Dogen’s Treasury of the True Dharma Eye edited by Kaz Tanahashi: Treeness

Zahozhou was asked by a monk, “Does the cypress tree have buddha nature?”

Zhazhou answered, “It does.”

The monk said, “When does it become buddha?”

Zhazhou said, “When the sky falls to the ground.”

The monk said, “When does that happen?”

Zhazhou said: “When the cypress tree becomes buddha.”

This gives me a new appreciation of feeling like the sky is falling.  And since I  know the sky falls constantly, it must mean there is buddha nature constantly manifesting even in my fear-drenched world.  However, I don’t think that’s the real connection between the sky falling and the cypress tree becoming a buddha.

The resolution is in synchronous nature of Zhaozhou’s words: “When the sky falls to the ground” and “When the cypress tree become buddha.”

Dogen’s Treasury of the True Dharma Eye edited by Kaz Tanahashi: Miracles

Layman Pang said “Miracles are nothing other than fetching water and carrying firewood.”

Dogen, writing on miracles, points out that we conflate the extraordinary with the ordinary.  Miracles happen “three thousand times in the morning and eight hundred times in the evening.”  We can only attain the way through the power of miracles.  But the miracle is not what we tend to think it is.  At one level, it is the everyday-ness of getting on with life, meeting each moment and responding to what is required.  At a deeper level, it is the thread of our history, the true transmission from time immemorial.

(F)etching water is a great miracle.  The custom of fetching water and carrying firewood has not declined, as people have not ignored it.  It has come down from ancient times to today, and it has been transmitted from there to here.  Thus, miracles have not declined even for a moment.  Such are great miracles, which are no small matter.

I’m always amazed when I think of my practice as something new, something I have to “do” because I’ve been “doing” it for some years now.  The real miracle is that living a life of practice has not been ignored, it has come down to us from ancient times, silently and without fanfare.