Hakuin Quotes

Great works of art in all cultures succeed in capturing within the constraints of their form both the pathos of anguish and a vision of its resolution. Take, for example, the languorous sentences of Proust or the haiku of Basho, the late quartets and sonatas of Beethoven, the tragicomic brushwork of Sengai or the daunting canvases of Rothko, the luminous self-portraits of Rembrandt and Hakuin. Such works achieve their resolution not through consoling or romantic images whereby anguish is transcended. They accept anguish without being overwhelmed by it. They reveal anguish as that which gives beauty its dignity and depth.

A soldier came to Hakuin and asked "Is there really a paradise and a hell?" "Who are you?" inquired Hakuin. "I am a samurai," the warrior replied. "You, a samurai!" exclaimed Hakuin. "What kind of ruler would have you as his guard? Your face looks like that of a beggar!" The soldier became so angry that he began to draw his sword, but Hakuin continued. "So you have a sword! Your weapon is probably as dull as your head!" As the soldier drew his sword Hakuin remarked "Here open the gates of hell!" At these words, the samurai, perceiving the discipline of the master, sheathed his sword and bowed. "Here open the gates of paradise," said Hakuin

If you forget yourself, you become the universe.

Not knowing how near the truth is, we seek it far away.

A bird gives a cry–the mountains quiet all the more.’ 49 (This is also perhaps the real meaning behind Hakuin Ekaku’s famous eighteenth-century-BCE koan ‘What is the Sound of the Single Hand?’: it is an invitation to attend to the silence, the emptiness.

It’s like chopping down a huge tree of immense girth. You won’t accomplish it with one swing of your axe. If you keep chopping away at it, though, and do not let up, eventually, whether it wants to or not, it will suddenly topple down. When that time comes, you could round up everyone you could find and pay them to hold the tree up, but they wouldn’t be able to do it. It would still come crashing to the ground…. But if the woodcutter stopped after one or two strokes of his axe to ask the third son of Mr. Chang, “Why doesn’t this tree fall?” And after three or four more strokes stopped again to ask the fourth son of Mr. Li, “Why doesn’t this tree fall?” he would never succeed in felling the tree. It is no different for someone who is practicing the Way. —ZEN MASTER HAKUIN

Suddenly,” Hakuin promised his students, “unexpectedly your teeth sink in. Your body will pour with cold sweat. At the instant, it will all become clear.” The word for this was satori—an illuminating insight when the inscrutable is revealed, when an essential truth becomes obvious and inescapable.

Four Universal (Bodhisattva) Vows: “Sentient beings are numberless, I vow to save them; the deluding passions are inexhaustible, I vow to destroy them; the Dharma gates are manifold, I vow to know them; the Buddha Way is supreme, I vow to master it.

In a small fishing village in Japan, there lived a young, unmarried woman who gave birth to a child. Her parents felt disgraced and demanded to know the identity of the father. Afraid, she refused to tell them. The fisherman she loved had told her, secretly, that he was going off to seek his fortune and would return to marry her. Her parents persisted. In desperation, she named Hakuin, a monk who lived in the hills, as the father. Outraged, the parents took the infant girl up to his door, pounded until he opened it, and handed him the baby, saying "This child is yours; you must care for it!" "'Is that so?" Hakuin said, taking the child in his arms, waving good-bye to the parents. A year passed and the real father returned to marry the woman. At once they went to Hakuin to beg for the return of the child. "We must have our daughter," they said. "Is that so?" said Hakuin, handing the child to them.

Beneath great doubt there is great awakening. —HAKUIN1

Priest Ch’ien-feng addressed his assembly: “This Dharma-body has three kinds of sickness and two kinds of light. Can any of you clarify that?” Yün-men came forward and said, “Why doesn’t the fellow inside the hermitage know what’s going on outside?” Ch’ien-feng roared with laughter. “Your student still has his doubts,” Yün-men said. “What are you thinking of?” said Ch’ien-feng. “That’s for you to clarify,” said Yün-men. “If you’re like that,” Ch’ien-feng said, “I’d say you’re home free.

It is into these two schools that Hakuin’s Zen is divided at present. The teaching of the Takuju School is characterized by the mysterious symbolism of words, whereas that of the Inzan School is reputed for the severity of its dynamic action.

However, as we sit in meditation, to be authentically aware of our selflessness and realize our true selves at the same time we should not let ourselves be agitated by the operation of Mana-vijnana. Hence, it is said, “If you meet the Buddha, kill him; if you meet your ancestor, kill him.” We must stir up our courage to be free from all the phenomena which arise to disturb our meditation. Makyo will then unconditionally surrender and perish and we will be admitted to the state of mind comparable to that layer of ice 25 million miles thick as described by Hakuin.

As will be on display throughout this book, Zen has all along been an ironically "iconoclastic tradition." Some of its canonical stories include Bodhidharma (fifth–sixth centuries) telling Emperor Wu that he has gained no karmic merit from all of his meritorious activities, and that the most sacred truth is that that there is nothing sacred; depictions of Huineng (seventh century) tearing up the sutras; Linji (ninth century) encouraging his students to "kill the Buddha"; Ikkyū (fifteenth century) writing erotic poetry about his steamy love affair during the last decade of his life with a blind musician; and "an older woman of Hara" (seventeenth century) boldly retorting "Hey, you aren't enlightened yet!" after she told the eminent master Hakuin of her luminously enlightening experience and he tested her by saying that "Nothing can shine in your asshole. " Contemporary Zen Buddhists should feel free to carry on this irreverent and iconoclastic tradition of destroying false idols of Zen—but only insofar as they have sufficiently imbibed its true spirit and are doing so in a genuine effort to keep it alive and let it thrive.

However important a role lineage has played in the Zen tradition, it has never been a historically based religion in the same sense as are the Abrahamic faiths. To begin with, it should be pointed out that "Dharma transmission" in Zen is really a matter of "recognition" of spiritual awakening, not the literal transference of anything, such as a robe and bowl, an esoteric teaching or ritual, or even a secret handshake or bowing technique. What is most important to practitioners is awakening itself, not the recognition they receive, however important the latter may be for the purposes of establishing teaching credentials and preserving institutional continuity. After all, one of the greatest Japanese Zen masters and the revitalizer of the Rinzai Zen institution, Hakuin, apparently never officially received a "seal of certification" (inka shomei) from any of the teachers he studied under, even though all Rinzai Zen masters today trace their transmission lineage back to and through him.

Master Hakuin emphasizes kufu in movement or practical training in Zen. He says, “To practice Zen in movement is superior to doing so in the stillness of meditation.

think that what Master Hakuin means by his words “beyond dualism” is that it is not only we, who transcend such playful dualism, but also all other things in their own no self-nature that are in operation according to their selfless essence.