mean shut your mouth in a vow of silence or to somehow stop all brain activity. In Zen this is what is known as being a stone Buddha, which is no Buddha at all. To stop talking and thinking means exactly what I’ve been saying with the play of these words. Drop the idea of separation. Drop the extremes. Drop spiritual and unspiritual. Drop activity and passivity. Drop all distinctions and judgments, and watch all happen as the flow of Existence, “where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess”.
Your Play of Words
In the awareness of your true nature as the ocean of being, let your play of words proceed in sharing your experience while reading this post in the comments below or by reaching out to me via the contact form at the bottom of Welcome Home.
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